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not only for online content creators,
but also for commercial purposes as well.
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later in the video.
Before we can really do this video,
there's something that I need to do.
(calm music)
What's up, my man,
how are you?
- How's it goin'?
- Good to see you.
- Good to see you.
- [Dunna] Good to meet you in person.
- [Jacob] Here it is, 16-35.
There you go, brother.
- [Dunna] Nice, what do you think of it?
- Dude that lens like,
If I had one lens, it
would be that one for sure
- [Dunna] And compared to,
'cause you have the Tamron,
this one, the 17-28.
- Yeah I like the Tamron,
and I'll probably be
getting rid of the 16-35
because the price difference,
but if I could hold on
to one lens forever,
it would be that one, man.
- Alright, we have officially acquired
the Sony G-Master 16-35 F2.8
from my man Jacob there.
Now we can officially get on
with the ultimate, wide
angled, full-frame lens
comparison for Sony.
(intense music)
(guitar music)
Alright, so we got five lenses here.
Wait a second.
Alright, so we've got four lenses here,
all full-frame
and all in that ultra-wide zoom range.
We got the Sony GMaster 16-35 F2.8,
Sony Zeiss 16-35 F4,
the Tamron 17-28 F2.8,
and this big guy over here
is the Sigma 14-24 F2.8.
Now, it would take me much longer
than you would want to
watch in this one video
to do a full review on
all four of these lenses.
So, what we're gonna do
is more of like a general comparison
of what these all have to offer
and why you might wanna
go with one or the other.
We're gonna cover price, size, weight,
focal range, build quality,
and we'll even do a little bit
of quality test in the end,
but I will also leave some
stuff in the description
if you wanna go check
out some other videos
that do more in depth looks
at all of these lenses.
Alright, let's start
things off with price.
So, first we got the Sony GMaster
which comes in at $2200,
being not only the most
expensive of the bunch,
but also twice as expensive,
actually more than twice as expensive
as the cheapest one which is the Tamron
coming in at only $900.
Then very close in the middle,
we've got the Sony Zeiss F4 which is $1350
and then the Sigma which is $1400.
As far as size and weight goes,
the Tamron is coming in as
the smallest and lightest
at only 420g,
very similar in length to the Sony Zeiss,
which comes in at 518g,
and then surprisingly enough,
the GMaster comes in at 680g,
whereas the Sigma comes in at 795g,
making it the heaviest of the bunch.
That is a whole lot of lens.
As far as the length,
they're not that far off,
but the GMaster and the Sigma
are a little bit taller than
the Tamron and the Zeiss.
If you've already got a bunch of filters,
the Tamron takes a 67mm thread,
the Sony Zeiss take a 72mm thread,
the GMaster comes in with an 82mm thread,
and the sigma doesn't have a thread.
This is one of the things that
stands out about the Sigma,
because the element on
the front is so bulbous,
this lens hood is actually built right on,
you cannot take this off
and therefore you can't
have screw-on filters,
you have to get some kind of a system
to go on the front for square filters
or however you wanna do it.
But that being said,
I believe that that is actually built
so that you can have some kind
of filter system in the back.
However, I don't have any kind of a filter
that would go in there,
so I have no way to test it.
And of course, if you already
own a bunch of filters,
that doesn't really help you.
Alright, lets talk about range.
The two kind of standard ones
or what I would consider
the standard range
would be the 16-35.
Now we've got the GMaster F2.8,
and the Sony Zeiss at four
that are both at that.
Tamron coming in at 17.
So slightly not as wide to 28,
so slightly not as telephoto,
and I'm 90% sure
that the reason they
went with a shorter range
was to be able to keep it
smaller, lighter and cheaper.
So you're getting a little
bit less range out of that,
but you're not paying
nearly as much money for it.
Then we've got the 14-24,
I know Sony makes a 12-24 F4 lens
that might be a little bit more comparable
as far as range goes.
But at this point,
Sigma doesn't make a
16-35 for the Sony system
so I thought it would still make sense
to put it in here with it.
Now, as much as going from 14 to 16 to 17
might not seem like a big deal,
it actually gives you
quite a bit more width
on that 14mm than you'd think.
