The Wild Photographer

My Thoughts on the 24-70mm vs. 24-105mm Class of Lenses

• Episode 56

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These lenses are no doubt your workhorses in any sort of photography. However, it can be a little complex deciding which one to invest in and have as part of your trusty camera kit.

In this episode, I go into detail on what makes each lens great, and why you might want to choose one over the other depending on your style and needs.

Takeaways

  • The 24-70mm lens is a favorite among professionals for its sharpness and low-light capabilities.
  • F2.8 aperture is excellent for portrait and low-light photography.
  • The 24-105mm lens offers more versatility with its extended range.
  • Weight and size are significant factors for travel photographers (feather in the cap for 24-105mm).
  • The 24-70mm lens has better resale value due to its popularity.
  • Consider your primary photography style when choosing a lens--do you need f/2.8?
  • The 24-105mm is more affordable and lighter, making it a great option for many.
  • Image stabilization can influence the choice between the two lenses.
  • Ultimately, the best lens is the one that fits your needs and is with you when you need it. 
  • If you don't need f/2.8 for your landscape/walking-around lens, save the money, size, and weight and go for the 24-105mm.

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Court Whelan (00:00)
Welcome back folks. Another episode here on The Wild Photographer. I'm Court Whelan your host, and today I'm talking about my thoughts on the 24-70mm vs. 24-105mm class of lenses. Now, for starters, I realize that not every single camera manufacturer has the exact equivalent of these two ranges. For instance, know Canon has 24-105mm, but Nikon and or Sony has 24-120mm.

The differences are going to be very, very similar and you do have indeed two distinct classes of lenses here.

they're indispensable. They're like one of my most used lenses for landscape travel, nature, and even a good bit of wildlife. This kind of wide angle zoom range. It's not going to be your big beefy telephoto. It's not going to be your ultra wides, but they're just such a sweet spot in the middle of that 24 to 70 or that 24 to 105 that one or the other is indispensable. And I have to say, I,

would be surprised if many folks out there have both. You really do kind of pick one or the other. And there are some major pros and cons to each. and I basically just want to lay it out all on the table today because it's something that I've wrestled with of, you know, which one do I get? Which one do I, do I want to upgrade to one or the other based on my needs? And I just want to give you my candid thoughts on what goes into my thinking.

choosing the 24 to 70 versus 24 to 105, mainly from like an acquiring standpoint. I'm not really choosing one or the other based on a photo trip or an assignment. I have one, I'll tell you which one in a bit, but it's really more of just the broader picture of which one is right for me, not right for the day because I don't have both, but which one is right for me and you know, by proxy, which one might be right for you.

OK, so before I get in the episode, big thank you to our sponsors of the episode today and the podcast in general. First up, it's art storefronts. They are a really amazing outfit. They are an all in one one stop shop photo promo photo feature photo website company. They set up a photo website for you based on your own artwork. They do all the marketing promo. They do.

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Next up, lensrentals.com, longtime sponsor of the podcast, an incredible rental tool for renting lenses and even camera bodies and other accessories should you need. And as I always say, a great way to try out a lens to see if you want to invest in it, especially these bigger fancier lenses, like I'm talking about today, going to lensrentals.com and using wild photographer 15 as a promo code will get you 15 % off.

So if you do not have one of these two lenses I'm talking about today, but you're thinking about investing in them, obviously this episode is here to help you choose which one, but sometimes just renting it and giving it a try is one of the best ways. And a super cool thing about lensrentals.com is they will actually allow you to purchase the used lens that you have in your possession, in your mitts, because you might just really like it and not want to trade it in. And they give you a really very, very fair used lens price. So it's kind of cool.

