Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G Review

Dustin Abbott

June 8th, 2020

I had a conversation with a third party lens maker last year, and they asked me essentially what lenses I felt were needed on Sony. One of the lenses I described to them was essentially the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G. I don’t know if Sony was eavesdropping on that call, but they have certainly built a lens that was definitely needed on the system. I don’t know that I could have scripted this lens any better, really, and I was very pleased at the concept of the lens when it was announced, and now that I’ve spent some time with it, I’m even happier. The FE20G (as I’ll call it for brevity) is the kind of lens that everyone can agree on. Reasonably sized, reasonably priced, and optically superior. Some lenses don’t leave you a lot of room for criticism, and frankly, this is one of them.

The FE20G is an excellent optical instrument, and, like the also-excellent FE 200-600mm G lens, I’m left with the impression that the line between G and GM lenses is a bit murky. The Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master is an excellent lens, but outside of the maximum aperture, I’m not really seeing any kind of significant difference between the two lenses in terms of build, autofocus, or performance. It should be noted that F1.8 is actually a very wide maximum aperture at this focal length, with only the Sigma 20mm F1.4 ART as a wider alternative, and that lens comes with some serious downsides to get that extra 2/3rds of a stop of light…including the loss of the ability to traditionally filter the lens and the reality that the Sigma is twice as large and heavy as the FE20G.

F1.8 is plenty for me at this focal length, particularly when I can get images like this at F1.8.

The 20mm F1.8 G clocks in at $899 USD, and while that isn’t cheap, it does undercut the 24mm F1.4 GM by a whopping $500. There are actually a fair number of alternative lenses that have arrived on the scene since the conversation I had last year, including the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 zoom, the Samyang AF 18mm F2.8 prime, the Tamron 20mm F2.8 prime, and the Sigma 14-24mm F2.8 DN ART zoom, so maybe a lot of people eavesdropped on that conversation! I’ve spent time with each of these lenses, and there are a lot of reasons why I think that the Sony may be the best executed, most complete package of them all.

In this review I’ll the lens itself, some comparisons to the aforementioned lenses, and I’ll deliver my conclusion at the end. Read on to join my in my exploration of why I think the FE20G should jump to the top of your list if you’re in the market for a wide angle prime lens.

If you prefer to watch your videos, I have both the definitive (long format) and standard (shorter format) video reviews available. Just click on your choice below!

Thanks to Sony Canada for the loaner. I’ll be reviewing the Sony 20mm F1.8 G on my Sony a7RIII and Sony a9 bodies; the text and video reviews contain photos and video taken with both.

Sony FE20G Build and Handling

Very much like the 24mm F1.4 GM, I find the FE20G to be essentially a perfectly executed lens as a complete package. It feels like Sony is really hitting their stride in execution, and the recent releases (200-600G, 24GM, 135GM) have all really hit the sweet spot for me. I review lenses across three different systems (Canon, Sony, and Fuji) and so I often evaluate lenses from the perspective of whether a better (or equivalent) lenses exists on a different platform. In each of these most recent cases, I can’t cite a superior lens available for another system. The FE20G has a great balance of size to quality and performance. It’s a great match for Sony’s mirrorless bodies and looks great on them.

Here’s a look at how the FE20G compares to some other lenses that I mentioned…though none of these are a direct apples-to-apples comparison.

A few quick observations. The Samyang 18mm F2.8 is the winner if absolute size and weight is your priority, as it is 23mm shorter and weighs over 150% less. As we will see, however, the Samyang is not in the same class optically with this lens and sports a maximum aperture that is 1 1/3 stops slower. It does not have weather sealing, has no physical controls, and has a completely different build quality. It is not the same class of lens (though it is a wonderful option when every gram counts in your bag!) The Tamron is a little bit bigger than the Samyang, and does have a slightly better build and some weather sealing, but again it isn’t in the same class in terms of build. It has an inferior focus motor and a potentially fatal flaw in terms of its extreme distortion.

The Sony lens is bigger than either of these F2.8 lenses (as is to be expected), but it doesn’t feel radically different than the Tamron in size and weight. At 373g (13.16 oz), it is still a light lens. It is 20mm longer than the Tamron (84.7mm/3.33″), but is about the same in diameter (73.5mm). They both have a 67mm front filter thread, and I noted in my review that Tamron’s noble goal of maintaining a standardized diameter and filter thread in its FE lenses has led to the greatest compromises in terms of size with these F2.8 primes. Put simply, the Tamron is bigger than it needs to be, so that particular advantage isn’t as significant as it should be. I don’t think the size of the 20mm F1.8 will be a deal-breaker for hardly anyone.

Despite it’s modest dimensions, this is unquestionably a premium lens. It has a rugged, sturdy feel to it, and has a flocked finish that experience says is more resistant to fingerprints, rub marks, and scratches. It also has the right weather sealing credentials, with a gasket at the lens mount, internal seals at the switches and rings, and a fluorine coating on the front element that resists oils and moisture (and makes it easier to clean).

The 20mm F1.8 G is a very feature rich lens in a way that none of the competing lenses are. The closest is Sigma’s 14-24mm F2.8 DN, though that lens is priced in a different class ($1399 USD). Included in the list of features is the fact that the FE20G has a very flexible approach to controlling aperture. There is a manual aperture ring that gives you the option of selecting A (automatic) and allowing the camera to control aperture (or you to control it from the camera) or to manually select the desired aperture with one third stop detents throughout the aperture range from F1.8 to F22.

There’s also a switch on the lower right side of the lens barrel that allows you to “declick” the aperture and smoothly rotate through the aperture range without resistance. This option is particularly popular with video shooters.

Regardless of what option you choose, it’s worth noting that aperture is controlled electronically rather than through a mechanical coupling. If you rotate the aperture ring without the camera powered on, nothing will happen.

The same is true of the manual focus ring, which is deeply ribbed and with a rubberized texture. The focus ring is “focus-by-wire” (as are essentially all lenses designed for mirrorless), which means that input on the focus ring will be routed through the focus motor. There is no direct mechanical coupling with the lens elements. The focus ring is pretty good here, though the weight is a little too light to really emulate the feel of true manual focus. It’s better than what many DSLR autofocus lenses are, however, as it lacks that “scratchy” feel so common to many of them. When manually focusing an electronic distance scale will pop up on screen and the active focus area will be magnified to help visually confirm focus. Also nice is that the focus ring is linear, which means that focus distance remains consistent regardless of your speed in rotating the ring. This allows more repeatable focus throws (important for video). The focus throw is also good, with enough distance for precision at difference distances.

Completing the package is an AF/MF switch (which I always prefer to have) and Sony’s Focus Hold button, which can be programmed to a variety of different functions from within the camera.

Up front there is a very common 67mm filter thread, which is useful as it is shared with a variety of other lenses.

The lens can focus down to 7.09″ (18cm), where it has a useful 0.20x magnification. This doesn’t compete with the Tamron 20mm F2.8’s 0.50x magnification, but it is an above average figure (the Samyang has a fairly miserable 0.09x magnification). Here’s a look at the amount of magnification you get from the Sony:

Performance is quite good near minimum focus, but know that you will be very, very close to your subject at MFD. You’ll want to remove the lens hood as it block a lot of light from your subject. While I do enjoy the close focus abilities of the lens, it is worth noting that having to be that close to your subject does limit the opportunities to get the most out of that magnification. Still, I had fun with emphasizing a foreground subject while including the broader scene.

It’s worth noting that the bokeh is fairly nice from the lens, and the close focus ability means that you’ll have some opportunities to show it despite the wide angle of view.

The aperture iris is 9 rounded aperture blades, and the aperture stays fairly circular with the lens stopped down, though this won’t matter quite as much on a lens with such a wide focal length. When you stop a 20mm lens down, everything tends to come into focus and there isn’t much “bokeh” left.

I think that Sony has done a great job with the build and handling of this lens. There’s nothing that I have to criticize; this is essentially the lens that I would designed.

Autofocus and Video Performance

The Sony 20mm F1.8 G Master is equipped with Sony’s XD LM focus motors (eXtreme Dynamic Linear Motors). This is dual linear motor design with motors on either side of the focus elements group.

Real world focus is fast and silent. Focus pulls for video are utterly silent even when recording with the on board audio. I had good results when using the lens on a gimbal for a video episode I did on canvases. This is one area where it really differentiates itself from the Tamron 20mm F2.8 M1:2 lens that I reviewed a few months back. That lens has slower, louder focus, and wouldn’t be as good for either video or event work.

Focus accuracy was also good, and I had no problem pinpointing subjects and getting precise focus.

But it on the subject of focus that I have my only real complaint. I did encounter a few situations where the lens did some unnecessary pulsing. This can be seen in some video shots with all points active and a static scene. In one shot, for example, I was filming a lake, and you can see some minor pulsing in and out instead of focus just settling.

It also showed up when shooting stills in AF-C mode. Rather than grabbing the subject and holding focus, the lens would occasionally pulse and do a quick focus rack. If you happened to click the shutter during the pulse, you would get this kind of result:

This obviously isn’t what you want. Accurate focus in these shots looks like this:

I’ve seen that pulsing with other wide angle lenses at times. It’s a rare problem, fortunately, and seems to be reserved for certain situations and typically with all points active. Still, there’s one area where there’s room to improve.

Focus overall is excellent outside of that one quirk. Shooting in AF-S mode helps, as does using a smaller focus group.

Eye AF is a little tougher to judge on wide angle lenses, as the eye often occupies too small an area of the sensor. What you tend to get is face detect rather than eye detect, but the end result is the same. What matters is if the appropriate things are in focus, and in a quick series of “portraits” that I did, I saw accurate focus results.

In most cases you will be using a 20mm lens like this for groups or environmental portraits, and in those situations the depth of field is deep enough that Eye AF is unnecessary anyway.

The focal length is a very useful tool for video or vlogging. It gives one a very wide angle of view without being extreme in standard full frame mode along with a 30mm framing in Super 35. I would consider this a very useful tool in a videographer’s arsenal. It would make an amazing lens for wedding work mounted on a gimbal.

So, outside of a small misstep with some pulsing, the autofocus is another area of real strength for the lens.

