Sony 30mm macro lens leaked
We all already knew that this lens was coming. And now here it is. The Sony 30mm f/3.5 macro for NEX. Sony Service Canada does list the lens and the french store Camara.fr said the 30mm lens price is 259 Euro. But we can already tell you that’s certainly not the only lens Sony will announce within next couple of weeks More about that soon 
P.S.: Sony already made a 30mm but for Alpha mount and with f/2.8 aperture. Check Amazon, B&H, Adorama, J&R, eBay.
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GH
3 years ago |Unfortunately, it looks even bigger than the mockup.
ahshing
3 years ago |awaiting 16-50/2.8 e-mount lens…:(
Henrik
3 years ago |Isn’t 30mm a little bit too wide for a macro?
I have both the Minolta 50mm and 100mm macro and since I got the 100mm, I rarely use tha 50mm (despite it being the sharpest lens in my collection).
ageha
3 years ago |Maybe but I don’t think that’s the point. It’s a great walk around lens you can keep all the time on the camera. It acts as a sharp normal lens and offers 1:1 macro in a single lightweight package.
Steve
3 years ago |30mm is a bit wide for me, but remember it closer to 50mm FF
I also have the Minolta 100mm; it’s an old friend, but I keep hoping that Sony will replace it with a lens equal to the Canon.
It would even make me happier if Zeiss would release that wonderful Makro-Planer for us ZA mounts users……..but I’m dreaming.
ChenAlan
3 years ago |You are not alone.
+1 to a Ziess Macro!
Jonas
3 years ago |I do quite a lot of close up work using a copy stand and often find 55mm macro with DX SLR doesn’t get close enough (depending on subject). An NEX with its swinging screen would be very convenient and a 30mm macro seems ideal for these situations, think I will go for it if NEX-7 appeals.
Myst
3 years ago |sometimes it is, for bugs especially, but with a wider macro lens you capture more of the background, and you don’t need shutter speeds as fast as with 50 or 100mm macro lenses.
If you shoot mostly handhold, anyway this lens on a tripod is almost useless, cause you can’t really get close enough to most subjects to photograph them.
In the end it all depends on what you want to photograph, and you shooting style, i am mostly on the move, so i need a macro lens that doesn’t require me to use the tripod each time i want to take a photo.
Maximus
3 years ago |You have to take in account that the 50mm and 100mm macros were developed for full-frame, so a 30mm macro for Nex has the same field of view like an 50mm on a full-frame DSLR
Sky_walker
3 years ago |“you don’t need shutter speeds as fast as with 50 or 100mm macro lenses.” – Shutter speed doesn’t change with focal length. It changes with aperture. It doesn’t matter if you shoot at 100mm f/5.6 or with 30mm f/5.6 – shutter speed will be the same.
“with a wider macro lens you capture more of the background” – more of a background and less of a subject? You can get this with 100mm macro lens too. Just move it away from the subject.
Chris
3 years ago |“‘you don’t need shutter speeds as fast as with 50 or 100mm macro lenses.’ – Shutter speed doesn’t change with focal length. It changes with aperture. It doesn’t matter if you shoot at 100mm f/5.6 or with 30mm f/5.6 – shutter speed will be the same.”
I don’t think that’s what they meant. At the same shutter speed, a longer focal length will be more blurry due to motion artifact for handheld photos, which seems to be the market sony is going for.
REVENGE
3 years ago |NEX needs a Tamron 60mm f/2.
kiril
3 years ago |This is nice lens. I do not shoot macro but will grab one if no other normal le.s shows up.
morgul
3 years ago |So the only two small lenses that Nex users get are a 16mm and a 30mm F/3.5??? What about some more sensible lenses? BOOOOOO Sony!
pancanikonpus
3 years ago |Geez, f3.5?!! why not f0.95 or f1.2 or f2.0…
today 11th May, 49 days to go! a77
ageha
3 years ago |A macro lens with F0.95? lol
Myst
3 years ago |there is a repro macro lens made by Nikon 85mm f/1, but it only stops down to f/8 and it’s rather old, i didn’t knew something like that existed till a few weeks ago..
Mel
3 years ago |Yay!! Only 49 more days of hearing this guy talk about how he’s waiting for the a77 because we really care what he thinks on a daily basis about the a77 release.
mact
3 years ago |what is it for? big, not bright at all, not-macro 30mm. nonsense
Sky_walker
3 years ago |It’s not big, it’s below average size
But yea, 30mm isn’t really a good thing for macro lens, but look – Sony made one already for the A-mount and it sells! Why? Well, guess what – for some people a “macro from 1 cm” is an advantage.
mact
3 years ago |1cm (for sure?) CAN be an advantage but 30mm is still to short
Maximus
3 years ago |a 30mm Macro has the same field of view on Nex like a 50mm Macro on full-frame, so its a normal focal-length
lomo
3 years ago |the funny part is that sigma announced their 30mm f2.8 macro… =.= this is not even lightweight. where’s the pancake lenses??? one 16mm is not enough.