You try before you buy or just rent it for your next photo trip and it's a great, great asset. Okay, so getting into the episode, the lenses we're talking about today, the 24 to 70 and or the 24 to 105 range,

They're just part of a super important class of lenses. And, you in my opinion, for your general purpose, walking around lens, a great landscape lens, perhaps the best landscape lens, excellent travel photography lens, and in some cases, really darn good, very flexible portrait lens. These are really the only two choices out there. Now, obviously, I'm not getting into some of the prime portraiture lenses. I'm not talking about ultra wide angle lenses because those are more niche. I'm talking about the two lenses, one of which

is probably gonna be on my camera like 50 % of any photo trip that I'm doing out there.

which one you choose very, very much comes down to, well, no surprise, what you want and what you need for your own purposes. So I'm gonna be constantly talking about the pros and cons in relation to what you might be doing and what you might need or want out of things like aperture, weight, even price or packability, size of the lens, et cetera, et cetera. So let's dive into the first one here, which is the 24 to 70.

Again, amazing class of lens. I will be totally honest, this is probably what you're gonna see most pros have as their dedicated zoom wide angle lens. The pros in terms of the positives is that, know, 24 to 70, it's incredibly versatile. It is a very, very sharp class of lens. But then the reality, the biggest part of all this is that most 24 to 70s come at an F 2.8 aperture. And this is where...

the whole thing just comes together. Like F 2.8 is a game changer for low light photography. It's excellent for portraits because it creates great background blur. ⁓ When I talk about low light, this could be anywhere from astrophotography to blue hour photography to, you know, wildlife photography at dawn and dusk, when you want to get those wildlife shots in the landscape. And it's fairly portable. You know, these are small lenses. One of the big things you'll hear coming up is that

The 24 to 70 versus the 24 105 is the size and the weight, but nevertheless, it's still a small lens, especially compared to like the 70-200 the 100 to 500 or any of the big primes, even like an 85 millimeter F 1.2 is a pretty darn big lens. But this gives you that range and 70 millimeters is a really nice tight shot for a lot of uses. It gives you framing for composition in your landscape shots, framing for people shots, framing for wildlife shots, but then 24 millimeters.

is really darn wide. And then the last thing about the 24-70 that I particularly like is that because it is frankly probably a little bit more of pro, option between these two lenses, it has really great resale value. So you're gonna find a buyer for that lens if you decide you need to upgrade or move on from it or just cash in for something different. It's got great resale value. Everybody wants the 2.8. The 24-70 is that iconic

classic range and spectrum. So, highly recommend that lens for those reasons. But there are some cons and let's talk about that. So, it's gonna be a heavier lens because of that f2.8. Getting that speed compared to the 24-105, which is generally an f4, the 24-70, in some cases might be twice as heavy. It might be a little bit bigger. And of course, it's a lot more money, to be totally honest. Like thinking from the Canon spectrum here,

The 24 to 105 is like $1,000 and the 24 to 70 is like $2,000. And to be totally honest, you know, cause we're going to move into the pros of the 24 to 105, there isn't much of a difference in terms of quality of shots. Generally the 24 to 70 is a little bit sharper, but from every test that I've done, from every article I've read, it is so marginal that you really, it kind of all boils down.

to the F 2.8. So talking about what you need this lens for, if you are a wedding photographer and you're doing inside shots or even low light shots, if it's evening and dusk hour for party time at a wedding, yeah, it's gonna be hugely important. For nature and wildlife, it definitely has some huge pros, but oftentimes when we're using a landscape lens and doing landscape photography, we're not shooting at 2.8. ⁓ Yes, for wildlife, that's

horrendously awesome. Horrendous, weird choice of words, but it's a really, really good choice for zoom telephoto lenses. But for wide angle stuff, yes, it's going to help with astrophotography, night photography, Northern Lights photography. But in general, when we're photographing, even at dawn and dusk, like we'd prefer to be on a tripod and shooting at f eight or f 11. So I'll be I'll be totally frank right here is that that's the reason I have personally the 24 to 105.

is that 2.8 would be nice. It is a game changer for portraiture. It's a game changer for people photography. But to me, that extra bit of range, it's even more versatile with the 24-105 that that is my go-to each and every time. So let's talk about the pros of the 24-105. Well, it is a more versatile lens. That difference between 70-105, I gotta say, it helps me tremendously in framing my shots. It gives me the ability...

