Micro Four Thirds Lens Buying Guide

Hello everyone, today I want to talk about which Micro Four Thirds lenses that you should buy if you are going to build a complete all-around Micro Four Thirds kit. This is just based on my opinion and also based on my experience since I don't have every single MFT lenses available.

The Beginner MFT Kit

Maybe you just started photography and you chose MFT as your preferred system. You want some good lenses to start with but you don't have a preferred genre of photography yet. I will recommend my lenses of choice for beginning photography with MFT:

1. Budget kit 
(US$399.00 to US$699.00 approximately)
(a) Any kit lens and 
(b) Olympus 45mm f1.8
Start photography with the kit lens. MFT kit lenses are sharp enough and they will cover flexible focal lengths. Learn to master the kit lens before you jump into any other lens and keep the kit lens because you will still need it even after you progress far enough with your photography. Add the 45mm f1.8 and learn to shoot portrait with it, it will give you the best result for portrait.

2. Beginner Prime Lens kit 
(US$500.00 approximately)
Olympus 17mm f1.8
I recommend this one prime lens and learn to use it exclusively for a few months and get acquainted with the feel and the field of view of this lens really well. This might even be the only lens you need because it is very flexible for both landscape and street photography. Everybody needs 35mm full frame eq. lens!

3. Super Zoom
(US$800.00 approximately)
Panasonic 14-140mm f3.5-5.6
Maybe you just need one lens to cover everything, you don't do serious photography but you want everything at your fingertips. Then the Panasonic 14-140mm will cover everything you need in terms of focal length.

The General/Traveler MFT Kit

My choice for general photography or for travel photography is usually one or two zoom lens maybe with some prime lenses for night photography or for portrait. The key when traveling with MFT is to keep everything lightweight and versatile. So I will limit the choices for two lenses only

1. Budget kit 
(US$399.00 to US$699.00 approximately) 
(a) Any kit lens and 
(b) Olympus 45mm f1.8
If you by any chance own either the Panasonic 14-42mm f3.5-5.6 II or Panasonic 20mm f1.7 as a kit lens, keep it! Either one of them will be the perfect lightweight travel lens because they are sharp, small and versatile enough for almost any kind of shot. You will not be able to get extremely wide or extremely telephoto with them however. Add the Olympus 45mm f1.8 for portrait and mild telephoto and you will have a very versatile kit with just two little lenses.

2. Super Wildlife kit
(US$600.00 to US$1000,00 approximately)
(a) Panasonic 14-42mm f3.5-5.6 II or 20mm f1.7 and 
(b) Panasonic 100-300mm f4-5.6 or Olympus 75-300mm f4.8-6.7
This kit is the preferred kit for travelling to a location where you will have some wildlife photography photo shoots. Either Panasonic or Olympus telephoto zoom will give you that extreme 600mm equivalent zoom and the 14-42 or 20mm to cover the short focal length needs.

3. Versatile kit 
(US$1,200.00 approximately)
(a) Panasonic Lumix 14-140mm f3.5-5.6 and 
(b) Olympus 17 or 25mm f1.8
The Lumix will provide coverage for all focal length, be it wide or telephoto and the Olympus will do emergency portrait and night photography. With just the 14-140mm, you will be able to photograph almost everything at any focal length, and with either one of the Olympus you will be able to get that shallow depth of field pictures and low light capability.

4. Ultimate Focal Length kit 
(US $1,800.00 approximately)
(a) Panasonic Lumix 14-140mm f3.5-5.6 and 
(b) Panasonic 7-14mm f4
With these two lenses you will be able to cover everything from extreme wide angle 14mm full frame eq. to a whooping 280mm full frame eq. focal length. This is the best way to cover all sorts of picture from all focal lengths if you don't need low light capability and shallow depth of field. This is also my personal traveling kit choice.