Sony FE20G Image Quality

The Sony 20mm F1.8 G is one of the sharpest wide angle lenses that I’ve used. This is optically one of the stronger lenses at this focal length on the market and has very few optical shortcomings. It sports an optical formula of 14 elements in 12 groups, with two of those elements being advanced aspherical elements (AA) and three being extra-low dispersion elements (ED). That may not mean much to you, but these are the more expensive, exotic elements that help to achieve more special performance…and they are very similar to those found in the more expensive 24mm F1.4 G Master lens.

If you are familiar with MTF charts, you can see that there is a strong optical performance here wide open and a flawless one stopped down. More on that in a moment.

I like to start by testing vignette and distortion, but I’ll preface this by saying that one advantage of a first party lens is that first party lenses tend to get the best support for profile corrections. Profiles for software (like Adobe) arrive quickly and reliably, and the in-camera support for JPEGs and video is unparalleled. My point is that you won’t see any vignette or distortion unless you intentionally disable the profiles…as I’ll do here to demonstrate.

What we can see is that the amount of distortion is minimal but also a little complex. I see a minor wave in the distortion that makes it function like barrel distortion on the top and bottom but like pincushion on the sides, and I couldn’t correct it satisfactorily with manual adjustments, though the tiny amount makes this less of a real world issue. You can see that the profile does a pretty job of correcting the distortion. When you compare it to the Tamron 20mm F2.8 (the last 20mm lens I tested) you see just how bad distortion COULD be at this focal length. Ouch!

Vignette is moderate. When I manually corrected, I used a +55 and a midpoint of 5 to get a clear result similar to the profile. The vignette is halved by F2.8 and mostly gone by landscape apertures.

Though not a flawless performance, the FE20G is clearly better than some competitors. I don’t see any real-world ramifications from vignette and distortion, and neither correction is so severe as to be destructive to image quality.

Here’s a look at my test chart globally (if you’ve forgotten what it looks like).

Here’s a look at the crops from center, mid-frame, and the corner at F1.8:

They reveal excellent center performance, excellent mid-frame performance, and excellent corner performance.

At infinity you can see a slight bit more variance between the center and corners, but the performance across the frame is still strong at F1.8.

You can shoot good landscape shots even at F1.8:

I ran through the list of competitors, and the closest competing lens around this price point is the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8. At F1.8 vs F2.8 the Tamron is sharper in the center but loses in the corners. If you stop the Sony down to F2.8, however, the Sony takes a mild win in the center:

…and a much more convincing win in the corners:

Obviously corner performance is genuinely important in a wide angle lens, and Sony is pretty convincing here.

It destroys the Samyang across the frame at F2.8, and that couldn’t be more obvious in the corners:

The Tamron 20mm F2.8 doesn’t fare any better and is damaged by how much correction of distortion is needed.

The Sony is clearly head and shoulders above the competition at F2.8.

There is more on tap at F4 and F5.6, with mild improvements to contrast and resolution. At landscape apertures the FE20G is essentially flawless (as we saw in the MTF); it is razor sharp across the frame even on my 42Mpx a7RIII. Landscapes are rich, detailed, and rendered with great acuity.

Colors looked good as well. Not Zeiss good, but probably GM good.

As noted previously, I thought that the bokeh was better than average for a wide angle lens.

Flare resistance was also excellent. Even when panning the camera against painfully bright sun, I saw only the barest minimum of reaction. There’s a slight flare pattern in a few of these stills, but so subtle as to only be apparent with a second look.

Both longitudinal and lateral chromatic aberrations are well controlled, with no evidence of either in my tests or real world results.

I did test for coma, though the time of year that I did my review (June) is a difficult one for astro. I live fairly far north, so as we approach the summer solstice the sky doesn’t really get dark until late (near midnight)…and I am not a late night person (early riser). The moon was also at an extremely bright phase. Excuses aside, while this doesn’t translate into artistically amazing images, there is still enough there for a technical examination.

Center of the frame is excellent. Crisp, round star points. The edge isn’t bad, either, as while the brightest star points do “grow wings”, the result isn’t extreme. This is better than what I saw on the 24mm F1.4 GM.

Stopping down to F2 makes no appreciable difference, but at F2.8 there’s an obvious improvement.

So yes, my list of optical complaints about the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G is very short one. I think this lens packs a lot of punch in a wonderfully compact and competent package. It is one of the more complete wide angle lenses I’ve tested.

You can see more photos by visiting the lens image gallery here.

Conclusion

As I noted at the beginning of the review, the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G is pretty much just the way that I would have designed it. Both its parts and the sum of those parts are impressive. The build and handling of the lens is a cut above everything else at its price point, the autofocus is quieter and smoother, and the image quality is second to none.

There’s a lot of punch to the images the FE20G produces, and they hold up on a technical level (pixel level) as well. The close focus abilities of the lens are useful as well, giving you more creative options when using it.

I took it out on rainy mornings and didn’t worry about it getting a little wet due to the weather sealing, and, of course, the damp conditions allowed the colors to just pop!

There are cheaper alternatives than this $900 USD lens. There are smaller and lighter options. But I’m not aware of any wide angle lens for any of the systems that I test that is a better combination of compact size, usability, and performance. The complete package that this lens provides is pretty special. It’s an easy lens to recommend if you are in the market for a wide angle prime. Both the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 and the Sigma 14-24mm F2.8 DN are nice zoom alternatives if you need a bit more versatility, but there’s no question that the Sony 20mm F1.8 G is the performance king here.

Pros:

Well built, compact lens
Feature rich
Fast, quiet autofocus system
Amazing image quality from F1.8 on
Great color and contrast
Great flare resistance
Decent coma performance
Reasonable price

Cons:

Some focus pulsing in some situations
Minor distortion but is somewhat complex

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

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BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
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Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

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Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/374NqaK | Amazon https://amzn.to/2Y7VuDx | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2XB7FKh | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/2BCI0s6 | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/2MyndYS | Ebay https://bit.ly/20GDLA

Keywords: Sony 20mm, Sony Fe 20mm F1.8 G Sony 20mm G, Review, Sony, 20mm, F1.8, 1.8, G, Sony 20G, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Sony a9, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Video, Sharpness, Real World, Landscape, Sample Images, Comparison, Action, AF-C, coma, Tracking, Eye AF

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Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

June 5th, 2020

The Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G is the kind of lens that everyone can agree on. Reasonably sized, reasonably priced, and optically superior. I don’t know that I could have scripted this lens any better, really, and I was very pleased at the concept of the lens when it was announced, and now that I’ve spent some time with it, I’m even happier. Some lenses don’t leave you a lot of room for criticism, and frankly, this is one of them. I’ll be reviewing the Sony 20mm F1.8 G on my Sony a7RIII and Sony a9 bodies, and you can see photos from both cameras below. Stay tuned for my ongoing coverage.

Images of the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G

Images taken with the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7RIV Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Peak Design Slide Lite: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Peak Design Leash Strap: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year Subscription
Exposure Software X5 (Use Code “dustinabbott” to get 10% anything and everything)

Want to support this website? Use these links to shop at:

B&H Photo | Amazon | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.

Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/374NqaK | Amazon https://amzn.to/2Y7VuDx | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2XB7FKh | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/2BCI0s6 | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/2MyndYS | Ebay https://bit.ly/20GDLA

Keywords: Sony 20mm, Sony Fe 20mm F1.8 G Sony 20mm G, Review, Sony, 20mm, F1.8, 1.8, G, Sony 20G, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Sony a9, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Video, Sharpness, Real World, Landscape, Sample Images, Comparison, Action, AF-C, coma, Tracking, Eye AF

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master Review

Dustin Abbott

March 3rd, 2020

I have gotten a LOT of requests to cover the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master lens since its release, though it took me a while to get to it. The idea of having a premium wide aperture of F1.4 in a wide focal length (24mm) in a reasonably compact size is obviously an intriguing one to many people. I’ve spent time with a number of the GM lenses, and they have always been highly quality optically, though they are also often among the largest lenses in their respective classes. In many ways the Sony 24mm GM has been one of my favorite GM lenses thus far in large part because it combines the optical performance with a great form factor. It is substantial enough to be high quality while not being gratuitous. I’m a little fatigued with ever-larger prime lenses, so the 24GM (as we’ll call it for brevity in the review) has been a breath of fresh air.

24mm is a little outside the standard “trinity” range of 35-50-85mm lenses, with a wider angle of view that is better for landscapes than 35mm but a less flexible tool for photographing people. But not all photographers “see” the world the same way; for some their standard (preferred) angle of view is a little wider, and 24mm is the focal length that lets them tell their stories. The 24GM helps accomplish that by having lower distortion than most 24mm lenses along with great punch at F1.4:

That being said, nearly $1400 USD is a lot to pay for a 24mm prime (it’s about $550 more than the Sigma 24mm F1.4 ART, which is also available in Sony E-mount (my review here). Is this 24GM worth the extra money? Ultimately that choice will be up to you, but read on to see why I think it just might be…

If you prefer to watch your videos, I have both the definitive (long format) and standard (shorter format) video reviews available. Just click on your choice below!

Thanks to Sony Canada for the loaner. I’ll be reviewing the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM on my Sony a7RIII and Sony a9 bodies; the text and video reviews contain photos and video taken with both.

Sony 24GM Build and Handling

The Sony 24GM is a lens that I wish more manufacturers would use as a blueprint. It’s not a small lens, per se, but rather a great balance of size to quality and performance. It’s a great match for Sony’s mirrorless bodies and looks great on them.

Here’s a look at how the 24GM compares to some other lenses in the class, though the Sigma is the only direct competitor in terms of focal length and aperture combination.

It’s worth noting that the difference to the Sigma is greater than what is reported here. Sigma has rarely bothered to update either the length or the weight of lenses like the 24mm F1.4 ART which were originally designed for DSLRs (2015) and ported over to mirrorless in 2018. The E-mount versions of the various ART series lenses required the inclusion of essentially a built-in adapter to allow focus to work properly on Sony, so both the length and the weight grew a fair bit. I measured the overall length of the Sigma 24mm F1.4 ART as being 126mm (about 34mm longer than the 92.4mm of the Sony) and the weight at 768g, which is a whopping 72% heavier than the GM’s 445g. To put that in perspective, you could add the Sony FE 85mm F1.8 into your bag and have a combined weight of 816g – less than 50g more than the ART series lens alone.

