Lens for a Sony A7iii

goinggreynow

goinggreynow

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Morning all
Have I really been away this long???
I was shocked this morning to see how long it’s been since I posted anything. I seem to have lost all enthusiasm for my photography due partly to being locked up indoors but I also blame my new hobby/interest of vintage hifi (if you ever want to go down a never ending big black hole, then i can recommend it!)
Anyway, I confess to being totally out of touch with new products, ideas, etc etc.
My current situation is that I have a Sony A7iii with one AF lens. A Samyang 35mm. All of my other lenses - all 12 of them - are vintage lenses.
My new grandson is due to visit over the summer. I won't get to see him very often as he lives on the other side of the world and so I would like to take the opportunity of this being the reason to kick start my photography hobby again.
I’ve been happy with my vintage lenses - everything manual - but realistically I need a decent AF lens to cope with a fast moving crawler/walker.
I don’t have silly money to spend (so no £1500 lenses unless so good that I’d be an idiot to miss it), but I’d really appreciate the thoughts and first hand experience of fellow members.
Other than price, my other main restriction is weight and getting older, I find my ability (and desire) to lug around anything heavy has gone. By way of example, my Mnolta 35-70 MD weighs in at around 400g which is as heavy as I really want to go.
I’m thinking I need to cover the 35/50mm range, although I’d be OK with a single prime of either focal length. A zoom also OK but I suspect weight/price could be against me.
I’m happy to trade in my Samyang which gets zero use now. And as an absolute last resort, I’d be willing to let go of 2/3 of my lesser used vintage lenses if it got me to a point where I’d be buying the ‘right’ lens.
I really would appreciate any help.
Thank you all.
 
I have a few prime lenses I can recommend. The Sonly 35 and 55mm f1.8's are both sharp across the frame from wide open with the only real issues being ca in strongly backlit scenes and par for the course and not really much better bokeh from the 35mm. The 35mm does have a nice close focusing ability though which may come in handy. Two other lenses I can recommend may not be quite so attractive but I'll suggest them anyway, the Sony 35mm f2.8 is a favourite of mine as it's very compact and the image quality is IMO very good. Another I'd recommend if it's not too wide is the Sony 28mm f2 which is quite compact, fast to focus and IMO has nice bokeh. It does have some distortion which may be corrected in your camera for all I know, but not with my ancient A7, applying a lens profile does seem to clear it up without any issues I can see.

I think Manny Ortiz has done reviews of both the 35 and 55mm f1.8's, if that'll help...

35mm.


55mm.


Good luck choosing.
 
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woof woof said:
I have a few prime lenses I can recommend. The Sonly 35 and 55mm f1.8's are both sharp across the frame from wide open with the only real issues being ca in strongly backlit scenes and par for the course and not really much better bokeh from the 35mm. The 35mm does have a nice close focusing ability though which may come in handy. Two other lenses I can recommend may not be quite so attractive but I'll suggest them anyway, the Sony 35mm f2.8 is a favourite of mine as it's very compact and the image quality is IMO very good. Another I'd recommend if it's not too wide is the Sony 28mm f2 which is quite compact, fast to focus and IMO has nice bokeh. It does have some distortion which may be corrected in your camera for all I know, but not with my ancient A7, applying a lens profile does seem to clear it up without any issues I can see.

I think Manny Ortiz has done reviews of both the 35 and 55mm f1.8's, if that'll help...

35mm.


55mm.


Good luck choosing.
Click to expand...
Hi Alan
Thanks for the reply.
I’m inclined to go with something which has a slightly bigger max aperture, so the F1.8s would probably suit me better than the 35mm F2.8.
I’m shying away from the 28mm only because I find the wider lenses can often distort facial features when used close in.
Case in point; my daughter has just sent me a photo from her iPhone. Crisp as you like but distorted as it was taken too close.
I’ll have a look at both the 35 and 55mms. Sensibly, I really should put both my Flektogon and Helios 44m on the A73 and remind myself exactly what sort of FOV I’d be looking at.
I suppose that‘s also just a reflection of how little I actually use some of my lenses.
Thanks
Stuart
 
Yup. 28mm isn't really the thing for close up people shots but nice when standing back a bit and including some context. Maybe 55mm might be the one. Sony also do a 50mm f1.8 but I think the focusing system on that lens may probably be slower acting.
 
woof woof said:
Yup. 28mm isn't really the thing for close up people shots but nice when standing back a bit and including some context. Maybe 55mm might be the one. Sony also do a 50mm f1.8 but I think the focusing system on that lens may probably be slower acting.
Click to expand...
Thanks.
Just been onto Camerapricebuster and under ‘third party’, Zeiss also have Batis/Loxia lenses. I have zero knowledge of these and ovviously I need to do some sensible research on the various options.
Thanks again
 
goinggreynow said:
Thanks.
Just been onto Camerapricebuster and under ‘third party’, Zeiss also have Batis/Loxia lenses. I have zero knowledge of these and ovviously I need to do some sensible research on the various options.
Thanks again
Click to expand...