5. Ultra Serious kit 
(US$ 2,000.00 to US$3,000.00 approximately) 
(a) Panasonic Lumix 12-35mm f2.8 and 
(b) Panasonic Lumix 35-100mm f2.8  
(c) Panasonic 7-14mm f4 (optional). 
These two lens will provide fast apertures at all critical focal lengths and will guarantee good sharp pictures throughout your holiday. The main drawback is the fact that they are expensive and the telephoto end only reaches 100mm (200mm full frame eq.). Keep in mind that these lenses are the top of the line kit for Micro Four Thirds! I said only two lenses for each kit but you can add the 7-14mm to cover ultra wide angle if needed, and those three lenses will be your Holy Trinity lens in the MFT world, perfect for travel or even professional works as well!

The Landscaper MFT Kit

For the landscape kit you want to have a wide angle of some sort and a general lens to cover the blind spot of the wide angle lens. Here's my recommendation:

1. The Mandatory Landscape kit 
(US$ 1,000.00 approximately)
(a) Panasonic 7-14mm f4 and
(b) Any kit lens
The Panasonic 7-14mm is a serious landscape photographer's lens, and the ultra wide coverage that it covers is enough for all kinds of landscape that you will need to do. Add any kit lens to complement the longer focal length for your landscape shoots and you will be good to go. This is my preferred kit for landscape photography.

2. The Low Light Landscape kit 
(US$1,500.00 to US$1,800.00 approximately)
(a) Olympus 12mm f2.0 and 
(b) Any other f1.8 prime lens of your choice(Olympus 25mm or Olympus 17mm or Olympus 45mm)
The Olympus 12mm f2.0 is the best landscape lens for those times when you need to have low light capability such as during wide field astrophotography shots or during nightscape shots. Add one more prime fast lens of your choice to cover longer focal length and you will have the ultimate low light landscape kit.

The Street Photographer MFT Kit

There are plenty of MFT lenses that will suit your street photography needs. For street photography, all you want are primes; there is nothing wrong with zoom lens for street photography, but with the prime you can isolate the subject with the shallow depth of field capabilities. Here are some of my recommendations with two lenses for each kit that I recommend:

1. The Versatile Street kit 
(US$800.00 approximately)
(a) Olympus 17mm f1.8 and 
(b) Olympus 45mm f1.8
This is a very versatile kit since you have a normal wide and a short telephoto focal lengths both covered with these two lenses. The 17mm will provide 35mm full frame eq. field of view which is versatile enough for most environmental street photo with a possibility to do close up. The 45mm will be handy for street portraits as well as for some detailed architecture shots. This is my preferred kit for street photography.

2. The Classic Street kit 
(US$1,000.00 approximately)
(a) Olympus 17mm f1.8 and 
(b) Olympus 25mm f1.8
Both 35mm and 50mm on full frame field of view is the classic focal length preferred by many street photographers. Both of the Olympuses will provide you with two of the most common focal lengths used in Street Photography. The gap between 17mm and 25mm isn't much, however there are many photographers who find that they always need both of them.

3. Wide Shot Street kit 
(US$1,500.00 approximately)
(a) Olympus 12mm f2.0 and 
(b) Olympus 25mm f1.8.
There are times when you want to include as much environment as you can to the subject of your photography and that's when the 12mm f2.0 will shine for your street photography. Add the 25mm to cover a bit longer focal length and you are good to go.

4. Mild Telephoto Street kit 
(US$1,500.00 approximately)
(a) Olympus 75mm f1.8 and 
(b) Olympus 17mm f1.8.
I know that telephoto lens isn't common in street photography but the fact that sometimes you need to get to a subject that is far away or to compress the background into the foreground will require you to get a telephoto lens of some sort. My choice for that will be the Olympus 75mm f1.8. Add the 17mm for a normal wide shots and you will be able to cover everything.

That's all for my MFT lenses guide. I hope you enjoy this post. Cheers and God bless :)

Update: Wondering about my own main personal kit that I currently use for semi serious work everyday? It's the Panasonic 12-35mm f2.8 and the Olympus 75mm f1.8. Both these lenses cover everything that I currently need with the best possible output for the Micro Four Thirds.