I do think that modern lensmakers have often underestimated how big a deal size and weight are to photographers. I get a lot of anecdotal feedback from photographers around the world, and I know that many of them won’t buy lenses that are unnecessarily large and heavy. Even more telling, however, is how many of them do purchase such lenses but eventually sell them because they find themselves not using them as often because they don’t want to carry them. It’s ironic that the professional camera/lens market is contracting as more and more people find the photos taken with their phones “good enough” for most situations even while lens makers seem to keep making their lenses bigger and bigger. Correlation?

It’s rare that I get a chance to praise a Sony G Master lens for its compact size, so I’ll certainly seize this opportunity to do so! Despite it’s modest dimensions, this is unquestionably a premium lens. It has a rugged, sturdy feel to it, and has a flocked finish that experience says is more resistant to fingerprints, rub marks, and scratches. It also has the right weather sealing credentials, with a gasket at the lens mount, internal seals at the switches and rings, and a fluorine coating on the front element that resists oils and moisture (and makes it easier to clean).

Like other G Master lenses, the 24GM has a very flexible approach to controlling aperture. There is a manual aperture ring that gives you the option of selecting A (automatic) and allowing the camera to control aperture (or you to control it from the camera) or to manually select the desired aperture with one third stop detents throughout the aperture range from F1.4 to F16.

There’s also a switch on the lower right side of the lens barrel that allows you to “declick” the aperture and smoothly rotate through the aperture range without resistance. This option is particularly popular with video shooters.

Regardless of what option you choose, it’s worth noting that aperture is controlled electronically rather than through a mechanical coupling. If you rotate the aperture ring without the camera powered on, nothing will happen.

The same is true of the manual focus ring, which is deeply ribbed and with a rubberized texture. The focus ring is “focus-by-wire” (as are essentially all lenses designed for mirrorless), which means that input on the focus ring will be routed through the focus motor. There is no direct mechanical coupling with the lens elements. The focus ring is pretty good here, though the weight is a little too light to really emulate the feel of true manual focus. It’s better than what many DSLR autofocus lenses are, however, as it lacks that “scratchy” feel so common to many of them. When manually focusing an electronic distance scale will pop up on screen and the active focus area will be magnified to help visually confirm focus. Also nice is that the focus ring is linear, which means that focus distance remains consistent regardless of your speed in rotating the ring. This allows more repeatable focus throws (important for video). The focus throw is also good, with enough distance for precision at difference distances.

Completing the package is an AF/MF switch (which I always prefer to have) and Sony’s Focus Hold button, which can be programmed to a variety of different functions from within the camera.

Up front there is a very common 67mm filter thread, which is useful as it is shared with a variety of other lenses.

The lens can focus down to 9.45″ (24cm), where is has a slightly below average 0.17x magnification. The performance at minimum focus is above average, however, even at F1.4, with a lot of fine details nicely resolved.

It’s also worth noting the aperture, which has a higher than average 11 rounded aperture blades. This gives the 24GM a couple of advantages. First of all, the aperture stays nice and round when stopped down, meaning that bokeh circles remain, well, circles. Here’s a look at F2, F2.8, and F4.

At F4, the lens is stopped down three full stops and yet the circles are very circular. Stop the lens on down, however, and you get a really nice 22 point sunburst effect:

I think that Sony has done a great job with the build and handling of this lens. There’s nothing that I have to criticize; this is the blueprint that I wish more lens makers would follow, and I would personally love for Sony to build a 35mm G Master lens similar in size.

Autofocus and Video Performance

The Sony 24mm F1.4 G Master is the second lens I’ve evaluated that has Sony’s DDSSM (Direct Drive SuperSonic Motor) focus motor. I’m definitely a fan of this focus motor, as it clearly can deliver a lot of torque (the other lens was the awesome Sony 200-600mm OIS) while also being essentially silent in operation. The focus motor in the 24GM is fast (near instant) and accurate. In my video tests doing focus pulls (see the video reviews above), you cannot hear the focus motors in operation, and focus pulls were smooth and accurate.

The 24GM also gets good marks for grabbing foreground objects and locking focus accurately. Some lenses don’t do as well with this.

I also had no problem locking focus with a ND1000 filter (ten stops) attached, resulting in a 15 second exposure at F5.6.

I also had very good results with Pet Eye AF, with quick, accurate focus of my dog and cat.

I had a minor issue in one situation where a hanging lock of hair tricked Eye AF into focus on the hair repeatedly even though the box was centered on my subject’s right eye.

My only other minor negative was that I experienced a bit of pulsing and errant focus in a strongly backlit landscape scene and all points active. The second shot shows accurate focus after I overrode focus by selecting a specific focus point. The same scene is shone in the third shot at a small aperture (F11).

I’ve seen that pulsing with other wide angle lenses at times. It’s a rare problem, fortunately, and seems to be reserved for certain situations and typically with all points active.

While I’ve cited what negatives I saw, I want to circle back and make it clear that my focus experience by and large was actually excellent. This is a great focus motor and achieves focus quicker and quieter than the competing Sigma lens and is one of the best-focusing large aperture prime lenses that I’ve used. Many large aperture primes perform more poorly than their smaller F1.8 or F2.8 alternatives, but that’s not the case here. I’ve not used a 24mm lens that did a better job at focus than the 24GM.

This is one area where it really differentiates itself from the Tamron 24mm F2.8 M1:2 lens that I reviewed a few months back. That lens has slower, louder focus, and wouldn’t be as good for either video or event work.

Speaking of video: the 24GM will be a tempting video lens for a number of reasons. As a first party lens, it gets the best support in terms of in camera corrections, producing pristine footage. The focus motor is quiet and smooth, and shows no propensity for nervous microadjustments during static shots. The linear focus ring along with the ability to declick the aperture gives one a reasonable ability to implement some manual controls (though I always say that if you want to use a lens manually, buying a good manual focus lens is actually the best option).

The focal length is a very useful, giving one a nice wide angle of view in standard full frame mode along with a nearly 35mm framing in Super 35. I would consider this a very useful tool in a videographer’s arsenal. It would make an amazing lens for wedding work mounted on a gimbal. Video performance in the clips I used the lens for during my review period (everything from product shots to landscape scenes) worked great.

Sony 24GM Image Quality

The Sony 24mm F1.4 G Master gives lie to the assertion that a lens has to be massive to deliver a great performance. This is optically one of the stronger lenses at this focal length on the market and has very few optical shortcomings. It sports an optical formula of 13 elements in 10 groups, with two of those elements being extreme aspherical elements (XA) and three being extra-low dispersion elements (ED). That may not mean much to you, but these are the more expensive, exotic elements that help to achieve more special performance.

Neither vignette nor distortion are real issues here. There is a very mild amount of barrel distortion that is unlikely to be visible in almost any shot, and a mild amount of vignette that natural clears up almost entirely by F2. Below we have the uncorrected image, the image after the Lightroom profile for the lens attached, and the third image shows vignette being a non-factor by F2.

Good stuff there, and an area of clear advantage over most competitors. Here’s a look at my test chart globally:

Here’s a look at the crops from center, mid-frame, and the corner at F1.4:

They reveal excellent center performance, excellent mid-frame performance, and a slight loss of contrast and detail in the corners.

The difference between center and edge performance is a little more marked at infinity. There’s a lot of wide open punch at F1.4 in the center, but definitely a softening along the edge of the frame.

In this scenario there is a radical improvement by F2.8, where the edge now presents as completely sharp:

There is a very mild improvement (mostly in contrast) from F2.8 to F4, though now we are at excellent levels anyway:

This is an excellent landscape lens, with good color, high sharpness and contrast, low distortion, and nice acuity in rendering fine details.

If your composition is a typical one favoring some foreground object, you can shoot perfectly good landscape images even at F1.4:

That being said, few people buy an F1.4 lens to only shoot at smaller apertures. Most of us want the benefits of shooting at wide apertures in lower light, or of creating some background blur by using the large maximum aperture strategically. In some ways the standout attribute of the 24GM is the unusually fine bokeh signature of the lens. Check out a wide open look at the bokeh:

Those bokeh circles are very smooth and round, maintaining good geometry even close to the edge of the frame. Let’s take a closer look:

While you can see a faint amount of fringing on the bokeh circles, they are remarkably smooth inside, with no signs of onion rings or general busyness. This translates into real world quality of blur. In this shot, for example, you can see that there is great sharpness on the in focus portion of the dog while the general scene falls away cleanly.

In these examples you can see that both the foreground and background bokeh is fairly smooth and clean:

In one final example, you can see that there is a fair bit of the image in the difficult transition zone, but I feel like the image is still very nice.

I did see some small traces of longitudinal chromatic aberrations (LoCA) in different situations, but never noticeable enough to make a negative impact. You can see the faintest traces of purple fringing in the bare branches here at F1.4, but even at a pixel level they aren’t impactful at all.

I’m less delighted about the control of coma. The lens is very sharp, has low vignette, and has a bright maximum aperture. That combined with a great focal length makes this a tempting lens for astro work, but some struggles in controlling coma diminish my enthusiasm somewhat. If you look at the middle crop below, you will find that star points are nice and round (and crisp) at F1.4 in the middle of the frame, though bright points show some purple fringing (LoCA) around them. As you move towards the edge of the frame (crop 3), however, you see some rather obvious “wings” and “tails” growing on the star points.

Stopping down does reduce the size and obviousness of the coma, but you can see that it persists to some degree even at F2:

I think at F2 it’s good enough to be usable for astro, though I wouldn’t buy the lens specifically for that purpose. A lens like the Sigma 14-24mm F2.8 ART does a bit better a job.

But that basically sums up my very brief list of optical complaints. I’ll finish with another strength.

Flare resistance is very good. There is a bit of veiling and increased proclivity for a bit of fringing in high contrast area with bright sun in the frame at F1.4, and I could see some mild ghosting effects panning back and forth across the sun doing video, but it was mild enough that I couldn’t hardly replicate it in a still photo. Stopped down the lens is even better, with minimal artifacts and a very clean end result. That, combined with the nice sunburst, makes this a lens that I would want to point at the sun fairly often!