And same thing going from the 24 or 28
all the way up to 35,
these two actually get
quite a bit more zoomed in.
So when considering these,
you wanna make sure you think
about how wide of a range
you actually want.
The 16-35's will give the widest range,
however, the Sigma
actually goes the widest.
The Tamron kinda suffers
in this department
as it has the narrowest focal range.
As far as build quality goes,
all of these are fantastically built.
They all have some sort of
mix of metal and plastic.
All of them except for the Sony Zeiss
have kind of a rubber coating
on their focus and zoom rings.
The Sony Zeiss has more of a metal feel
throughout the whole thing.
In fact, there is barely any
plastic on that thing at all.
Honestly, they all feel
pretty good in the hand,
they all feel like
they're very well built.
And as much as I like a good, heavy lens,
I think my favorite had
to be the Sony GMaster .
When you put it on your camera,
it just feels really good.
A close second to that
would be the Tamron,
partially because of the weight of it,
because it's a lot lighter,
you feel less conspicuous.
And also, if you don't like
having a really big kit,
it's a little bit smaller in your hands.
I feel like I kinda go
one way or the other,
I either want it to be like big and heavy,
or I want it to be like
nice and sleek and small.
But I think the Sigma was
pushing it a little far for me
on the big and heavy side.
The two least expensive,
the Tamron and the Zeiss
don't have any kind of extra buttons,
no manual focus switch,
or focus hold button or anything,
whereas the Sigma and the
GMaster both have a focus switch
and a custom button.
On the Sigma, we've got
the focus switch there,
and then we've also got the AFL button.
I'm pretty sure you could customize that
to whatever you want though.
And then on the GMaster,
we've also got our focus switch
and our custom button there.
The Sony Zeiss barrel
extends as you zoom out.
So when it's at 16mm,
it's longer than when it's at 35mm.
The GMaster is exactly the same.
So when it's long it's 16mm,
when it's short it's 35mm.
Both the Sigma and the
Tamron zoom internally,
so the end of the actual lens itself
doesn't get any bigger.
You can see the glass moving inside.
But technically, it is all internal,
that front filter space
won't actually be moving,
or in the case of the one
that doesn't have a front filter,
the whole front doesn't move on it.
One little thing that
people find a little odd
about the Tamron
is actually that the focus
and zoom rings are backwards
from what they normally are.
So the zoom ring is actually
closest to the end of the lens
and the focus ring is
closest to the camera side.
All of the other lenses
are the opposite of that
but you do get used to it after a while.
And of course, let's talk
about the elephant in the room.
The Sony Zeiss kinda sticks
out amongst the bunch
and it's pretty obvious why
it's the only one of the
four that's an F4 lens,
and doesn't have that F2.8 aperture.
So right away when people
are looking at these,
they're gonna notice that,
and they're gonna think,
"Okay, well maybe I don't want that F4."
But it's also got something
that none of the other lenses have,
which is Optical Steady Shot.
aka stabilization inside the lens.
So, you might not be able to get that
F2.8 shallow depth of field
but if you are a video shooter
on something like the A6400
and you want to use this lens on it,
that's why I bought it,
for my A6400 that doesn't
have stabilization in it.
Having something with OSS in it,
really makes a huge
difference for handheld shots.
Some might even argue that OSS is better
than the In Body Stabilization
that's in things like the A73.
So, this can be handy even for people
with full-framed cameras.
And if you're talking
about photography as well,
having OSS will allow you
to slow down your shutter
speed just a little bit more,
so you can get a little bit more exposure
so it makes up for that
difference in aperture.
Just a little bit.
I know it's not a huge thing
but it does help a little bit.
Now, one other thing I did
was an auto focus test in video.
I basically just wandered back and forth
to and from the camera
to see if they could
keep tracking my face,
which lens performed the best,
that kinda thing,
and I was honestly not really surprised
to find out that all of them
performed pretty darn well.
It seems like even the third-party lenses
for Sony E Mount these days
are getting it pretty good.
I did notice that on the Sigma,
if you look close to the edge,
it actually is kind of pumping,
and it looks like it's warping
the edges of the screen.