Sky_walker
3 years ago |Sigma lens will be plastic, this one is metal. So most likely there will be enough place for both of them
Eric
3 years ago |Let’s not pretend like Sony’s e-mount metal lenses are built any better than plastic lenses. All they are is a very thin piece of aluminum wrapped around a plastic barrel. They may look the part, but they feel nothing like a true metal lens such as a Zeiss ZM or Pentax Limited lens.
Sky_walker
3 years ago |last time I checked – they do feel more solid build than eg. plastic Sigma lenses, or Sony SAM lenses.
Eric
3 years ago |Compare one to something like the Panasonic 14-45mm. Not only does the Panasonic feel more solid, more importantly it has much better IQ. What Sony is doing with these E-Mount lenses is akin to putting faux brick veneer over dry wall instead of just building an actual brick wall. I’m hoping the Zeiss E-Mount lenses as well as the Sony G E-Mount lenses are actual machined aluminum similar to the Pentax 35mm Limited instead of this cheapo veneer technique Sony is using with their cheap E-Mount glass.
Pick one of these up sometime then see if your opinion of the Sony “metal” lenses changes:
http://www.photozone.de/sony-alpha-aps-c-lens-tests/545-zeisszm50f2nex
Carl
3 years ago |Looks awfully big for an f3.5 prime for a short flange distance format. How much smaller is it than the Minolta 50/3.5 and LA-EA1 adaptor?
SonyA77
3 years ago |I think some are missing the point here. A 30mm lens will give you the equivalent of an old 45mm FF camera. Not far off the old 50mm. That’s a nice lens walkabout prime to have IMO.
Jacco
3 years ago |That’s what I was thinking. It also looks like it is about 1.5 cm shorter than the 18-55. It isn’t super compact, but it is starting to get pocketable.
I noticed I use the 28mm range quite a lot on my kit zoom. It just looks right.
And with the high iso and HHT modes F3.5 is not really a problem. We are just spoiled by some of the manual lenses.
Eric
3 years ago |I agree that 30mm’s is almost the perfect focal length for a standard prime on APSC sensors. I don’t understand why everyone makes 35mm primes for APS-C. However, at only f/3.5 you might as well just use the 18-55mm lens, it’s not that mich larger. IMO, Sony needs a Zeiss 30mm f/1.4. That hypothetical lens would be enough to get me to switch from m4/3′s to NEX for a 2nd time. However, as it stands now it may be years before Sony had the glass to make me switch again.
WhiteDesertSun
3 years ago |Ok this is not really relevant to this current rumor but bear with me…
Does anyone know if the new flash that the a77 is supposed to launch with is the HVL f43am or is it a refresh of the hvl f58?
Carl
3 years ago |I’m pretty sure it’s the F43. The F58′s successor will probably get launched along side the A900′s successor (A99?).
jackau
3 years ago |i already got the 30mm 2.8 and with the adaptor ring there is no need for nex only lens. this lens is the worst in the lineup, 3.5 is not big enough in aperture count. Anti shake is useless as those shoot marco knows a pod of somesort if required. THis make Signma’s upcoming 30 more attractive !
bring on the 55-200 and the CZ those are the lens to make NEX great!
WhiteDesertSun
3 years ago |Ah thanks! You are probably right.
Fun fact: the hvl 42 has been taken taken off the sony store. Guess its been officially discontinued.
WhiteDesertSun
3 years ago |Fail
Response was meant for Carl.
Sorry jackau!
SonyA77
3 years ago |Lol really annoying when you hit the wrong “Reply” link isn’t it.
Milos Janata
3 years ago |Yeah, would be nice to see some new fixed layout… and maybe +1 button?
Any plans admin?
WyldRage
3 years ago |Two things. First, the focus ring is much smaller than the one on the mock-up that was shown. Combine that with the fact that this is a rendering, I think someone may have taken a rendering for the 16mm, added length and changed the description.
Secondly, I would be surprised if it didn’t have OSS. Sony already makes a 30/2.8 macro for A-mount, and this is probably the same lens. The only reason I can think of for the smaller aperture would be to include OSS.
Myst
3 years ago |yup, you might be right, the focus ring is a lot smaller here, than in the mock-up, we’ll just have to wait and see if sony really did change the design.
fail
3 years ago |Huge, dark, no Optical Steady Shot and very very expensive for what it is.
Samsung has much smaller and cheaper 30/2 that is sharp from f2.0.
I wonder if there is anyone here interested in this crap.
We need fast and small primes. Zeiss could be nice but it will be probably too expensive and I guess no OSS…
DP
3 years ago |I agree here–Samsung has some great lens choices right now, but the sensors and bodies aren’t as good.