So all told there is a lot of goodness in the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM. If the focal length suits a need for you, the optical performance is going to make you happy. You can see more photos by visiting the lens image gallery here.

Conclusion

If you have read through the review to this point, then you probably already know my conclusion. The Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master lens is one of Sony’s best prime lenses. It combines features, optical performance, and good autofocus into an attractive, reasonably sized package. It is capable of producing a lot of fantastic images even shooting at F1.4:

Or stop on down to landscape apertures, where it becomes a very capable landscape lens.

The real strength, however, will be for wedding, event, and portrait photographers who happen to value a wider angle of view. The sharp performance at F1.4 combined with fast, confident autofocus will allow them to use that large maximum aperture to keep the ISO down and also to have a bit of subject isolation. The quality bokeh will set the images apart from more pedestrian options. The Sigma 24mm F1.4 ART is only a suitable alternative if you can’t afford the 24GM (It costs $849 USD vs the $1399 USD for the 24GM), but if it were me, I would save a little longer and spring for the G Master. It’s smaller and yet sharper (the 24mm F1.4 ART is not the peak performer in the ART lineup in my tests), has better autofocus, and weighs only a little more than half that of the Sigma.

While the Tamron 24mm F2.8 is much, much cheaper ($349 USD), but isn’t in the same class for build, handling, or performance. It’s maximum aperture is two full stops smaller. It does perform quite well optically, but the autofocus isn’t really competitive with the GM. If you are on a tight budget, then go for it, but if you are looking for the best autofocus 24mm on the Sony platform, the Sony 24mm F1.4 G Master is the way to go. So if your wallet is crying over my conclusion, take heart in this: the 24GM may be expensive, but it is the cheapest of the G Master lenses by a good margin!

Pros:

Excellent balance of size to performance
Beautiful, feature rich build
Weather sealed design
Smooth, quiet, and fast autofocus
Manual focus ring is linear and nicely damped
Excellent wide open performance over most of the frame
Extremely sharp corners from F2.8 on
Low vignette and distortion
Very smooth bokeh

Cons:

Fairly expensive
Coma performance isn’t incredible
A bit of focus pulsing in certain backlit situations

Purchase the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 GM @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
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Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

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Keywords: Sony 24mm, Sony Fe 24mm F1.4 GM, Sony 24mm GM, Review, Sony, 24mm, F1.4, 1.4, GM, G Master, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Sony a9, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Video, Sharpness, Real World, Comparison, Action, AF-C, coma, Tracking, Eye AF

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Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

February 27th, 2020

I’ve been getting a LOT of requests to cover the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master lens since its release. The idea of having a premium wide aperture of F1.4 in a wide focal length (24mm) in a reasonably compact size is obviously an intriguing one to many people. In many ways the Sony 24mm GM has been one of my favorite GM lenses thus far in large part because it has a very appealing size. It is substantial enough to be high quality while not being gratuitous. I’m a little fatigued with ever-larger prime lenses, so this one is a bit of fresh air. I’ll be reviewing the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM on my Sony a7RIII and Sony a9 bodies, and you can see photos from both cameras below. Stay tuned for my ongoing coverage.

Images of the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM

Images taken with the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM

Purchase the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 GM @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7RIV Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Peak Design Slide Lite: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Peak Design Leash Strap: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year Subscription
Exposure Software X5 (Use Code “dustinabbott” to get 10% anything and everything)

Want to support this website? Use these links to shop at:

B&H Photo | Amazon | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.

Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Purchase the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 GM @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/2wK3wsh | Amazon https://amzn.to/2HZX8zH | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2wQUji7 | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/3c9Dejn | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/3cd0JrO | Ebay http://bit.ly/Sony24GMda

Keywords: Sony 24mm, Sony Fe 24mm F1.4 GM, Sony 24mm GM, Review, Sony, 24mm, F1.4, 1.4, GM, G Master, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Sony a9, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Video, Sharpness, Real World, Comparison, Action, AF-C, coma, Tracking, Eye AF

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 (F050) Review

Dustin Abbott

February 12th, 2020

A couple of months ago I had a look at the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 along with the 35mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 lenses. These lenses were part of a trio of highly similar prime lenses from Tamron designed specifically for Sony FE (full frame E-mount). The third lens was not ready at the time, and it was (to many of us) the most intriguing, as the 20mm focal length is a very practical one for landscape work and/or vlogging on the video front. Fortunately I now have the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 in hand. Here’s what those initials mean: OSD = Optimized Silent Drive (the type of focus motor), Di III = designed specifically for mirrorless (in this case Sony Full Frame E-mount), and M1:2 =1:2 Macro…which is one of the main reasons why the F050 might be worth considering even with so many other options available. It is a unique lens with both a wide angle of view and the interesting ability to also do 1:2 macro shots (a 0.50x magnification). This lens (the F050 in Tamron’s lens identification, which I’ll use for brevity in this review) was the focal length of the group that I was most interested in. I spent time with the Zeiss Loxia 21mm F2.8 during my review and loved the little lens because of the mix of compact size, focal length, and image quality. I looked at the F050 as being a much cheaper alternative to that lens but with autofocus and that close focus macro capabilities.

And, to some extent, that’s true here, though with one major caveat. The Tamron F050 has good optical performance, a reasonably nice build (remember this is a $350 lens!), fairly good autofocus, but it also has a potentially fatal flaw for some photographers. This review will be devoted to exploring whether or not the Tamron is still worthy of consideration despite that issue. I suspect for some photographers it will be, as the F050 is a very compelling blend of capabilities, including some very stellar up close performance that opens a lot of extra creative opportunities.

I’ve now reviewed all three of the current batch of little prime lenses announced by Tamron, and I’ve found an interesting quirk connected to that internal code of F050. The 20mm F2.8 OSD has a lens designation of F050, the 24mm is F051, but the 35mm is code-named F053 (not F052).

Hmmm…

This makes me suspect that another lens (most likely a 28mm) is yet to come in this series. 28mm is a great focal length…and there aren’t a lot of options there, so this could potentially be a solid move for Tamron.

I always have a few reservations when examining a prime lens that doesn’t offer an aperture advantage over a zoom lens, but we’ll see how the F050 compares to the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 RXD zoom lens that covers the 20mm focal length with a similar F2.8 aperture. One thing is sure: the macro(ish) performance of these lenses at least gives them a “killer app” not matched by the zoom lenses…and Tamron has priced them to move at $349 USD each. So should the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 be on the short list for your next lens purchase? Let’s find out together…

If you prefer to watch your reviews, I have both a shorter length review along with a thorough, “definitive” review available:

I did this review on both Sony a9 and Sony a7RIII bodies. Thanks to Tamron USA for the loaner.

Tamron F050 Build, Handling, and Design

As mentioned previously, the F050 is designed specifically for Sony FE, though it can also be used on Sony’s crop sensor E-mount cameras where it has an equivalent angle of view of roughly 25mm. This makes this a very interesting focal length in both full frame and APS-C modes where shooting stills or doing video work, as these are both compelling focal lengths.

All of Tamron’s development to date for Sony FE has come without their popular VC (Vibration Compensation) system and instead rely on Sony’s Steadyshot Inside (IBIS) for stabilization. This has allowed Tamron to have less complex lens design and really focus on keeping things smaller and lighter, which is often the forgotten element of modern lens design. The F050 weighs only 7.8 oz (221 g), which is incredibly light for a full frame optic with such a wide focal length. Here’s a look at a chart of how the raw specs compare to some alternatives (both affordable and expensive).

You’ll note that Loxia is an aberration here, as while it is narrower than the Tamron is is both heavier (394 vs 221g) and MUCH more expensive ($1499 vs $349). That extra weight comes from the all-metal construction of the Zeiss (which is truly lovely!) and the price comes from, well, Zeiss. Perhaps the closest competing lens for many photographers will be the diminutive Samyang AF 18mm F2.8 (my review is here), which is most similar in size and price. The Samyang is the smaller of the two, weighing only 145g and being only 60.5 (vs 63.5mm) in length. The biggest physical difference, however, is the diameter of the lenses, which is almost 10mm more on the Tamron and results in a much larger 67mm filter thread compared with the 58mm thread of the Samyang). This gives the Tamron a rather squat appearance:

There are a few mitigating factors that balance the two lenses, however. The Tamron comes with the aforementioned macro capabilities (0.50x vs a rather sad 0.09x) along with the inclusion of weather sealing, which the Samyang lacks.

That’s right…weather sealing. Tamron has given us fairly strong value for money when it comes to the build of these little primes. They all have a LOT of shared design elements with each other and even with the FE zooms. One shared design element is the inclusion of weather sealing, starting with a gasket at the lens mount, several internal seal points, and a fluorine coating on the front element to resist fingerprints and watermarks (this also makes the front element easier to clean).

Few lenses at this price point offer that, and certainly the inexpensive first party options on any system would not. So far Tamron has included this on all of their FE lenses…and it’s very welcome! Also included is a lens hood, which is plastic and functional but without any particular defining characteristic. It is rather shallow, but that’s no real impediment here, for, as we will see, the flare resistance is fabulously good.

Another shared design element is that every FE lens thus far has had a shared 67mm front filter thread. There are both pros and cons to this. The primary con is that this shared design element is a limiting principle in the size/shape of a lens, though in many ways the 20mm is the least compromised in that this lens is still fairly compact for a wide angle lens.

The main upside (and it’s a big one) is similar to what Zeiss has done with the Loxia series. That shared diameter and front filter thread means that one set of filters can easily be shared across all the Tamron lenses (and in a very common size), and also anything like gearing or other accessories can be shared in a similar fashion. The shared filtering is a rather big deal to me, as I’ll obviously invest my filter money on the most commonly shared size, and this means that I’ll have a wide range of filters available to use with the lenses (and could potentially bring along one set of filters). I used the Freewell Vari-ND filters I reviewed a few months back at the nine-stop setting for this shot:

The physical design is also quite similar. These little primes carry a strong family resemblance to the FE zooms, with a body made of mostly engineered plastics around a lightweight metal mount. This is finished in a satin black with a platinum-color (“luminous gold”, according to Tamron) accent ring near the lens mount. There is white lettering on the lens barrel with lens designation and other information, and no switches to be seen anywhere. I do prefer having an AF/MF switch, but you’ll have to rely on controlling that from within the camera.

