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As a real estate photographer, you will need to walk around with a lightweight and fast-aperture lens that can shoot outstanding real estate photos no matter the shooting situation. In this review, I focus on the best walk around lens for Nikon that will suit several different scenarios.
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While walking around a property, every shooting condition is different, and you will need a versatile lens that can zoom when necessary and still perform well in poor lighting if need be. Below, I detail my best walk around lens for Nikon that meets these specifications.
The Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 is a workhorse lens that covers portraits to wide-angle fields of view. As a standard zoom with a bright aperture of f/2.8, it can shoot in virtually all outdoor conditions, making it the overall best walk-around lens on my list.
The bright aperture makes it excel in subject isolation and depth of field control. The optical construction consists of four aspherical and two low dispersion elements, which helps to reduce the spherical and chromatic aberrations effectively than the Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8.
With Nano Crystal and ARNEO coating, the Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 effectively eliminates the ghosting and flare, enhancing the color accuracy and contrast.
Unlike the Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8, it features a two-stepping motor which helps realize a near-silent, fast and smooth autofocus performance. However, the 1.8 pounds weight is harder to carry around.
The Nikon 20mm f/1.8 is an ultra-wide-angle lens that blends a bright design, broad view field, and a sleek form factor. This makes it an excellent choice for landscape shooting even in poor lighting conditions.
The optical construction consists of low dispersion and aspherical elements geared towards the reduction of optical distortions for clarity and sharpness enhancement.
With the use of Super Integrated Coating and Nano Crystal, it significantly reduces the ghosting and flares even when shooting in situations of strong lighting. Like the Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8, it comes with a Silent Wave Motor, which helps realize a quiet, fast and accurate autofocus performance.
Also, the autofocus comes with a full-time manual override which allows you to have a better focusing control, especially where precision is required. Although it's heavier than the Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8, at 1.11 pounds is still portable enough.
The Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8 is a versatile prime that incorporates professional features in a sleek form. With an f/1.8 bright aperture, it gives a better application of selective focus techniques than Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5.
The Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8 utilizes one aspherical element to eliminate the spherical aberrations and distortions for enhanced picture clarity and sharpness. However, this one element is not effective like the three elements in the Rokinon 16MAF-N 16mm f/2.
The element is coated with a Super Integrated Coating to control the ghosting and flare, which helps to enhance the color accuracy and increase the contrast.
With a weight of 0.44 pounds, it's the second most lightweight on my list, making it convenient to carry and shoot for a prolonged time.
The Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5 spans a useful focal range from portrait-length to wide-angle, making it suitable for use in a wide range of shooting situations.
The optical construction consists of low dispersion and three aspherical elements. These are geared towards reducing the spherical and chromatic aberrations for better image sharpness over the zoom range.
Also, the elements are coated with Super Integrated Coating to help suppress the ghosting, flare, and surface reflection for better color accuracy and contrast when working a bright light.
Unlike the Nikon AF-S 35mm f/1.8, it's equipped with an image stabilization mechanism that helps eliminate the camera shake effect by around four stops.
Although it's heavier than the Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8, the 1.07 pounds weight can't exhaust you when walking around. However, the Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5 aperture is not impressive in low-light shooting.
The Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8 is a normal-length prime that comes with an impressive bright aperture of f/1.8, making it ideal for use even when shooting in poor lighting. It performs exceptionally well in both portrait and landscape
One aspherical element is included in its optical construction, which helps to suppress aspherical distortions and aberrations to enhance image clarity and sharpness.
Like the Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5, this element comes with a Super Integrated Coating, which eliminates the ghosting and flares to facilitate color accuracy and improve contrast. The Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8 comes with a Silent Wave Motor to enhance the speed and precision of the autofocus function.
It weighs 0.4 pounds, making it the most lightweight on my list and ideal for carrying. However, unlike the Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5, it lacks image stabilization.
The Rokinon 16MAF-N 16mm f/2 is a wide-angle prime that offers an impressive 83.1 degrees view angle, making it suitable for capturing landscapes. The bright aperture of f/2 makes it good for low-light shooting with an effective depth of field application.
Unlike the Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8, the optical construction consists of one low dispersion element and two aspherical elements, which helps to eliminate the chromatic and spherical distortions for enhanced picture sharpness.
The elements come with a UMC coating, which reduces the flare and ghosting by enhancing uniform light transmission. It features a manual focus that is noise-free, making it ideal for use with camera-sensitive subjects.
However, the manual focus may be inconvenient where fast focusing is needed. It weighs 1.29 pounds, the heaviest on my list, making it unsuitable for a prolonged period of use.
The Nikon 24-200mm f/4-6.3 is one-lens that is suitable for working in a wide array of shooting conditions due to its variable focal length and aperture. It can achieve an 8.3x zoom, allowing you to cover a telephoto to wide-angle focal lengths.
The optical elements feature both the Nano Crystal Coating and ARNEO, which are geared towards enhancing color accuracy and contrast. However, unlike the Nikon 20mm f/1.8, the f/4-6.3 aperture is not ideal for shooting in poor lighting conditions.
Nikon 24-200mm f/4-6.3 features an advanced image stabilization functionality that can reduce the camera shake effect by around five stops, promoting sharper images even when shooting handheld. With a weight of 1.26 pounds, it's the second heaviest on my list, which limits its portability.
Although it appears simple, the Nikon 24-85mm f/2.8-4 is a sophisticated standard zoom that boasts a maximum wide aperture of f/2.8, making it excel even in back-lit shooting conditions.