At this stage in the game they need to concentrate on speed–people buy these large sensor MILC’s for the shallow depth of field as well as the IQ boost.
So far, we haven’t been able to exploit this sensor to its fullest!
I look forward to the 24/1.7, but a fast 30-35 pancake and a portrait 50-55 should be a top priority, if only because they’d sell!
Mark
3 years ago |Where is the Carl Zeiss E mount??
rob
3 years ago |if it was smaller id buy it.. seriously… i love my nex3, and the camera is tiny, what sucks about the next system is the lenses are just to big, almost deafeats the purpose, IMO of course. i guess its still easier to carry around than my D700 though. o.O
Kyle Batson
3 years ago |Still looks like a pretty small lens, but for f/3.5 it should be smaller. The only way I think this lens will be appealing is if it’s really cheap. We’ll have to see how its size compares to the kit zoom.
I understand that Sony wants to appeal to compact camera users, but enthusiasts like small cameras too.
pancanikonpus
3 years ago |Mr. Tiger, 49 days too long to go! can you push faster. so tempting.
imelca
3 years ago |I want a compact 24/1.7 !!!
Steve
3 years ago |I’m not a NEX user, I shoot Alpha so maybe I don’t get the point, but Sony continues to focus on lowest common denominator with its lens offerings like this one……….
It would be nice to see lenses that a pro would find exciting and a reason to put a NEX in the bag purchase or move to an Alpha.
Sony did a little of this with the Zeiss offerings; some pros left other manufactures and purchased an a900/a850 or a700 because of optics like the Zeiss 135 f1.8
It would be nice to see a mix of “cheap” kit glass for the people that just can’t spend $1 to 2K on a lens and world class optics for those who want every pixel sharp and clear all through the frame even in poor lighting and can pay for it.
SonyA77
3 years ago |Pro users are a tiny market. The money is with mass produced consumer products. Start at the bottom and work up.
Vlad
3 years ago |The DSLR market is growing much faster and the profits are much bigger.
Almond
3 years ago |The CONSUMER DSLR market is growing much faster and the profits are much bigger.
Vlad
3 years ago |I would tend to agree with you, but we only have numbers for the whole DSLR market. And professionals will always buy more lenses and accessories, resulting in the biggest profits.
Carl
3 years ago |It wouldn’t surprise me if amateurs bought more lenses numerically than professionals. Maybe not by value, though given the cost of f2.8 zooms, though.
SonyA77
3 years ago |@Vlad, there is absolutely no way that pros contribute more than the massive consumer numbers. Pro sales are tiny in comparison to consumer sales.
If it were true, then all dSLR makers would concentrate on pro cameras and not bother with consumers at all. Common-sense really. Sony would have concentrated on pro bodies recently and certainly would have had the A7xx replaced years ago and a bunch of pro lenses.
It makes no sense what-so-ever for Sony to attack the pro sales of Canikon.
Carl
3 years ago |Giving up on the pro market did Minolta no good, although their problems ran deeper than that.
They had good market share with consumers (better than Nikon as far as I can gather) right up until the end of the film era, but still managed to barely make money off cameras during the life of the alpha mount.
SonyA77
3 years ago |…and the SLR users during the Minolta days are a completely different beast compared to the huge dSLR consumer base of today.
Carl
3 years ago |I don’t agree with that analysis. The majority of SLR users in the film era were consumers, just as now. Pros were more inclined to use Hasselblads and Mamiyas rather than high end 135 format SLRs except in fields where they were impractical like photojournalism and sports.
Digital has caused the popularity of SLR cameras to grow, but not markedly changed the industry dynamics.
Vlad
3 years ago |@A77 Overall profit, of course. But not when looking at the profit per camera. Anyway…
I completely disagree with you on addressing the pro market – I do not think that “start from the bottom” strategy applies here. All camera companies were built exactly the opposite way – starting from professionals and then simplifying stuff when technology allowed. It is certainly a bit more complicated than that today, but flooding the market with compacts is not the solution IMHO.
The DSLR market is growing very fast compared to compacts, the profits are big and the brand recognition is generally built on it. It would be a huge mistake not to address it.
Vlad
3 years ago |@A77 Here are some numbers about Nikon. DLSR and lenses sales bring less than compacts but the profit can hardly be qualified as being “tiny”.
http://nikonrumors.com/2011/05/12/nikons-yearly-financial-results-are-out.aspx
Dude
3 years ago |First off you should not mix The NEX and the A-Mount lines in your thinking.
Yet they are still separate kinds of products.
Even without overlapping models!
Why?
Because there is no NEX camera with dedicated control buttons.
Control flow like a DSLR (or GF-1).
Not even thinking of a DSLR shaped body with EVF.
Hack there isn’t even any EVF for NEX.