There is a ribbed focus ring a few centimeters wide near the front of the short lens. The focus ring moves fine, though I detected a noticeable lag and that focus seems to move in small chunks rather than a smooth, linear-type focus. This makes making fine focus adjustments somewhat difficult. You’ll never mistake the action for a Loxia lens! While focusing the selected area of the image will automatically magnify to help you to visually confirm focus.

If you look at the front of the lens while focusing, you will find that the front element group is the group that moves to achieve focus, so you will see some movement forward and backwards, though all within the lens housing, meaning that this is still technically an internally focusing lens, as the the lens does not change length during focus. There are a few seal points near this area according the diagram, so Tamron has taken steps to assure that dust won’t enter here. If you have any further concerns, however, adding a protection filter is always an option.

The F050 can focus down very closely (4.3″ or 10.92cm), which is the primary reason that it can achieve such a high magnification figure. Just know that you will be VERY close to your subject when shooting at MFD, as that figure is from the sensor of the camera. Here’s what that looks like, what kind of magnification you can achieve, and an example of a wide open macro shot.

You will have to be careful to avoid shading your subject with the lens, and you’ll obviously need fairly good light on your subject, too. While the magnification figure is useful here, the working distance is far less so, so there will probably be few situations where you can squeeze out the full reproduction value of the lens.

If you attach the F050 to an APS-C camera (or shoot in crop mode), that magnification level rises even higher perceptually to something akin to 1:1. The first shot is in full frame mode; the second is an APS-C mode. Nothing has moved in between the shots:

In this case the camera has just cropped into the image, but if one were using the lens on an APS-C camera the additional magnification becomes even more compelling and useful. The “macro” capabilities (many contest if 1:2 constitutes macro) of the lens are a definite selling feature, and gives you many additional creative options when photographing different scenes…and image quality is quite good at close focus distances (any distance, really).

The lens has an aperture consisting of seven rounded blades. Starting around F5.6 you will start to see the shape of the aperture, but frankly this isn’t a lens where you will see much bokeh at F5.6 anyway!

Overall, the lens design here is clean and simple. There are no obvious bells and whistles, though the nice amount of sealing throughout the lens is a great selling point.

Tamron F050 Autofocus Performance

The OSD in the lens designation stands for “Optimized Silent Drive”, and, as with other lenses that I’ve reviewed with this particular focus system, it is not a highlight for me. It’s worth noting that Tamron has released more named autofocus systems than any lenses maker I’ve ever seen before. USD, RXD, OSD, HLD, DC, and PZD are some that spring to mind from reviews in the last few years alone. That’s not to say that other lens makers don’t experiment with focus motors; it’s just that Tamron likes to name them all! OSD is a somewhat misleading designation, as while I’ll cede the O (optimized) and d (drive), I’m not willing to give them the S (silent). While the focus motor is not like the old scratchy, buzzy micro-motors of the past, there is definitely some clicking that you will hear during focus…particularly when shooting in AF-C and as the focus motor makes tiny adjustments to accommodate for movement either of the camera or the subject. The RXD motors in the FE zooms are quieter and smoother by comparison.

This is, however, a better application of OSD than what I saw in either the 17-35mm F2.8-4 or the 35-150mm F2.8-4 (an otherwise brilliant lens!). The reasons for this is that on DSLRs where manual focus is typically accomplished by a direct coupling to the lens elements, the OSD focus motor had two major limitations: 1) It did not allow for full time manual override, and, since this is rare these days, you would often grab the focus ring and start to turn it and then feel like you were stripping the gears. If you switched to MF, however, there was no damping on the focus ring at all, so you had no resistance, making precise focus difficult. 2) There was no distance window on those lenses, and, because the viewfinder was optical, there was no electronic distance calculator. Manual focus just wasn’t a great option due to the nature of the OSD.

Fortunately those major problems are solved here. Because mirrorless lenses are designed for manual focus input to be routed through the focus motor (not a direct coupling), manual override is available when in DMF mode. All focus modes are supported along with every aspect of Sony’s hybrid AF system (more on Eye AF in a moment). Feel during manual focus isn’t particularly good on the F050, but neither is it completely without resistance as it was on those lenses. During MF there will be both a distance scale (in either the viewfinder or on the LCD) along with an automatic magnification of the focus area to help visually confirm correct focus. As always, of course, you also have the option of employing Sony’s manual focus aids in your camera like colored overlays. So functionally OSD works much better on mirrorless than it did on DSLRs.

But the function of focus still lags behind the RXD focus system of, say, the 17-28mm F2.8 RXD (which covers this focal length). The OSD motor here on the prime lens is noticeably slower and less smooth than the near-instant focus on the RXD lens. It’s fast enough for most situations, but major focus changes feel deliberate rather than speedy (more so in AF-S than AF-C). I think that the RXD motors have more torque and are thus able to focus faster and quieter. They are probably also more expensive to manufacture, which is probably (my guess) as to why they aren’t being employed here.

On a positive front, I had largely excellent focus results with the F050. In real world situations focus was confident and I didn’t run into the pulsing that I sometimes get with wide angle lenses on Sony when shooting landscape scenes with all focus points active.

Low light sensitivity was not exceptional (probably due to the only moderately wide maximum aperture). When a camera has a lens with a larger maximum aperture attached, it is able to open the aperture up during focus and let in as much light as possible, which helps the AF system achieve focus. In this case the limiting principle is the F2.8 aperture which cannot be opened any wider. This may be a consideration if you are often shooting in very low light conditions, though in less extreme, real world situations I didn’t really have any problems. I was able to focus fine with an 9-stop ND filter attached, for example.

Eye AF worked quite well overall, with both human and pet Eye AF locking accurately onto the subject.

In short, I had no concerns with the accuracy of the focus (it was excellent), but focus speed in the OSD lenses leaves me wanting a bit. The 20mm is perhaps the least offender in focus speed, though this is mostly due to the nature of the focal length. The 35mm was the worst in this regard of the three and the 20mm the fastest.

Finally, let’s talk about video for a moment. The F050 will not be a top pick for video shooters who are using on board audio recording. You will DEFINITELY hear some clicking through the onboard mic as the lens makes adjustments. Focus pulls are smooth and didn’t really show pulsing or hunting, but there is a clicking sound that occurs as the motor spools up the torque to start the elements moving for a focus pull. If you are recording audio separately, this isn’t a problem, but you will definitely hear it if you’re recording on camera audio.

Footage from the lens looks great as it the lens is optically strong and the biggest optical flaw (distortion) is corrected during video recording.

Where I will criticize, however, is that when filming a fairly static scene the focus doesn’t always stay still. It doesn’t do major pulses like some lenses, but the F050 is guilty of some unnecessary microadjustments where you can see tiny pulsing on occasion. The fact that you hear a little click when this happens also serves to draw your attention to it.

I did some work on a gimbal, however, and I was perfectly happy with the footage and quality of focus. My conclusion for both videos and stills is that the OSD focus motor works fine for the vast majority of work, but it isn’t as refined in the more difficult margins as some better focus systems including Tamron’s own RXD. To be fair, this is a budget lens, but so is the Samyang AF 18mm F2.8 and its focus system is definitely most sophisticated in both noise and confidence. I would recommend either the Samyang or the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 RXD for video work.

F050 Image Quality

On most fronts there is a lot of good to report here, but first we’ve got to spend some time detailing a serious, serious liability; the Tamron 20mm F2.8 has some seriously bad barrel distortion. There is a mild amount of mustache pattern to the distortion, so it is better to use the correction profile in Adobe or similar software. I dialed in a +42 of correction, which generally straightened the lines out, but with some minor wave remaining. To give some perspective: I used a +4 to correct the 35mm and a +13 for the 24mm, so we are talking about a completely different class of distortion. The first image shows the distortion and vignette in a RAW file, the second my manual correction, and the third has the JPEG which receives in camera correction.

You can see that a minor amount of barrel distortion remains after the in camera correction, though I suspect it wouldn’t be visible at any other distance (the test chart was only a couple of feet away from the camera). If you are a JPEG shooter (or are shooting video), this isn’t a big deal, as the camera corrects everything fairly well, but if you shoot RAW, you will definitely need to use the correction profile to straighten out those lines, and even then it isn’t quite perfect.

I’m aware that the close focus distance of my test chart tends to slightly exaggerate distortion, so I thought, “It won’t be nearly as bad at further distances. It’s just being exaggerated by the close distance to the test target.” So I went into the field with the lens, and discovered that things still weren’t very positive at other focus distances. First of all, here’s the side of a commercial building with a corrugated steel exterior, shot from a more generation 15 feet (5m or so) away:

Ouch! That’s a LOT of distortion. The profile does a good, but not perfect job of correction:

How about at infinity? Here’s one with the horizon just slightly off center:

You can definitely see a bulge. Here’s what it looks like to correct that bulge, then with the crop constrained to those dimensions, and then the JPEG which shows that the in-camera profile manages to save a little more of the image:

If you compose with the horizon near the edge of the frame, things look much, much worse. Here’s the RAW version and the JPEG with corrections compared:

Here’s a look at the more extreme example with, then without the profile, along with the more moderate composition after having the profile applied in post:

I’m typically a fan of what Tamron does with their lenses, but I have to say that I’m disappointed by this performance. I’m somewhat surprised that they released a lens with this degree of distortion. You are definitely going to need to utilize either in-camera or in-post corrections, and this is definitely NOT going to be a good choice for architecture photography.

The Samyang 18mm has a wider focal length but much less distortion, though it does have slightly more vignette. I used an amount of +59 and a midpoint of 10 to correct the vignette from the F050, which is nearly three stops in the corners and a penetration fairly deep into the frame. The Samyang required both more in quantity and a midpoint throughout and also shows a bit of tint in vignette areas.

The comparison against the Tamron 17-28mm is more drastic, with the zoom lens at 20mm showing a tiny bit of pincushion distortion and less vignette as well.

