These few days were rainy and shady. The sky was full of soft sunlight. The weather is not ideal for the lens review, but I still try my best to review the Sony SEL35F18 with my Sony NEX-6.
Introduction
The Sony SEL35F18 was released in December 2012. This lens has the focal length of 52.5mm in 35mm equivalent, which gives you the angle of view similar to what we see daily, not too broad, not too narrow, just a lovely view. It has the built-in Sony OSS (Optical Steady Shot) image stabilizer, which is rare in the lens of these focal lengths. It is still one of the best E-mount prime lenses, and it is sold at the price of SGD 629.
Pros & Cons
Key Specification
| Aperture (Max.) | f/1.8 |
| Aperture (Min.) | f/22 |
| Focal Length (35mm equivalent) | 52.5 mm |
| Filter Diameter | 49 mm |
| Lens Groups-Elements | 6 groups, 8 elements (2 aspheric surfaces, 1 ED) |
| Minimum Focus Distance | 11.88″ (30 cm) |
| Aperture Blade | 7 blades (Circular aperture) |
| Dimensions (Max. Diameter x Length) | 2 1/2″ x 2-13/16″ (63 x 45 mm) |
| Lens Weight | 5.5 oz (155g) |
| Maximum Magnification | x0.15 |
Source from Sony Official Website.
Look and Feel
This lens is a fingerprint magnet due to its shiny black surface material. It is lightweight, compact, and built solid, but it won’t make you feel premium as well. You get a plastic sound and feel when you knock it with your fingernail.
The lens comes with a small lens hood. It looks nice and balanced when attached to the lens and the camera. However, the lens hood will still block the lens focus ring when it is attached oppositely.
The Sony SEL35F18 supports the DMF (direct manual focus), and its focus ring is smooth and comfortable in use.
Sharpness (Infinity)
I had taken shots from the scene below and cropped the center and bottom-left corner for sharpness comparison.
Center Sharpness
The center sharpness is improved significantly from F2.8 onward. The maximum sharpness is achieved at F5.6 and maintains a good sharpness at F8. It started to drop from F11 and has a closed performance till the minimum aperture of F22.
Corner Sharpness
Except the F1.8 and F22, the corner sharpness at other apertures are performed similarly while the sharpest corner occurred at the F4. Its corner sharpness performance is not too bad but still not able to match any of its center sharpness.
Macro Performance
The Sony SEL35F18 only has a maximum magnification ratio of 0.15 times and the closest focus range of 30 cm. These conditions make this lens not an ideal macro lens.
The shot below was captured at F5.6 on the tripod at the minimum focus range. The details level is excellent and very sharp indeed.
Distortion
This lens almost has no distortion at all. Well done.
Vignetting
The Sony SEL35F18 exhibits heavy vignetting at the F1.8 and F2. Stopped down to F 2.8, and smaller apertures will reduce it significantly. You will not need to worry about it too much when you turn on the Shading compensation in your camera setting, even at F1.8.
Chromatic Aberration
The Sony SEL35F18 has some issues when handling the CA at wide open.
Center Chromatic Aberration
There is heavy purple fringing at F1.8 and some magenta at F22 at the center. The center CA performance at other apertures is in good control.
Corner Chromatic Aberration
The Sony SEL35F18 corner CA performance is similar to its center CA performance. However, the corner purple fringing is much lighter than its center at F1.8, and it also shows a little magenta at F22.
Ghosting and Flare
I used the spotlight to test the ghosting and flare.
The lens handles the ghosting nicely, but if you look carefully at the top right area, you will notice a light blob near the light source throughout every tested aperture.
Bokeh Effect
The Sony SEL35F18 has an excellent bokeh effect. It is able to produce lovely, smooth, and creamy bokeh easily. The bokeh background remains a good circular shape from F1.8 to F2.8 and becomes a polygon shape from F4 onward.
Handheld Low Light Performance
With the crop factor of 1.5, the SEL35F18’s safe shutter speed should be at least 1/50 second. It is so rare to have the image stabilizer in the lens of this focal length. The OSS included in the SEL35F18 is a bonus to us. Besides the low light shooting, OSS is an advantage for video recording too. Let’s see how the OSS performs in low-light shooting.
Without OSS
Without the OSS turn on, the slowest recommended shutter speed for this lens is 1/40 second. Any shutter speed slower than that will easily result in a blurred image.
With OSS
The OSS does what it is advertised. By turning on the OSS, you will be able to shoot at 1/8 second and still get a blur-free result. It is 3 stops down from the safe shutter speed. The results obtained from 1/6 and 1/4 seconds are still better and usable than those from 1/20 seconds without OSS. However, you will start to suffer when shooting from 1/10 second and slower as you need a substantial hand to get the blur-free shots.
Bottom Line
The Sony SEL35F18 is a good fast prime lens that is sold at the price of SGD 629. It has the normal angle of view, smooth and creamy circular bokeh, no distortion, great OSS, and a large aperture for low-light scenes. Its focusing is pretty fast and accurately during daylight shooting.
This lens does the focusing quietly and seldom hunt for focus. However, it tends to focus on the rear subject when shooting in the low light scene. I supposed this is an individual issue as the first copy I used previously had no such issue at all.
I really enjoyed shooting with the SEL35F18. Its creamy bokeh effect and the extra stability provided by the OSS make night photography more manageable and more enjoyable. Before the end of today’s review, below are some shots of the Sony SEL35F18 with my Sony NEX-6.
That’s all for today’s review. Hopefully, this review will give you some ideas about how it performs, and I hope you like it. Thanks for reading!
Eric
28 Jan 2016I am in the market for a lens like this and I was also thinking about the Sigma 30mm. However, the SEL-35F18 has two big advantages: a faster aperture and optical stabilization, which will make for much better indoor and low-light performance. The faster aperture will also allow for shallower depths of field when needed.
Thomaxs
25 Nov 2015How is it compared to the Sigma 30 mm? Thanks.
James Tan
2 Dec 2015Hi, I do not review the Sigma 30m so cannot give you any comment for the comparison.
Vincenzo
31 Oct 2014Excellent work, thank you so much for sharing this! I actually would like to know how good this lens would be for portraits…
James Tan
1 Nov 2014Hi Vincenzo, if you occasionally shoot portrait then the SEL35F18 will not let you down. If you mainly shoot portrait, I will recommend you the SEL50F18 which is much better in almost every optical performance and cheaper than the SEL35F18.
CL
13 Oct 2014Nice, thanks for sharing