If I see wildlife, like 105 millimeters, gosh, that's like a four times, five times telephoto or zoom as you might refer to it. And that, that gives me some reach, you know, and 70 millimeters is no slouch, but 105 is even better. So it's a more versatile lens. Like I said, it is still incredibly sharp. You know, the pro version of these lenses, in general, you're not going to see a whole lot of difference. These 24 to 105 millimeters are F4.

as the maximum aperture, you cannot go down to 2.8. That means that you invariably at your biggest aperture, your brightest amount of aperture, it's gonna let in half as much light. It's a big deal, it's a big number, but like I said, generally when I'm shooting my 24 to 70 or 24 to 105 range, when I'm shooting in that range,

I'm already looking at F4, F5.6, F8 because I generally do want everything in focus. It's lighter, it's more affordable. Like I said, it's half the price. Maybe you have the money for the bigger lens, but maybe instead of going for $2,000 for the 24-70, to have that F2.8, you go for the $1,000 24-105 and that extra money, you go to getting some really cool prime lens or maybe an ultra wide to give you more versatility or maybe you put it into

a 70 to 200 millimeter lens. So being affordable is a really great thing, obviously, but probably more than that for me personally is it is a lot lighter. It's a bit smaller as well. So for someone that's constantly packing a camera bag, constantly flying around the world, constantly needing to minimize weight and or bring additional lenses in place of what would be a higher weight lens, it's about half the weight. And that is a really, really big deal to me.

It also feels really good in the hand. It feels really good if you have it on a shoulder strap. It's a little bit lighter and that does make a difference when you're toting this thing around all day every day. But there are cons to it. ⁓ You know, F2.8, if you go for the 24 to 70 is so nice. It is just such a lovely thing to have twice as much light at the biggest aperture. ⁓

you will get a probably a little bit less resale value. And of course resale value is proportional to how much you paid for it, you know, in the marketplace, but you might even have a little bit more trouble finding a buyer because it's not quite as much of a pro lens. But I gotta say, as you know, ⁓ a professional photographer myself, I love this lens. I love the reach. I love the lighter weight. I love that it's a little bit easier in the pocketbook. And while there are definitely times each and every time I'm out that I would

like to have twice as much light with an F 2.8. I'd like to have that blur. I'm finding that camera bodies these days with their incredible ISO range, frankly, I'd rather take that thousand dollars and put it into a slightly better camera body like upgrading from a cropped frame to a full frame to get that higher ISO if you need more light.

So really when we think about the takeaways of this, it comes down to, you gotta come to grips with whether you really need f2.8 and how often you plan to be shooting at f2.8. So if you're considering these lenses, truly think about it and think how often am I going to be shooting at f2.8. If you're getting this because you do a lot of night photography, a lot of astrophotography, then awesome, that's fantastic. You should probably go for the 2.8.

But if you're thinking this is more of my daytime walking around lens, I do a lot of landscape stuff, but I'm using a tripod most of the time, I would prefer to be at f5.6 or f8, then you're paying a pretty big premium for f2.8, both in space, size and weight, but also the actual finances when it comes down to it. The other thing to think about when comparing these two is what else is in your kit? If this is going to be your main portrait lens, if you do some people photography, some cultural photography,

You know, you might want to have something that has that shallower depth of field. F 2.8 is a beautiful blur, but maybe you have a nifty 50, like a 50 millimeter F 1.4, F 1.8, and that's what you throw on your camera when you do cultural photography. Maybe when you want to do low light photography of landscapes, you have a 70 to 200 F 2.8. You know, I think as long as you have something that has a very fast aperture, we'll call it something with like, you know, that F 2.8 and lower in terms of F number.

then maybe you don't need the f2.8 in this lens. But if you are using this as your one stop shop, maybe you don't even plan to get into wildlife photography, but just one lens that does it all, you don't plan to change out lenses, then the f2.8 is indeed gonna be probably more versatile than that additional 105 millimeters in a lot of cases. The other thing to think about, and this goes into your exact make and model and brand and everything, is are both these lenses

image stabilized or do they have vibration reduction or whatever your brand of camera might call that little stabilization device that's in the lens. Nowadays on most new mirrorless systems, both of these lenses are stabilized, meaning you have a stabilization in the 24 to 70 and in the 24 105. However, if you're trying to compare apples to apples and you find that one of them does not come with image stabilization, that all of sudden sends me in the direction.