The zoom lens has the advantage of being closer to the middle of the zoom range where optical deficiencies are minimized. Still, if one is deciding between the two lenses, this definitely might push one towards the zoom.

Fortunately everything else is very positive. The sharpness from the lens is quite excellent. Here’s a look at my test chart (I’ve corrected the distortion and vignette as much as possible to give us a clear look at the results):

What follows are three crops from the center, mid-frame, and corner:

What we can see is that there is good sharpness all across the frame along with good contrast that only slips a bit at the extremes. This is a very good performance, and if we compare it to the Samyang, the Tamron is clearly better (better sharpness and contrast) at every point in the frame:

The Samyang has less glaring flaws on some levels, but it also isn’t nearly as sharp at F2.8.

Ironically the strongest competition to the F050 is Tamron’s own zoom lens. Tamron’s zooms for Sony have been very strong, and because they’ve worked at keeping them light and reasonably compact, they actually are more direct competitors to these primes than what would have otherwise been. The zoom lens is a bit sharper and more contrast in the center and corner, with perhaps a slight edge to the prime at mid-frame:

Stepping back from comparisons for a moment, however, it’s important to recognize how good this is on a 42Mpx camera. Here’s a look at a real world shot from the F050 at F2.8 and a pixel level crop:

That amount of sharpness and contrast from what is a budget lens is very impressive. How about for landscape purposes?

Once again that is a very strong performance.

It is also worth noting that the “macro” performance is also excellent. There will be a bit of field curvature at play here, but at the center the resolution is really impressive.

Stopping down to F4 shows a clear uptick in both sharpness and contrast:

This is true across the frame. Stopping down to F5.6 shows a very slight improvement in contrast. At F5.6 all three of our lenses that we are comparing are very similar. The F050 has slightly more contrast than the Samyang, but it is a tiny amount. I would still give the slight edge to the zoom in terms of resolution and contrast across the frame.

Real world resolution from the 20mm F2.8 is impressive at smaller apertures:

Landscape images without a clear horizon line escape the barrel distortion being visible, and they look pretty great:

Longitudinal Chromatic Aberrations (LoCA) are well controlled, with only a tiny amount seen in the most challenging of situations.

Lateral CA is also well controlled, with next to no evidence of green and purple fringing along the edges of real-world images:

I also tested for comatic aberrations (coma), which are most often seen at night with star points, and found that while there is a tiny bit of “wings” growing on stars at the edges of the frame, the F050 actually turns in a fairly strong performance here and delivers very crisp night sky images even at F2.8:

The bokeh of the lens is fine, though a 20mm lens gives you few opportunities to create a lot of defocus.

I’ve saved the greatest strength until last, as Tamron employed their BBAR coatings on this lens to help prevent flaring, and the F050 delivers perhaps the greatest flare resistance I’ve ever seen in a wide angle lens. I was essentially unable to induce any veiling or ghosting of any kind at any aperture value…even while panning across the sun and shooting video. Amazing!

This lens is much more appealing as a video lens than a stills lens on some levels because of the distortion and vignette being corrected in camera, and thus the stellar flare resistance, sharpness, color, and contrast can be shown off to fullest potential.

It’s unfortunate, really, as the lens is so good at so many things, but is cripplingly bad at one thing. Feel free to check out even more photos in the image gallery here.

Conclusion

So here we are trying to render a verdict on a lens that both delights and disappoints. On many levels the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 is a dream lens, combining good resolution with a compact, weather sealed build, a great focal length, and the creative possibilities inherit with a 1:2 magnification…and at a very reasonable price of $349 USD (1/4th the price of the Loxia!).

I’ve knocked the OSD focus motor a bit in each of these reviews (I haven’t liked it in any of the 5 lenses I’ve tested that have it!), but in many ways it is least objective here. No, it is that one glaring flaw of distortion that really plays havoc with my judgment on the lens. This is definitely a lens that needs correction of this optical flaw either in camera or in post, and this is not a lens you should choose if your priority is shooting architecture.

It’s really too bad, as the F050 is otherwise a wonderful little lens. I can give it an easy thumbs up to those of you who prefer to shoot JPEG, as your images will arrive looking great. Likewise for video shooters, who gain a lot of benefits without too many compromises (other than focus being a little noiser than desirable). If you shoot RAW, however, you’ll have to definitely do some work correcting that distortion. I would recommend springing for the Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 RXD if your budget extends that far. It has fewer flaws, more flexibility, and is still quite compact. It’s also more expensive, and money is a real consideration. If the distortion is a deal-breaker for you, and you have a limited budget, consider either the Samyang AF 18mm F2.8 or the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD, which shares many of the strengths of this lens without that one huge flaw.

Pros:

Strong optical performance
Good close up performance
BBAR is awesome = excellent flare resistance
Excellent chromatic aberration control
Good color and contrast
Includes weather sealing
Excellent price to performance ratio

Cons:

Massive amount of barrel distortion
OSD focus motor is not silent nor as fast as some competitors
Lens can do some of micro-pulsing when continuously focusing in stills or video

Gear Used:

Purchase the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 35mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7RIV Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Peak Design Slide Lite: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Peak Design Leash Strap: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year Subscription
Exposure Software X5 (Use Code “dustinabbott” to get 10% anything and everything)
Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.

Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Keywords: Tamron 20mm, withmytamron, Tamron, 20mm, F2.8, OSD, M1:2, Tamron 20mm F2.8 Review, Tamron 20mm 2.8 review, Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD, F050, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Sony a9, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Video, Coma, Real World, Comparison, VS, Sony FE, Tamron 17-28mm F2.8, 17-28mm

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

January 31st, 2020

A couple of months ago I had a look at the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 along with the 35mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 lenses. These lenses were part of a trio of highly similar prime lenses from Tamron at different focal lengths. The third lens was not ready at the time, and it was (to many of us) the most intriguing, as the 20mm focal length is a very practical one for landscape work and/or vlogging on the video front. Fortunately I now have the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 in hand. It is a unique lens with both a wide angle of view and the interesting ability to also do 1:2 macro shots (a 0.50x magnification). This gallery will share photos from the lens that I take during my review period, and you can check back regularly to both see new photos and to check in for my final review of the lens. Photos taken with and review done on both Sony a9 and Sony a7RIII bodies.

Tamron 20mm F2.8 Product Shots

Tamron 20mm F2.8 Samples (Sony a9 and a7RIII)

Purchase the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 35mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7RIV Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Peak Design Slide Lite: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Peak Design Leash Strap: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year Subscription
Exposure Software X5 (Use Code “dustinabbott” to get 10% anything and everything)
Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.

Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Keywords: Tamron 20mm, withmytamron, Tamron, 20mm, F2.8, OSD, M1:2, Tamron 20mm F2.8 Review, Tamron 20mm 2.8 review, Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD, F050, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Sony a9, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Video, Coma, Real World, Comparison, VS, Sony FE, Tamron 17-28mm F2.8, 17-28mm

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART Review

Dustin Abbott

January 27th, 2020

There are few lenses more important to photography than the 24-70mm F2.8 standard zoom, which covers everything from landscape focal lengths to one of the favored focal lengths for portrait photography. Most photographers could do at least 80% of their photography with such a lens. Sigma has followed up their excellent 14-24mm F2.8 DN wide angle zoom with a standard zoom at the 24-70mm focal length. The Sigma 24-70DN (as we’ll call it for brevity) is going to make a lot of people question whether they are willing to pay twice as much for the GM lens ($2198 USD) when the similarly built and performing Sigma is available for $1099 USD.

This is an incredibly useful focal range, going from 24mm:

…to 70mm:

In many ways the new Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART becomes a more direct competitor to the very expensive Sony FE 24-70mm F2.8 G Master lens due to having a more similar focal length, maximum aperture, optical performance, and feature set than the extremely popular Tamron 28-75mm F2.8. At the same time, however, some of the same arguments for choosing the Tamron over the GM lens remain true with the Sigma (size, weight), though the biggest one (price) is much less true. The Tamron is available for $879 while the Sigma costs $1099 (in the US Market), which is obviously a much smaller gap than comparing a $879 lens to a $2198 one. So is the Sigma the lens to buy in the category?

Very possibly, though the answer is a little more nuanced than that. Read on to find out why…

If you would like to watch the review, you can choose either the long format or quick format review videos:

I’ve reviewed the 24-70mm DN on my Sony a7RIII and Sony a9 bodies. Thanks to Sigma Canada for the loaner test lens.

Sigma 24-70DN Build and Handling

While researching the 24-70DN during my review, I came across this language on Sigma’s website: “By exerting superiority in mirrorless camera-dedicated designs, the lens size and weight are successfully reduced…” I’m going to have to give them a Pinocchio or two on this, as that’s only partially true, and even the partial truth isn’t the whole truth. Take a look at this:

A careful look at the specs reveals that the DN lens is actually quite a bit longer than the Canon EF mount version (122.9mm vs 107.6mm) and is a scant 0.2mm narrower (a rounding error). The internal volume of the lens is certainly more, not less. It is considerably lighter (835g vs 1020g), so that’s the true part, though, in full disclosure, the Canon EF version included an OS (optical stabilizer) unit that Sigma is able to forego here due to so many Sony bodies having IBIS (in-body-image-stabilization). The DN lens has a slightly leaner looking profile, but that is primarily due to it being considerably longer rather than actually being narrower.

What is perhaps better marketing is the fact that the Sigma lens is shorter (13mm) and lighter (by 50g) than the Sony GM lens, though that still makes it a fairly large lens. And it is here that the Tamron may still prove more attractive to some perspective buyers, as while it isn’t much shorter (117.8mm, or about 5mm shorter), it is both narrower (15mm) and more than 50% lighter (550g). It uses a 67mm filter size (which is shared across all of Tamron’s other FE lenses) compared to the 82mm of the Sigma. If you often use a smaller bag and want to travel light, the Tamron is noticeably smaller, and that is most obvious when the lens hoods are reversed for storage. The Tamron’s lens hood is a full 2cm (20mm) less wide from edge to edge.

So, if your vision of mirrorless is small and light, the Tamron may still be the more attractive lens despite the Sigma being more pro-grade in its build and features.