It uses two aspherical elements to minimize the spherical distortions and aberrations, helping render clear and sharp images. Like the Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5, it uses a Super Integrated Coating to suppress the ghosting and flare for improved image contrast, especially when capturing in harsh lighting circumstances.
The use of an internal autofocusing design ensures the lens maintains its overall length over the focusing range, which is important especially when capturing camera-shy subjects. With a nine-blade aperture diaphragm, the Nikon 24-85mm f/2.8-4 produces a pleasing and smooth bokeh quality.
However, although it's lighter than the Nikon 24-200mm f/4-6.3, the 1.2 pounds weight is not ideal for an extended carrying time.
Walk-around lenses come with varying attributes and specifications, which you need to take into account for you to make an informed decision. For instance, you will need to emphasize the lens’s weight, size, and optical build quality as they dictate its suitability.
Additionally, you can use the table below to compare the aperture, weight, and focal length of different lenses.
| Lens | Type | Aperture | Weight (Pounds) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nikon AF-S VR 24-85mm | Zoom | f/3.5-4.5 | 1.07 |
| Nikon AF-S 50mm | Prime | f/1.8 | 0.4 |
| Rokinon 16mm | Prime | f/2 | 1.29 |
| Nikon AF-S DX 35mm | Prime | f/1.8 | 0.44 |
| Nikon Z 24-200mm | Zoom | f/4-6.3 | 1.26 |
| Nikon Z 24-70mm | Zoom | f/2.8 | 1.8 |
| Nikon Z 20mm | Prime | f/1.8 | 1.11 |
| Nikon 24-85mm | Zoom | f/2.8-4 | 1.2 |
A wider aperture allows in more light, while a small one lets in less light. Also, a large aperture provides better depth-of-field control.
Walk-around lenses should have a variable wide aperture, which means the aperture changes as you zoom in and out or when you change the focal length. Typically, it is because the maximum aperture decreases as the lens barrel is extended.
For instance, a lens such as Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5 with f3.5-4.5 aperture means that the aperture is f/3.5 at a wide-open, but zooming in reduces it to f/4.5.
In walk-around
The magnification that a lens offers is directly related to its focal length. Typically, the focal length number is measured in millimeters (mm) and is always indicated on the lens package or label.
The general rule of thumb is that you get more magnification when using a higher focal length number, and the lower the focal length number, the smaller the magnification.
For walk-around
A good reference lens is the Nikon 24-200mm f/4-6.3, which is widely recognized by professional photographers as the travel lens of choice.
It's difficult to make general statements concerning image quality, as in most cases, it depends on the viewer's perspective and the experience of the photographer. However, lenses with large zoom ranges ought to sacrifice some sharpness in order to get versatile.
In addition, the number of optical elements that reduce chromatic and spherical aberrations determines the clarity and sharpness of an image. The higher the number of these elements, the sharper and clearer the image.
For instance, a large number of optical elements in Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 enables it to shoot outstanding image quality.
However, modern lenses are very good in terms of image quality. So unless you're professionally capturing pictures for a demanding customer, any of the lenses on this list will realize sharp images if you utilize the necessary capturing techniques.
Weight is a crucial factor to consider when choosing a walk-around lens because the idea is to use it for walking around and traveling purposes.
It's preferable to carry a lightweight lens, especially if you are carrying it for a prolonged period. It's therefore advisable to go for a lightweight lens such as the Nikon 50mm f/1.8.
In addition to weight, the dimensions of the camera lens must be taken into account. Portability can be a crucial factor in a walk around the camera lens, especially if you are traveling and prefer to carry with you only the carry-on luggage.
Therefore, when making your decision, consider the physical size of the lens. In such a case, you will want a lens with a sleek form factor such as the Nikon 20mm f/1.8.
The image stabilization feature is used to compensate for the movements of the person holding the lens. This helps to take pictures without blurring them, even at slower shutter speeds.
Typically, the lowest shutter speed your hands can hold the lens is the reciprocal of the focal length. With a 200mm lens, you wouldn't want to take pictures at a shutter speed slower than 1/200 second. It would be 1/50th of a second for a 50mm lens.
Image stabilization techniques help you take pictures at slower shutter speeds and are generally categorized according to how many additional "stops" you can be given to play with. "Stop" is a selection of photos to halve or double the light.
So if you moved to 1/50th of a second from 1/100th of a second shutter speed and nothing else changes, that becomes one-stop.
Advanced techniques of image stabilization offer 3-5 levels of stabilization. For instance, the Nikon 24-200mm f/4-6.3 offers image stabilization of up to 5 stops. As you can see, image stabilization can make a big difference, and definitely, it's worth considering when buying a lens.
Generally, both autofocus and manual focus are important depending on where you are using them. Autofocus is better than manual focus when you are shooting in a high-contrast environment. The manual focus will be preferable when you are shooting in low light, taking macro photos, or when there are foreground distractions.
The lens's cleaning frequency depends on the conditions of use and how you are packing it when carrying. For instance, if you are using it for shooting in dusty conditions, you may need to clean it at least once a week.
Generally, zoom lenses don't perform well in low-light. However, a high-quality zoom lens such as the Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8, with a wide aperture of f/2.8, will perform well in poor lighting like its prime counterpart.
With a wide range of shooting conditions out there, choosing a Nikon lens that will suit your walk-around
