If you could only own one lens for the rest of your life...

Al Downie wrote:

If you could only own ONE lens for the rest of your life, and money was no object, and anything was possible and all lenses were equally sharp, which would you choose?

In a fantasy world, I suppose a 24-70F1.8 Zoom that was as good as the Canon24-70F2.8mkII optically but weighed as much as the Canon 24-70F4 Zoom and had IS like the 24-70F4.  That's not too unrealistic is it?

In the real world, with lenses currently available (or almost), I would be hard pressed to choose between the Canon 24-70F2.8mkII, the Sigma35Art, the Canon 50L, and the new Sigma50Art. The versatility of Zooms is undeniable, but I am a fast prime guy at heart.

Al Downie wrote:

If you could only own ONE lens for the rest of your life, and money was no object, and anything was possible and all lenses were equally sharp, which would you choose?

it will have to be canon 24-70 2.8L II. my fantasy lens would be canon 200 f1.8L, if i could get my hands on it

cheerz.

I voted 16-600 because if I could have ONLY one lens (the rule of the game you defined) I would value versatility over IQ.  I want to go wide AND capture the birds.  And the f4+ aperature would not be a problem if you shoot high ISO and have a good raw converter.  Obviously I'm not a pixel peeper......

JAH

I'd kill myself.

If you could have only one testicle, which one would it be?

Dimes wrote:

Canon 8-600 f1.2 IS of course!

Dimes, i didn't say that as a joke, there is such a lens but canon made very few of them. it'll cost a lot of cash if you are lucky enough to find one canon came out with 200mm f2.0 as replacement for 200mm f1.8 a few years ago. just in case if you didn't know

cheerz.

I love primes.  I shoot with a 50mm lens on my camera most of the time.  But what is great about primes is that you can own several of them and use them in situations calling for different focal lengths.  If I was limited to only one lens for the rest of my life, that would necessitate a zoom lens.  Even a mid range zoom is rather limited for a single lens for the rest of one's life, but for me that would be the range I would go for.  24mm is just wide enough and while 70mm isn't as long as I would like, it would have to do.  Also, the f/2.8 aperture is better than the f/5.6 of the superzoom, and I don't really need the telephoto end.  I like wide angles but not enough to limit myself to an UWA zoom for the rest of my life.  So I guess this question is a bit extreme and unrealistic, of course, but given the constraint of 1 lens for the rest of my life I'd have to go with a 24-70mm f/2.8, even though I don't even own one of those!

If you could only own ONE lens for the rest of your life, and money was no object, and anything was possible and all lenses were equally sharp, which would you choose?

When you throw out conditions like "anything is possible" you just beg for answers like this...

A universal mount 1-infinity mm f/0.1 with 1000 stop IS, IQ that is 700x greater at all focal lengths and apertures than any other lens ever imagined with an OTF (On The Fly) size and weight adjustment (changes size, shape, and weight according to your thoughts - instantaneously). All for the low, low price of free.

Next time, I'd recommend a reality component to your poll lol

Al Downie wrote:

If you could only own ONE lens for the rest of your life, and money was no object, and anything was possible and all lenses were equally sharp, which would you choose?

I would choose to pick a different hobby.

Jonathan Brady wrote: "A universal mount 1-infinity mm f/0.1 with 1000 stop IS, IQ that is 700x greater at all focal lengths and apertures than any other lens ever imagined with an OTF (On The Fly) size and weight adjustment (changes size, shape, and weight according to your thoughts - instantaneously). All for the low, low price of free."

Hah! Sadly though, in my book, that's still a zoom and therefore inferior in every way to a good prime.

Maybe you missed the part where I said it has IQ 700x better than any lens (including primes, obviously) ever imagined. And since it can change weight, size, and shape to whatever you want, instantly, it can be the same size, weight, and shape of any prime you want!

What else ya got?

Just messin' around