New Sony lenses and 70-400mm G

[bfitzgerald]

http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/sr5-70-4 ... ing-in-q2/

Never used a 70-400mm so no idea if that was up to par
Not sure what a new 70-200mm f2.8 will bring v the older one.
Or where this 50mm f1.4 Zeiss will fit in (I assume it won't replace the 50mm f1.4 purely on cost)

18-270mm does not interest me much
Would have loved to see a 70-200mm f4, 24mm f2.8 is missing too, as is a 35mm FF lens (not the £1000 one!)
Sony also have no current 28mm prime, 85mm f1.8 also needed, no up to date UWA zoom either, updated 16-80mm was also expected by some

I would think a few pancake primes mixed in could have some appeal too

Thoughts?

[Philip]

The lens I most miss having now switched to Nikon is the 70-400mm. It was a super piece of kit, great on FF and spectacular on APSC, and the Nikon 80-400 isn't a patch on it. Would assume that any upgrade to it is not for optical reasons.......

Philip

[mvanrheenen]

And yet again they discontinue a product without bringing a replacement on the market. Weird business strategy.

I agree with Philip about the 70-400G, it is a top class piece of glass. Maybe they'll upgrade SSM for faster focussing.

Mark

[bfitzgerald]

Maybe they feel they have enough stocks of 70-400mm's to last until Q2?
I do think they are being pretty slow at addressing some of the more obvious gaps.

If they're thinking of stopping the normal 50mm f1.4 and replacing it with I assume the 50mm f1.4 Zeiss which is likely going to be quite a bit more expensive that would be a bit silly (not saying they will but you never know!)

[David Kilpatrick]

The replacement tele lenses will be weatherproof and have a new coating similar to Pentax and Nikon - water and oil repellant. That much I can work out from garbled info I've had at photokina and from non-Sony sources. I think there will also be a new 70-300mm unless they have decided to make this a 70-200mm. The replacament for the 70-300mm SSM G was supposed to be a Carl Zeiss labelled lens but nothing seems to have happened to that plan.

I've got the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 here in Canon mount. All I can say is - what a shift up for Sigma. It's an interesting strategy, making what could be the best in the field at this spec from any maker.

David

[Ken M]

How does one get on the list for a prototype tester???

[bfitzgerald]

The new 300mm f2.8 II has turned up with
Nano AR Coating with nano-precision structure, and weather sealing.

Pre order on WEX
http://www.wexphotographic.com/buy-sony ... s/p1532765

The price is well over the old 300mm f2.8 and well above Canikon versions

[Heidfirst]

£5799 at Park Cameras. dearer than the Canon but not by much & the Canon has been out for 18 months.
Sony just don't have the nos. to benefit from economies of scale on products like these - they probably order a couple hundred lenses in a batch when Canon is probably doing a couple thousand.

Also faster AF motor (& probably better optimised for video use too).

[bfitzgerald]

Price is better than WEX (hit and miss for price at times)
I know Tamron get some stick for for having the same price for all their lenses ala non VC A Mount ones.
But would I bet a bit nuts to suggest that Sony also benefit from not having to make VR/IS in lens, and this could "maybe" help on the prices.

70-200mm f2.8 is one obvious example I was playing with the non IS Canon version, it's around £900 v £1500 for the Sony one. It would seem to me that maybe Sony have a way of attracting users, (ie price v the IS/VR competitors) but chose not to do so.

[Heidfirst]

I know Tamron get some stick for for having the same price for all their lenses ala non VC A Mount ones.
But would I bet a bit nuts to suggest that Sony also benefit from not having to make VR/IS in lens, and this could "maybe" help on the prices.

I don't know why Tamron remove VC from Alpha mount lenses (could be Sony pressure, could be that there actually is an argument that you get sharper images with fixed elements - no parking errors - or something else). But doing so actually incurs additional R&D/engineering/parts cost & on relatively low volume SKUs.
Sony only have to engineer it once (as do Canon & Nikon) but I suspect that the volumes of scale production savings that they have over Sony probably mean that they are no dearer to produce & maybe even cheaper despite having additional parts.

70-200mm f2.8 is one obvious example I was playing with the non IS Canon version, it's around £900 v £1500 for the Sony one. It would seem to me that maybe Sony have a way of attracting users, (ie price v the IS/VR competitors) but chose not to do so.

