My Sony FE 28-70 OOS "Kit" Lens is a Winner!

[Sony Guy]

I have found that my Sony FE 28-70 "Kit" lens that came bundled with my original a7 body (which I sold off and got a a7II), has turned out to be a real little champ. I've put it thru the paces at various apertures and focal lengths with test patterns and found it rivals  my "G" and even Zeiss glass. Maybe I just lucked up and got a sweetheart here, but it's resolution is incredible. Have you Guys out there had good luck with this lens or is my situation just a fluke? 

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

[Lefty]

I've argued for years that what we're usually looking at is more sensor resolution than lens. Once the lens hits what the sensor can resolve it does not matter how much sharper one lens is than another. The G and Zeiss glass is absolutely sharper, but it does not make much difference to us. We can't see it. In 2006 MHohner did a comparison between a G lens and the kit lens on an A100. You could not see an appreciable difference. It's still up on his site, and still valid.

 

Pixel density on the A7/A7ii/A99 is just about what the A100 was on APS-C. Due to technical advances the new FF sensor resolves some better, but not profoundly. A7 density is 2.8mp per square cm, A100 is 2.68mp. In comparison the A6000/A77 24mp APS-C sensors have 6.63mp density. That's the equivalent of a 50+mp FF sensor.

 

From work addicted2light has done (see elsewhere on this site) it looks like most lenses we use will resolve 24mp FF, many will do 36mp and the good ones (like Minolta primes/Gs) will do 50mp. An Otus will stand up to a 100mp sensor, but 3/4 of that is lost between the pixels of a 24mp sensor.

 

New lenses usually are not a lot optically sharper than older lenses, but do have better contrast through modern coatings. That makes them look sharper. It is easy to fix contrast in older lenses in post. But, you're shooting a modern lens, so it doesn't matter to you.

 

I believe you've called the lens equivalent of the Emperor's New Clothes. Be prepared for the slings and arrows of the hi dollar, hi status, lens fans. I'd suggest you believe your eyes and enjoy your camera, lenses and coins in your pocket.

[Golem]

`   

  

Lotsa peeps get their jollies by dumping on kit lenses.

 

Nothing generally inferior about kit lens IQ. They feel

cheap and klunky and wobbly, and they tend to be of

modest aperture, so they attract insults. The zooms 

tend to show distortion if you cancel the firmware fix,

or your lens is newer than your firmware. No big deal.

 

OTOH, benefits go beyond high IQ for low cost. They

are light weight, and tend to have very accurate focus

in dimmer light, cuz their big aperture, speed-motored

cousins are racing too fast thru too little DOF to catch

the moment of focus as it occurs ... so they overshoot

and, hunt, and refocus.

  

I don't think it's anything flukish that you have a really

good kit lens. You can spend 10X the price of it and

get a lens thaz maybe twice as good, and that "twice

as good"-ness will show up in your pix about 10% of

the time ... maybe more if you're always working near

the limits of craft, but how much more ? Not 10X more.

But those whose working conditions require a fast 5X

wide-to-tele, sooper speed ultra-wide prime, or other

tour-de-force of lens engineering hafta ignore the low

cost-to-benefit ratio and pay up. Count your blessings.

 

    

Opinions to the contrary, or musings as to my sanity,  

are very welcome. I'm only here for the entertainment. 

  

` 

[Daryl Berg]

I love my kit lens, I also have an A7 with the 28-70 and have consistently had excellent results. Although I would have loved for it to be a couple of stops faster but nothing that raising the speed or ISO did not fix. The reality is that with todays lenses they are all designed to give optimum results most of the time. If you go to DXO labs and see the results for this lens compared to a Zeiss 24-70 you will see it nearly matches the test numbers for hundreds less. I also have a NEX-6 with kit lens and have also received excellent results from this combo. I would guess that Sony does a lot of testing with lens design before matching it to their cameras. 

[nippa]

Unless there is an enormous variation in assembly quality , I just can't account for all the negativity I read.

I just love mine even for edge sharpness.

 

I have a theory that when a camera manufacturer produces a new line of cameras it cannot afford to add a lacklustre kit lens.

When m4/3 was introduced , Panasonic added an excellent 14-45 lens to kick the system off and then when it got established it fell back to a less inspiring 14-42mm.

The fact that this 28-70 was only introduced with the A7 might be indicative of how well it is matched to the sensor and was designed to impress new adopters.

If so , it impresses me.

I love it's weight ,it's size , performance and it's price even though I use A Mount Zeiss lenses.

[MichaelComeau]

I thought I was the only one that loved the kit lens! Amazing bargain for $300 (when bought with camea).