Now, I don't know
if that's just because
it's a little big wider
than the other ones are,
or if it's something specific
to the focusing mechanism in this.
So, if you're doing something
where your subject is constantly running
towards and away from you,
maybe that might be an issue.
Generally, I found that if
I was just standing still,
it didn't seem to have
any kind of a problem,
it wasn't doing that when I wasn't moving.
Having watched back the footage,
I honestly thought that the Tamron
probably performed the smoothest
as far as focusing.
All four lenses had no
problem using face detection,
and generally following along.
On the photography side,
I do notice that the third-party ones,
the Tamron and the Sigma,
both struggle a little
bit more in low light
to catch what they want in focus.
Just a little bit more hunting
and a couple more missed
shots here and there
than the two Sony ones.
But I'm really, really
splitting hairs there,
they still performed really well.
Now, as far as the image quality of these,
again, I can't go into like a super crazy
amount of detail.
I was really surprised actually to find
that the Tamron really kept up
against all the other lenses
considering all the other ones
are so much more expensive.
All of them have some kind of vignetting
when you're wide open at wide apertures.
They're all pretty darn
sharp in the center
and they're a little bit
softer in the corners.
And then as you stop
down, they get better.
It's pretty standard stuff,
and I would stack any of
these up against each other
and feel pretty good about it.
Now that being said,
this is kind of just a general comparison
and I have left some
links in the description
that have some more
reviews of these lenses
where you can go and check
out some of that stuff.
But for my general use,
I found that all of them
performed really well.
Alright, before we talk about
which lens you might
wanna choose out of these,
let's talk about the sponsor
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Okay, so the question is
if they all perform so well,
and they all have a little bit
of a different set of features,
which one do you get?
I'm just gonna say it right now,
my personal recommendation for most people
would be to go with the Tamron 17-28 F2.8
for a couple of reasons.
First of all,
it's the lightest and the smallest
and personally that makes
a big difference for me.
I like to carry more gear,
but I don't want it to be heavier,
I don't want it to weigh me down too much
and that gives me some versatility
with some great quality,
and it's smaller.
And the second reason is pretty obvious,
it's $900, it's so much less expensive
than the other ones.
We got $1350, $1400 and $2200.
This is more than two times what that is.
So the $1300 difference
between the Tamron and the GMaster,
you could pretty much
buy the Zeiss too if you wanted.
Speaking from personal experience,
having both of these is
a little bit redundant
but my other recommendation
would be probably for the GMaster
if you're the kind of
professional photographer
or videographer that needs to just have
the top quality glass.
You're okay to spend a
whole bunch of money on it
and you want no compromise,
the GMaster is probably the way to go.
It's going to work the
best with the system
because it's Sony making it.
There's always just going
to be something about
buying a Sony lens for a Sony camera
that I think is a good choice.
I think the 14-24 has
a specific place too.
If you're someone who
does a lot of interiors
or you do architecture,
and you really need it
to be as wide as possible
while still maintaining
incredible quality,
this is Sigma Art Series by the way
then it might make sense
to go with the Sigma.
Again, we're talking $800 cheaper
than the GMaster as well.
So value wise, it's
still really not too bad
and then unfortunately in my last place,
the Zeiss F4.
The only place I could
really recommend this
against the other ones,
is if you're shooting APS-C,
you need a reasonably wide lens
let's say for vlogging
or something like that,
and you need something that has OSS in it.
But even that being said,
I probably would suggest something
with an even wider range.
Something like the 18-105 F4.
You're still getting F4,
it's really not that
much bigger than this one
and it's significantly cheaper
than this one too (laughs).
The poor Sony Zeiss.
All that being said,
the quality that comes out of this thing,
it is still Zeiss glass,
let's remember that,
so this is really, really nice quality.
It's just, when you've
got the other options,
it's hard to recommend this one.
But as always, I wanna
hear what you have to say.
What do you think of these four lenses?
If you could only choose one,
which one would it be and why?
Leave a comment below and
on your way down there,
hit that like and subscribe button
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when I upload new videos.
Thank you so much for watching,
thanks to Artlist for
sponsoring this video,
and I'll see you next time.
(slow techno music)
