Where are our quality E mount lenses?

[bossel]

Its true I'd also like to see more lenses. Saw a used A-mount 50/1.8 yesterday for 80 euros incl. pp and was close to buying it. Then I remembered how little use my now sold 50/1.7 got and resisted. It would be nice to see this kind of offers for the NEX sometimes.
Will certainly get the 55-200, no sure about the 24/2.0, will depend on the price. The 30mm macro is of no interest for me.

[Birma]

I bought a Minolta MD 45 f/2 yesterday and I haven't even got a Nex yet I think I have a lot of older manual lenses to go through before I worry about a new Zeiss in e-mount. The E 55-200 may tempt me if it is sub £250.

[RedTail_Panther]

The 30mm macro is of no interest for me.

I thought I was the only one who felt this way....

[Marcell Nikolausz]

The 30mm macro is of no interest for me.

I thought I was the only one who felt this way....

I will buy the 30mm macro for sure!

[pakodominguez]

The 30mm macro is of no interest for me.

I thought I was the only one who felt this way....

I will buy the 30mm macro for sure!

I'm still thinking about buying this lens or not... I would love a 85 to 105 mm Macro instead... I asked yesterday at Adorama hen they'll get this lens, they told me they expect the first shipment in two weeks. I'll go to the store and see how it looks like before I decide if I'll spend 250 on that lens, or if I better save that money and wait until the 24mm shows up.

[Marcell Nikolausz]

I would also prefer a longer macro lens (60mm would be the best for me), but the 30mm one is also fine. I have a 50mm sigma macro and the 100mm minolta macro. They are very good lenses and I can use them via an adapter but they are quite bulky on the nex. I always wanted to try the new 30mm alpha macro lens but with my other two macros it just didn't make much sense.
Now this is a good opportunity to try this focal length as a macro option. I will probably use it mainly for close-up. I think it will be good to show small animals and plants together with the environment.

Cheers

Marcell

[Mark K]

If you read LL's recent review of G3, you will notice that they commented that Sony is not capable of producing quality lenses small enough for NEX cameras.

[agorabasta]

The problem is that making a small high-quality lens for the Nex makes no sense whatsoever given the current poor Nex bodies.

It's only the big lenses like those made for the a-mount plus the size of adapter that only may bring out the real quality out of the current Nex toy bodies.
Mind also that, some a-mount lenses, like the 16-105 DT, already produce horrible corners with high-contrast scenes when used on a700, leave alone the a55/33 with their totally inadequate sensor toppings (the same as used in the Nexes).

So it's all really simple: no high-quality body - never a high-quality lens for that odd mount. As simple as that.

[artington]

If you read LL's recent review of G3, you will notice that they commented that Sony is not capable of producing quality lenses small enough for NEX cameras.

Actually, that's not what he said.

What he said was this (direct quote)

"This too is the Achilles heel of the NEX system. Sony has managed to make an APS-C camera smaller than an MFT. But, the lenses still need to cover a larger APS-C sized sensor and therefore are limited in how small they can be made."

Which is not quite the same thing

[alphaomega]

So it's all really simple: no high-quality body - never a high-quality lens for that odd mount. As simple as that.

I am certainly not an expert, but even that Nikon enthusiast Thom admitted that NEX produced the best result of all these micro cameras. He did not like the menus but neither do I. I find the quality produced by my NEX-5 16mm, W/A converter and 18-55mm very satisfactory and the performance at higher ISO settings is most welcome. I mostly shoot at ISO400 now and get sharp images. To me IQ is everything and in that regard NEX seems top of the pops in the micro segment. Hoping for a NEX-7 with EVF and also now an external microphone provision (including Alpha hot shoe).

[Mark K]

If you read LL's recent review of G3, you will notice that they commented that Sony is not capable of producing quality lenses small enough for NEX cameras.

Actually, that's not what he said.

What he said was this (direct quote)

"This too is the Achilles heel of the NEX system. Sony has managed to make an APS-C camera smaller than an MFT. But, the lenses still need to cover a larger APS-C sized sensor and therefore are limited in how small they can be made."

Which is not quite the same thing

Thank you for the clarifying this point

[agorabasta]

Small lenses for the Nex may be developed. Many good examples of small high-quality lenses were produced by Leitz/Leica over decades. Even the SEL 16mm is a good enough lens under certain conditions.

But I insist that the current Nex sensor assy design is the primary limitation. There's simply too much of internal reflections happening inside that sandwich.
And it leads to bad corner smearing with high-contrast scenes.

Below are two corner crops, one made with a Nex5, another with NexC3. The same scene, the same time, the same SEL 16/2.8 lens. Notice that the C3 looks much better, but still quite ugly. Much the same happens both with the 18-55 and the 18-200 native lenses with the only exception that there's almost no smearing, only the ugly purplish ghosting.

[agorabasta]

Good news

Seems like they really nearly eliminated the corner smearing at high-contrast with their new Nex-C3.

So I renamed the raw EXIF tag SonyModelID to SLT-A55V and fed the files into Lr3.4.1, below are the 100% crops from the both upper corners at f/8 with SEL 16f2.8. As you may see, there's hardly any smearing left, only the purple shadow ghost remains there. I'd say it's about the same quality one may expect from an a55/a580 when using some SAL 16-105 (that lens has its exit pupil too close to the lens exit throat).

[douglasf13]

More evidence that the C3 sensor is improved at the edges: http://forum.xitek.com/showthread.php?t ... genumber=1

[alphaomega]

I wonder where mine is. Have just placed an order with Warehouseexpress.com for Sony's SEL55-200 to go with my NEX-5, making use of Sony's £30 cash-back offer. I just hope that it will turn up at some stage before the offer expires. As it is made in Thailand I may have to wait some time. That lens will kind of round off my NEX system with NEX-5, 16mm pancake, W/A converter, 18-55mm and 55-200mm tele. Coverage from 18 to 300mm in 35mm speak and with SSS in the two zooms where it matters most. I have an old Minolta 50mm makro lens and NEX adapter so close up is also catered for. The NEX-5 is a great little camera as long as the AF speed does not put you off. I will purchase the NEX-7 next spring though and relegate NEX-5 to back-up.