A lot of PROs have mentioned this points.
And they wont use a NEX for professional work.
Some have considered the NEX as small walkaround 2nd or 3rd camera.
Making some snapshots with more options than P&S.
(And the quality is better than P&S even with the not-so-great lenses).
In the Alpha line there are two main things right now.
The FF pro line and the cheap APS-C lines.
Going FF pro with the A-Mount, you get a pretty decent set.
Not for sports/action photography – ya we know that^^
And with the new plastic SAM lenses you can get decent quality for a steal of price with your APS-C body.
Right now there are few to no cheap FF lenses.
Because Sony has not users to buy them actually.
And there are few high quality APS-C offerings.
Not only is the camera for it still missing.
But also do have the users in this group already higher grade FF lenses (from Sony or Minolta).
Sony did build up a premium FF segment in the past.
But it is very doubtful that they made much money of this.
That was for image reasons.
What they do now is to get entry level users to the brand.
These are the people that might some day upgrade within the system.
Who hasn’t switched (bought as 2nd system) into FF A-Mount, wont do it because of one new lens.
Nor will the people with 1985 premium lenses go crazy.
(these are the people to mock Zeiss lenses for their problems the most actually)
dyna
3 years ago |Any of you 4:3 cats using Olympus’ 35mm f/3.5? That’s a cheap, AND sharp as hell, lens.
I see very little reason to gripe about a macro prime that’s not built to be superbright. I expect that it’ll be plenty high res. Which is, of course, the point.
The fast primes will come. Give it time. Micro 4:3 has had three years and three companies to build. Give Sony a little leeway here.
GH
3 years ago |This 30/3.5 appears to be a bit over twice the length of the Sony 16mm, and it is certainly longer than the Photokina mockup was:
[IMG]http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2114/5710334228_1c56ef8765.jpg[/IMG]
dyna
3 years ago |Skywalker you’re correct about aperture based shutter speeds but a longer focal length requires better shutter speed just to keep it steady.
Also the 30mm lense’s lack of compression at 1:1 is what will allow it to capture greater background area that neither the 50 no r the 100 can.
This lens won’t be for every one but I think it’ll sell just fine. As will pretty much anything NEX.
PhotoNut
3 years ago |Sony is clueless when it comes to photographers! Why a lack luster f/3.5 lens? That is kit lens territory at 30mm. One of the benefits of the short flange distance of the NEX mount is that it is much cheaper and easier to build well corrected and fast wide to normal lenses. So far Sony has failed to provide any NBX lenses with large apertures and high image quality. This is after more than a year or so in the market.
This new macro lense is a joke. 30mm f/3.5 and $259 Euro? That thing at even f/2.8 shouldn’t even sell for more than $200 US.
Sony — the Photography company that couldn’t!
E
3 years ago |2.8 macro for less than $200 ???
Point me in the direction where I can find that on any brand,
som I can move there.
/E
WyldRage
3 years ago |And yet, Pentax sell their 35/2.8 macro at over $500. Sony sells their Alpha 30/2.8 at $200, but it’s completely made of plastic. Add the metal barrel and the longer length needed for the e-mount, and you’ll understand why it’s $50 more (assuming that the MSRP in Euro is the same as in dollars, which is often the case despite the exchange rate).
GH
3 years ago |Wide lenses still need to be retrofocus for short flange distance digital cameras, because digital sensors don’t receive light as well at the periphery as film does, and it leads to soft and/or color shifted corners. So, it isn’t easier to build lenses. In fact, I’d say the opposite. Even Leica is building retrofocus wides now. Of course, Sony could take the Panasonic route and build lenses with massive distortion that is corrected in software…no thanks.
WyldRage
3 years ago |Quote: Of course, Sony could take the Panasonic route and build lenses with massive distortion that is corrected in software…no thanks.
I deeply agree with the sentiment, and it is one of the reason I went with Sony instead of M43 or Samsung (their first lenses didn’t need it, but their 20mm pancake now does).
Ray
3 years ago |i scaled the image of the 30mm lens and it is exactly the same length as the 18-55mm lens. its pretty long for a 30mm prime.
WyldRage
3 years ago |And the focus ring is exactly the same as the 18-55mm’s. I’m calling it a photoshop job until Sony announces it.
GH
3 years ago |I believe it is around 49mm, which is a little shorter than the zoom, but not a lot.
GH
3 years ago |Both the Zeiss mockup and this new image of the macro both seem to be around 48-49mm, which is a little shorter than the kit zoom.
Cody
3 years ago |I had a NEX 5 and I couldn’t stand it. I can’t wait for the a-77!!!!
GH
3 years ago |Horses for courses. I sold my A700 and A900 after using the NEX-5 for a couple of months.
Zstan
3 years ago |How macro is this macro admin? Any idea about the MFD?