And it is more pro-grade. The 24-70DN has a familiar ART series look, though with a little more upscale feel. There’s a coating similar to fluorine on the front element to make it resistant to oils and water (easier to clean). There’s a mix of metals (including brass in the lens mount) and engineered plastics that results in a sturdy, robust build. You’ll find a gasket at the lens mount and a diagram from Sigma reveals that there are a total of 8 seal points throughout the lens, including at the rings and switches.

The Sigma is also more like the GM lens and less like the Tamron when it comes to the feature set. While the Tamron has no switches or controls other than the zoom and focus rings, the Sigma sports a robust feature set. There is an AF/MF switch (always welcome), a focus hold button that can be programmed to a variety of functions in the camera body, and a locking mechanism to prevent the lens from inadvertently zooming.

There is no tendency towards zoom creep, but the lock does help when hiking with the lens to prevent rubbing on the focus ring while moving which might cause it to zoom out.

The focus ring has thick ribs in a rubberized finish, and is (like all lenses actually designed for mirrorless) a “focus-by-wire” focus ring where input on the focus ring is routed through the focus motor. This method has a little less tactile response but Sigma has done a pretty fair job of giving a smooth, evenly damped focus experience. When input is detected the active focus area will automatically magnify in the viewfinder or LCD screen and an on-screen distance scale will appear. It is worth noting that the focus ring is in the opposite position from the Tamron. It is closest to the front of the lens while the zoom ring is closest to the lens mount. What’s odd is that they turn in opposite directions, too, with the Tamron turning the same direction as the Sony zooms I’ve tested and the Sigma turning in the opposite direction.

I found this a little ergonomically disconcerting and noticed it more than I did on the 14-24mm, probably because that lens was internally zooming and required less force to zoom it. People’s opinions vary, obviously, but I actually prefer the zoom position of the Tamron because I found the Sigma’s zoom ring a little close to the camera mount and often inadvertently reached for the focus ring (nearer the front) instead.

One other factor here is that the additional girth of the Sigma 24-70DN means that one doesn’t have much room for their knuckles between the grip and the lens barrel. This is more a Sony problem than a Sigma problem, as the Sony bodies I used for the review (a9 and a7RIII) don’t have enough room between the lens mount and the camera grip for North American sized hands.

Like the Tamron, Sigma utilizes two different minimum focus distances, with the lens able to focus closer (0.18m) at 24mm where it achieves its higher magnification figure (1:2.9 or 0.34x – the same as the Tamron).

Unfortunately this is a little less than useful, as the lens itself is 0.13m long (and MFD measures from the sensor which adds another 0.015m), resulting in not even enough room left to fit your lens hood between you and the subject. Here’s what MFD looks like at 24mm and the resulting degree of magnification:

This is obviously not particularly practical for many situations, though better to have it than not have it. At 70mm the MFD grows to 0.38m and the magnification figure drops to 1:4.5 or 0.22x magnification.

That’s useful, but not as good as the Tamron (0.25x at 75mm) or the Sony GM (0.24x at 70mm). I noted that out in the field I had a very hard time getting a sharp close focus result, and I think I eventually diagnosed the problem. At 70mm there is a massive amount of field curvature up close that creates an effect almost like motion blur in the corners. This image looks like it was shot with a Lensbaby.

This makes composition more of a challenge, so you might want to remember to keep your subject near the center of the frame, though that is obviously less than ideal for composition sometimes. What’s ironic is that the Sigma is actually sharper at 70mm than the Tamron is at 75mm (as we’ll see in a moment), and that’s true in a controlled test (in the center of the frame at least) at MFD. Because of the quirk, however, I actually have a much easier time getting real world sharper images with the Tamron because of the flatter plane of focus.

The Sigma comes with a nice padded case and also a more upscale lens hood than the Tamron. It has a ribbed portion to add both texture for removing it and also a bit of visual distinction and has a rubberized transition surface near where the hood mounts on the lens. This also makes for a nicer tactile experience when removing the hood. There is a locking mechanism that will assure the lens hood doesn’t get accidentally knocked.

Minor complaints aside, however, the lens handles really well. It is a beautifully made, pro-grade lens that feels very quality in the hands. There is very little “extra” about the GM lens compared to the 24-70DN.

Sigma 24-70DN Autofocus Peformance

Sigma’s “made-for-mirrorless” lenses have all shown very positive autofocus performance. The focus motors are quick, quiet, and smooth. That remains the case here, and, like the build, I have much more good than bad to mention.

First of all, autofocus was fast in all tested situations. There’s little drama in focus. The lens simply gets to where it needs to go silently and without fuss. When I did my focus pull test and tried to pick up sound with the on-board microphone, there was just nothing to hear. Focus pulls were smooth, with little visible stepping, and there was little to no settling or pulsing. Video focus was also very stable when I used the 24-70DN to record several of my video episodes, without any unnecessary pulsing or jitters.

Focus speed is excellent, and compares very favorably to 24-70mm lenses I’ve used on DSLRs. When comparing the Sigma with the very speedy Tamron 28-75, I could not really tell a practical difference.

I was also very impressed with the focus in low light situations. I was able to quickly lock focus in a nearly dark room without any obvious slowdown. This shot was taken on a Sony a9 at ISO 25,600 and 1/8th of a second (a -5.33 exposure value).

Not a very artful shot, obviously, but it’s impressive that focus worked so well. Also worth noting is that, thanks to Sony’s excellent IBIS, the shot is very steady at 70mm and 1/8th second. Ironically the stabilization is better in this iteration than the OS (optical stabilizer) on Sigma’s 24-70mm F2.8 OS ART.

I have only one complaint about focus, and that was in close focus situations. The 24-70DN seemed reluctant to focus on close objects at times. I could sometimes resolve this by putting a focus point exactly on where I wanted focus, but there were times (like this one), where I still couldn’t get good focus lock.

This contributed to the problem mentioned above where I found it hard to get good results at close focus distances.

The opposite was true when using Eye AF for either humans or pets. I got flawless focus results in these situations, with not one miss during my review period. Here’s an example of human Eye AF:

…and of pet Eye AF:

It’s worth noting another reality here. The shot I just shared is literally the very first photo that I took with the lens. Thanks to the mirrorless focus systems and excellent AF in a lens like this, there is no need for calibration or “learning” the lens. Just put it on the camera and reap good focus results. If nothing else, this makes my job as a reviewer (and a photographer!) so much easier!

I got excellent focus results in other portrait situations as well:

So the overall conclusion is that focus is excellent here. I’m hoping that the close focus situation can be improved via firmware just like Tamron did with the 28-75, but in most situations I had fantastic focus results.

Sigma 24-70DN Image Quality Breakdown

The reviews were a little mixed when it came to the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 OS ART and its optical performance. I directly compared it with the excellent Canon EF 24-70mm F2.8L II along with the Tamron SP 24-70mm F2.8 G2 lens, and it came out on the bottom of that comparison. I read and watched other such comparisons that drew largely the same conclusion. But Sigma has tightened things up here and delivered a lens with improved optical consistency.

Even at F2.8, it is easy to get really excellent results like this:

I like to start by looking at distortion and vignette. There is definitely some very pronounced barrel distortion at 24mm along with noticeable vignette. Both of these are more pronounced than the Tamron at 28mm (first chart), but as you can see from the second chart, there is a noticeable difference in framing width between 24mm and 28mm.

While at the time of my review period there wasn’t yet a standard correction profile in Lightroom, both JPEG and video receive in camera corrections (as you can see from the third image in the series above). This profile does a fairly good job of correcting for distortion and vignette, though I don’t think this lens would be a great pick for architecture or interiors because there is too much correction needed.

I said it in my review of the Tamron, and I’ll say it here: I would definitely take the extra 4mm on the wide end over the extra 5mm on the telephoto end when comparing these two zoom ranges. I understand why Tamron did what they did (it’s the reason why we got a smaller and lighter lens while retaining strong optical performance), but Sigma has addressed the challenges of the focal range more directly even though that required them to build a larger and heavier lens. The good news for us all is that we get to choose which approach better suits our needs.

The distortion turns to mild pincushion distortion of varying degrees over the rest of the zoom range. The vignette improves as the lens is stopped down, though some remains even at smaller apertures. Logic would dictate that the much larger front element of the Sigma would give it an advantage over the smaller Tamron in terms of vignette, but that wasn’t actually the case in my comparisons.

Both lenses are very sharp at 24/28mm and F2.8. I saw little to distinguish the two, with some give and take depending on where I looked in the frame. Both lenses showed good evidence of centering, with all four corners delivering roughly equal results. I did these formal tests on a 42Mpx Sony a7RIII. I did feel that the Sigma delivered slightly better contrast results at the wide end of the focal range, but, as you can see from this crop from my test chart, there was little distinction to be made:

Real world 24mm F2.8 results were excellent:

Little changes in the center and mid-frame at F4, but the corners definitely improve through both improved contrast and a vignette lift.

There’s a similar improvement at F5.6. Landscape images at 24mm and smaller apertures are detailed and rich.

At 35mm, the most notable difference between the two lenses is that the Tamron delivers a clearly brighter image with equal settings. The 82mm front element vs the 67mm of the Tamron would seem to favor the Sigma, but I did note a trend through the zoom range that the Tamron delivered a brighter image with equal settings. This could be a side effect of more elements (19 Elements in 15 Groups) of the Sigma vs the Tamron’s 15 Elements in 12 Groups, or it could be something else that I’m missing.

I experimented and found that it wasn’t quite 1/3 stop difference. Enough to be noticeable side by side, but probably not a “big deal”. I saw little difference between the two lenses in terms of sharpness or contrast though I looked long and hard. Both were excellent. Little is gained in the center of the frame when stopping the lens down, though the corners will definitely improve a bit.

Let’s step back from the vacuum of the test chart, though, and look at the real world. Real world sharpness and contrast are excellent even at F2.8 at 35mm on the 24-70DN.

At 50mm, the Tamron enjoys its biggest advantage, and it is an incredibly slight one. Textures look slightly better defined on the Tamron, though I suspect the slightly better light transmission is probably the single biggest distinguishing factor. By F4 the 24-70DN’s image has brightened up beautiful and the contrast pops in both the center and corners. Another very strong performance.