of whichever one has the stabilization. Back in the day, the 24 to 105 class was the one with stabilization and the 24 to 70 did not have stabilization. So that was even a further feather in the cap of the 24 to 105. However, nowadays, at least with the Canon system and I know with Sony and others, you do have that image stabilization in the 24 to 70. So they're becoming a bit more equal in that. But nevertheless, I do want to point out if one is not image stabilized, that definitely sends me in the direction of which one is.

then you kind of have to think about like, what are you more likely to reach for and use? Are you the kind of person that just wants to go a little bit lighter weight, a little bit smaller? Maybe you're doing a lot of hiking trips. Maybe you're having to carry this camera around a lot all day every day and you already plan on changing lenses. A smaller lighter lens is gonna be huge for you. At the end of the day, know, the very best camera, the very best lens is the one that you have with you and the one that you use.

So you have to think from a little bit a practical standpoint as well as what are you more likely to reach for and use? Do you just become so enamored by the F2.8 that it gives you creativity options that you wouldn't otherwise have and therefore you're likely, more likely to bring that out with you on a hike, then great, that's the direction. If you're thinking instead, gosh, I already have a heavy camera system, any more weight is just gonna force me to keep this camera back home more.

then probably go for the lighter direction, which is invariably the 24-105. And like I mentioned, the final thing, the final takeaway here is, are you looking for one lens to do it all? Do you wanna be able to do night photography, portrait photography, walking around photography, anything your heart desires? I do think having that F2.8 gives a feather in the cap of the 24-70, F2.8 lens. If you're really just looking for one lens, one stop shop, you don't plan on changing lenses,

You don't have other lenses that are in the 2.8 range. Having one thing in your kit that is just a tried and true workhorse is a huge value. again, feather in the cap, the 24 to 70, if you're looking for a one-stop shop. Okay, there we go. A full download on my thoughts on the 24 to 70 versus 24 to 105 millimeter class of lenses.

⁓ I hope you enjoyed, I hope you learned something. If you are indeed looking to try these out, again, I'm gonna recommend lensrentals.com using promo code wildphotographer15 to get a little bit of money off that. And then I'm also gonna ask humbly, if you are enjoying this podcast, the best way you can help support is to leave a review. You can leave up to a five-star review on most podcast platforms like Apple, Spotify, et cetera, et cetera. And if you leave a comment that is even better.

to give this podcast more visibility and more love by the old algorithm out there. I'd also like to turn you on to my YouTube channel. You just search Court Whelan, so that's C-O-U-R-T-W-H-E-L-A-N on YouTube, and you're gonna find a lot of other photo tutorials, maybe some different ones, certainly more visual. I've been getting into this one where I do real-time photo editing ⁓ via Photoshop and show you kind of the behind the scenes, where my mind goes, just full.

transparency when I'm editing a photo and I'm trying to get quite a diversity of photos out there so there's something that I'm sure you're gonna enjoy and learn from and so you can just search Court Whelan on YouTube or if you're looking for the actual username on YouTube it's just @courtwhelan first and last name and then finally I think a great way to inspire yourself or to learn by example is to check out my photo portfolio at shop

dot court whelan.com online. You can check out my latest and greatest website, big revamp via art store fronts in the last couple of months. And I'm so proud of I'm just in love with this website. I think you're gonna really like it too. And you know, yes, I do have things for sale like prints and merchandise, you know, even things like iPhone cases and all that comes available on this. It's absolutely amazing. But more than anything, just kind of seeing and emulating looking at other photographers artwork, I think is a really, really great way to

learn and maybe even expand your own style a little bit. So just look at it as something that might help you in your creative vision more than anything that I'm trying to, ⁓ you know, convince you to buy any prints or anything like that. Just check it out. see my style, see the diversity of stuff. Look at what a photo portfolio might look like online. And certainly if you're interested in art store fronts, it's a great way to see the capabilities of

their website and software and everything that they're offering. So once again, thank you so much for joining. Hope you learned, hope you enjoyed, and I'll talk to you next time.


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