Well, yes all things being equal but they aren't. Sony don't have the volume for the economies of scale that Canon & Nikon can lever & I would bet that that impacts the top end more than the bottom.
From what I understand the money in DSLRs/lenses is made in the volume end of the market - A3x, A5x level. A7x & above & FF together are under 10% of the market so you would expect Sony to aim for low & mid-level first & there they are quite competitive. As I've said before I'm pretty certain that Sony have a capacity issue for lens making & from hints from the likes of DK & others it appears that at least sub components if not entire production of some lines are being sub contracted out which adds in an extra margin thereby increasing RRP.
& of course there is also supply & demand matching price adjustment. Take the RX1, probably 90%+ of people say that it's expensive for what it is & yet I'm told that there is a stock shortage ...

At the end of the day only Sony truly know the costs, implications etc.& we either have to decide to live with their decisions or decide to move on.
If it was easy we would all be running multi million dollar companies

[classiccameras]

I'm only guessing here, but do you need a lens with built in VC when you are using a Sony body that already has built in IS. It was advised by one review site that if you had a lens with IS on your Sony body, it would be wise to switch off one of the systems so they don't clash and work against each other.

In 2 reviews of the Tamron 17-50 lenses, one with VC and one without, Photozone found the non VC lens performed optically better than the VC version.
I think the Polish site Lenstip also found this to be the case.

I suspect because Sony DSLR/SLT bodies have built in IS, Tamron thought it unneceassary to fit VC in A mount lenses., just a thought, could be wrong.

[bfitzgerald]

Sony might not have the volume, but they're also missing out on potential sales. Maybe they could charge £1300 for a 70-200mm f2.8 v the £1500 for the Canon IS one. To charge as much for a non IS lens seems like a poor way to promote mount adoption. This could be said on other lenses in the range too.

I think they've failed to exploit a potential appeal for in body AS/IS
Most of the pull comes from buying legacy A mount lenses (mix in a few non IS Tamron's/Sigma's) which gain in body AS, and of course Sony make no profits on that.
Looking at some other lenses the 16-80mm CZ is long overdue an update (I would suggest SSM and better build) it's a whopping £550 odd just grossly overpriced.

[alphaomega]

Classicameras wrote

I suspect because Sony DSLR/SLT bodies have built in IS, Tamron thought it unneceassary to fit VC in A mount lenses., just a thought, could be wrong.

When the new 18-270 Tamron zoom with motor came out in Sony A mount without VC I actually e-mailed Tamron to express my surprise and point out that leaving in VC would have been great when using this lens on a NEX body. Never got a response and only understood why when Tamron released their 18-200 with VR for NEX. I actually fancied buying the 18-270 for use on both my A580 and NEX-5 with LA-EA2 for video.
Not sure that Sony actually know what they are doing. They have released the A99 FF and per SAR delaying further A-mount FF cameras focusing instead on FF NEX with E-mount. At the same time they release an expensive 300mm F2.8 lens (for whom?). I would have expected full ahead on FF A-mount to justify these upgrades on essentially professional lenses or dumping FF A-mount and going full steam on NEX APS-C and FF and sufficient lenses for both sensor sizes. To me it does not look like strategy, but rather at "muddling through as the wind blows". Are they trying to be "all things to all people" with limited resources in capital and production capability?

[Heidfirst]

I'm only guessing here, but do you need a lens with built in VC when you are using a Sony body that already has built in IS.

No, you don't need it but it's nice to have the option for which as 1 or the other can perform better under different circumstances.

[Heidfirst]

Sony might not have the volume, but they're also missing out on potential sales. Maybe they could charge £1300 for a 70-200mm f2.8 v the £1500 for the Canon IS one. To charge as much for a non IS lens seems like a poor way to promote mount adoption. This could be said on other lenses in the range too.

I'm guessing but I wouldn't be surprised if Canon have something like 10x the demand for pro level lenses & that is going to have an effect on production costs & hence pricing.
& part of the getting demand for pro level lenses is of course having pro level bodies & however you look at it both Canon & Nikon have at least 2x if not 3x those.

Looking at some other lenses the 16-80mm CZ is long overdue an update (I would suggest SSM and better build) it's a whopping £550 odd just grossly overpriced.

I'm sure that Sony will do a complete transition of lenses to SAM/SSM over time. I also understood that later 16-80 production seemd to have improved build over early?
There is already the 16-50/2.8 which you can argue is a replacement or even an upgrade.
& overpriced compared to what? I'm not sure that Canon/Nikon equivalents are any cheaper (where they exist)?