As you might have guessed already, real world results at 50mm look excellent:

It is at 70mm (vs 75mm) where Sigma gets its revenge. It is easily stronger than the Tamron, and this is in fact the most noticeable difference between the two lenses optically, and arguably at one of the most important points in the focal range. There are only minor gains in the center stopping the lens down, but the corners get to fantastic levels by F5.6.

As you might imagine by this point, real world results look great whatever aperture you choose.

70mm accounted for about 36% of my shots with the lens, 24mm for about 24%, leaving everything else accounting for less than 40% of the total…and I suspect my results are pretty similar to where many people will use the lens. It’s worth noting that Sigma has delivered a very consistent performance in terms of sharpness and contrast across the zoom range, which is fantastic. It’s not hard to get beautiful results with this lens.

There are a few remaining areas of strength and weakness. The greatest area of weakness is in flare resistance. I found the lens to be particularly susceptible to veiling and ghosting, with some vulnerability on the wide end and steadily worse performance towards the telephoto end. When I did my video test of panning the lens across the sun the results were pretty brutal, and you can see some of that even in the stills here. Hiding the sun a bit helps (see the last two in the series), though you will have to be wise with your composition with the 24-70DN and recognize this is a vulnerability.

The Sigma has a very high blade count (11 blades), which gives it a slightly busy 22 pointed sunburst/sunstar effect, though the trade off is that it retains a more circular aperture shape when stopped down.

There is a bit of LoCa (Longitudinal Chromatic Aberrations) that remain uncorrected (green and purple fringing), though it is mild and not a real issue.

I often prefer a slight bit of LoCA remaining to allow for softer bokeh. This is an area where the 24-70DN will be far less controversial than the Tamron, which has more unique bokeh (particularly on the telephoto end) that will either delight or dismay according to taste. The Sigma has fairly conventional bokeh which is softer and worked nicely in the various situations I shot in. No 24-70mm lens is going to be replacement for a high end prime in this metric, but I think Sigma has done a pretty good job of mixing sharpness where it should be with softness where it should be.

The 24-70DN does a fairly good job for a standard zoom when shooting the night sky. There’s a bit of coma along the edges of the frame (see the crop below), but it’s fairly well controlled and the results look quite good.

Standard zooms are often asked to do a little bit of everything, and I think this is within the capabilities of the lens.

So, all in all, Sigma has done a pretty great job of the 24-70DN. It shows some of the familiar weaknesses of standard zooms (distortion, vignette), has one area of true weakness (flare resistance), but does a better job with sharpness, contrast, and bokeh than many competitors. That’s not an easy thing to do in a lens that must cover everything from wide angle to short telephoto. If you would like to see more photos from the lens, please visit the image gallery here.

Conclusion:

As noted in the introduction, few lenses are as indispensable as a competent 24-70mm F2.8 lens, and the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART rates as one of the most competent of its kind. It is extremely sharp across the zoom range, has good bokeh, and backs up the optical performance with quick, accurate autofocus. There are few photography subjects that one cannot cover with a lens like this.

The greatest optical vulnerability is the less than stellar flare resistance, so be careful to mitigate this shortcoming through careful composition if your subject is backlit.

The 24-70DN is undoubtedly going to be a disrupter. To this point, the market has been bifurcated between the cheaper Tamron 28-75mm F2.8 RXD ($879 USD) and the much more expensive Sony FE 24-70mm F2.8 GM. ($2198 USD) The Sigma is more like the latter in character but priced ($1099 USD) closer to the former. It will give potential buyers of the Tamron pause, as they could get a better built and slightly more competent lens for a price that is not unreasonably higher. The Tamron still maintains the distinction of being smaller and considerably lighter (and not giving up much of anything optically), so I suspect it will still have its market. The Sony GM lens is more likely to feel the brunt, however, as the Sigma has almost all of its build quality, features, and performance at literally half the price. There will still be some who mistrust third party lenses and want “the best”, but I suspect that there will be a fairly strong market for the Sigma among those who do the math and decide that the Sigma strikes the best balance of price-to-performance ratio for them. At the end of the day, however, it is the Sony consumers that are the winners here. We get to choose between three outstanding options covering the standard zoom range…and there really isn’t a bad choice to be made. #blessed

Pros:

Pro-grade build competes with Sony GM
Weather sealing throughout lens
Fast, quiet, and accurate autofocus
Eye AF works well
Good image sharpness across the focal range and image frame
Good color and contrast
Fairly good coma performance
Good bokeh for a standard zoom
Excellent price-to-performance ratio

Cons:

Pronounced barrel distortion at 24mm
Poor flare resistance
Fairly large and heavy
Focus quality isn’t as good at very close focus distances

Purchase the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7RIV Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Peak Design Slide Lite: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Peak Design Leash Strap: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year Subscription
Exposure Software X5 (Use Code “dustinabbott” to get 10% anything and everything)
Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.

Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Keywords: Sigma, 24-70mm, Sigma 24-70 DN Review, Sigma 24-70mm DN, 24-70mm DG DN, Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 Review, Sony, 24-70mm, F2.8, 2.8, FE, DG, DN, Sony FE, Tamron 28-75mm, Tamron 28-75mm F2.8, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a9, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Eye AF, Video, Coma, Standard Zoom, Real World, Comparison, VS

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

January 18th, 2020

There are few lenses more important to photography than the 24-70mm F2.8 standard zoom, which covers everything from landscape focal lengths to one of the favored focal lengths for portrait photography. Most photographers could do at least 80% of their photography with such a lens. Sigma has followed up their excellent 14-24mm F2.8 DN wide angle zoom with a standard zoom at the 24-70mm focal length. In many ways the new Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART becomes a more direct competitor to the very expensive Sony FE 24-70mm F2.8 G Master lens due to having a more similar focal length, maximum aperture, optical performance, and feature set than the extremely popular Tamron 28-75mm F2.8. This gallery gives you a look at the lens and also with the kinds of photos it is capable of producing. I’ll be reviewing the 24-70mm DN on my Sony a7RIII and Sony a9 bodies, and you can see photos from both cameras below. Stay tuned for my ongoing coverage.

Images of the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART

Images taken with the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART

Purchase the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Sony a9 Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7RIV Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Peak Design Slide Lite: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Peak Design Leash Strap: Peak Design Store | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
BenQ SW271 4K Photo Editing Monitor – B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud 1-Year Subscription
Exposure Software X5 (Use Code “dustinabbott” to get 10% anything and everything)
Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Purchasing your gear through B&H and these links helps fund this website and keeps the articles coming. You can also make a donation here if you would like. Visit my Amazon page for some of my gear of choice! Thank you for your support.

Great News! I can now offer a 5% discount on all purchases at Amplis Foto, Canada’s Leading Photographic Supplier. Please enter discount code: AMPLIS52018DA in your cart. It is good for everything in your cart, and is stackable with other coupons, too! It will take 5% off your entire order! Proceeds go towards keeping this site going and providing you with new reviews!

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Purchase the Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART @ B&H Photo: https://bhpho.to/2tlHuuT | Amazon https://amzn.to/3anhwaP | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2R59ED8 | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/3apK4Am | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/38usQQX | Ebay http://bit.ly/24_70DN

Keywords: Sigma, 24-70mm, Sigma 24-70 DN Review, Sigma 24-70mm DN, 24-70mm DG DN, Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 Review, Sony, 24-70mm, F2.8, 2.8, FE, DG, DN, Sony FE, Tamron 28-75mm, Tamron 28-75mm F2.8, Dustin Abbott, Review, Autofocus, Sony a9, Sony a7RIII, Sony A7RIV, Sony a7R IV, Hands On, Video Test, Portrait, Eye AF, Video, Coma, Standard Zoom, Real World, Comparison, VS

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G Review

Dustin Abbott

June 8th, 2020

Sony FE20G Build and Handling

Autofocus and Video Performance

Sony FE20G Image Quality

Conclusion

Pros:

Cons:

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this website? Use these links to shop at:

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Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/374NqaK | Amazon https://amzn.to/2Y7VuDx | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2XB7FKh | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/2BCI0s6 | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/2MyndYS | Ebay https://bit.ly/20GDLA

Related Articles at DustinAbbott.net

Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

June 5th, 2020

Images of the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G

Images taken with the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this website? Use these links to shop at:

B&H Photo | Amazon | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Purchase the Sony FE 20mm F1.8 G @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/374NqaK | Amazon https://amzn.to/2Y7VuDx | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2XB7FKh | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/2BCI0s6 | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/2MyndYS | Ebay https://bit.ly/20GDLA

Related Articles at DustinAbbott.net

Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master Review

Dustin Abbott

March 3rd, 2020

Sony 24GM Build and Handling

Autofocus and Video Performance

Sony 24GM Image Quality

Conclusion

Pros:

Cons:

Purchase the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 GM @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this website? Use these links to shop at:

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Sony FE 24mm F1.4 G Master Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

February 27th, 2020

Images of the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM

Images taken with the Sony 24mm F1.4 GM

Purchase the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 GM @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this website? Use these links to shop at:

B&H Photo | Amazon | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Visit Dustin’s Amazon Storefront and see his favorite gear

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

Purchase the Sony FE 24mm F1.4 GM @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/2wK3wsh | Amazon https://amzn.to/2HZX8zH | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/2wQUji7 | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/3c9Dejn | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/3cd0JrO | Ebay http://bit.ly/Sony24GMda

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Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 (F050) Review

Dustin Abbott

February 12th, 2020

Tamron F050 Build, Handling, and Design

Tamron F050 Autofocus Performance

F050 Image Quality

Conclusion

Pros:

Cons:

Purchase the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 35mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

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Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 Image Gallery

Dustin Abbott

January 31st, 2020

Tamron 20mm F2.8 Product Shots

Tamron 20mm F2.8 Samples (Sony a9 and a7RIII)

Purchase the Tamron 20mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 24mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Purchase the Tamron 35mm F2.8 OSD M1:2 from B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Use Code “DUSTINHDR” to get $10 off ($15 CDN) any Skylum product: Luminar, Aurora, or AirMagic

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Sigma 24-70mm F2.8 DN ART Review