The Loxia lenses are manual focus. The Batis lenses are AF but personally I'd steer clear as as far as I know there's only the 40mm f2 that sort of fits the brief but if I remember correctly that lens had some focus issues but it may have been fixed, that issue would be worth looking into if you're seriously interested in the lens. Personally I'd head for Sony and Sony lenses carrying the Zeiss badge but my A7 is perhaps more susceptible to any focus issues than more modern cameras.
 
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The Sony 35 1.8 and 85 1.8 make a fantastic pair especially with eye AF on your A7iii. Personally I’m not a fan of 50-55mm, neither here nor there for me - can achieve the look with a bit of zooming with your feet via 35 and 85 ;)

The 85 seems to still be available here for £389. Given the time it’s been up, you could probably get a bit off that too: https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/threads/sony-85mm-fe-prime-lens.728228/
 
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I know a lot of people like 85's and I do have the Sony f1.8 and a few film era ones but I personally find 85mm a bit tight for indoor people shots and I think that the Sony 85mm f1.8 does lack a bit of focusing speed when compared to the 35 and 55 but it may operate faster on newer bodies.
 
I have Sony SEL E Mount 50F14Z Zeiss Planar T FE 50 mm 1.4 ZA Lens which I got from Amazon Warehouse and paid about £850 for it, very happy with the image quality - using it with a Sony A7R3 - can be very lens heavy - for instance my wife struggles with it, I prefer it that way as I am “conscious” about carrying it so I am more careful with it and don’t forget to pick it up
 
Appreciate that it’s been almost a couple of weeks since my original question.
In addition to the lenses mentioned above, I’m now seeing references to Sony G lenses; 40 and 50mm F2.5 and a wider 24mm.
I’m a bit confused as to where these sit amongst the various other offerings - quality wise.
Any help much appreciated.
 
goinggreynow said:
Appreciate that it’s been almost a couple of weeks since my original question.
In addition to the lenses mentioned above, I’m now seeing references to Sony G lenses; 40 and 50mm F2.5 and a wider 24mm.
I’m a bit confused as to where these sit amongst the various other offerings - quality wise.
Any help much appreciated.
Click to expand...
Given your mention of a new grandson visit bring the motivation, I think you'll find 24mm too wide for more than the occasional portrait or wide family scene. I would still stick to my previous recommendation of 35 and 85. As I said before, 50mm for me is neither here nor there.

In terms of quality of lenses, with primes you'll be hard pushed to find duds at f2 or wider Aperture on sony FE mount (there's a couple of 35 f2.8 I'd steer clear of). Just watch out that some primes are manual focus only / I might be wrong but think it's Sony Batis ones that are.
 
goinggreynow said:
Appreciate that it’s been almost a couple of weeks since my original question.
In addition to the lenses mentioned above, I’m now seeing references to Sony G lenses; 40 and 50mm F2.5 and a wider 24mm.
I’m a bit confused as to where these sit amongst the various other offerings - quality wise.
Any help much appreciated.
Click to expand...


Sony recently introduced the 40 and 50mm f2.5 and 24mm f2.8 G lenses. They are very small and light and quite high quality but they only have the f2.5/f2.8 apertures, not f1.4 or f1.8.

There's also the much older Sony Zeiss 35mm f2.8 which again is very small and light and very good.

Here's a vid about the G's.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB_W0BLDwyc&t=1s
 
Tricky01 said:
Given your mention of a new grandson visit bring the motivation, I think you'll find 24mm too wide for more than the occasional portrait or wide family scene. I would still stick to my previous recommendation of 35 and 85. As I said before, 50mm for me is neither here nor there.

In terms of quality of lenses, with primes you'll be hard pushed to find duds at f2 or wider Aperture on sony FE mount (there's a couple of 35 f2.8 I'd steer clear of). Just watch out that some primes are manual focus only / I might be wrong but think it's Sony Batis ones that are.
Click to expand...

Just to be doubly clear. The Batis range are Zeiss own brand rather than Sony and they're AF.
 
woof woof said:
Just to be doubly clear. The Batis range are Zeiss own brand rather than Sony and they're AF.
Click to expand...
My bad. Which are the Sony MF ones? Sorry, really should just Google it...

...I'm back, it's the Sony Loxia lenses
 
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Tricky01 said:
My bad. Which are the Sony MF ones? Sorry, really should just Google it...

...I'm back, it's the Sony Loxia lenses
Click to expand...

I can't think of any Sony MF lenses but you can get Voigtlander and Zeiss Loxia FF MF lenses in Sony mount and possibly others too.
 
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