Should you get the superb new Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 FE lens or the much cheaper Rokinon 50mm f/1.4 FE autofous lens? What’s the trade off with the rokinon? Check out those two new review:

Admiringlight tested the Zeiss and concludes:

The cons list is short, and show really the only two things that are bad about the lens: it’s quite big, and it’s quite expensive. If you can get past those, there’s absolutely nothing left to worry about. Optically, this is the finest 50mm lens I’ve ever used, and is among the finest lenses of any focal length I’ve ever used. It’s exceptionally sharp across the entire frame right from f/1.4, and somehow gets even a bit sharper at smaller apertures. The bokeh is excellent and it controls almost all aberrations extremely well. The lens handily outperforms the already rather exceptional FE 55mm f/1.8: extremely impressive.

Lenstip tested the Rokinon (Smayang) lens:

The Samyang AF 50 mm f/1.4 FE seems to be a bit less successful lens than its reflex camera brother with the same parameters.Not so long ago the Samyang AF 50 mm f/1.4 FE was the cheapest standard with autofocus available and that fact held promise of a significant sale volume. After the launch of the Sony FE 50 mm f/1.8 the situation doesn’t look so rosy anymore; it seems without a distinct lowering of the price the Samyang won’t enjoy a huge market share.

To me this sound slike: if you have the money and ened the ultimate image quality go for the Zeiss. If money is factor and f/1.4 is not really needed go for the Zeiss 55mm f/1.8!

And by the way…here are the links to ALL FE 50mm lenses:

Sony FE 50mm f/2.8 macro ([shopcountry 51065])
Sony FE 50mm f/1.8 ([shopcountry 49849])
Zeiss FE Loxia 50mm f/2.0 ([shopcountry 47047])
Zeiss FE 55mm f/1.8 ([shopcountry 37736])
Rokinon (Samyang) FE 50mm f/1.4 ([shopcountry 51066])
Sony APS-C 50mm f/1.8 ([shopcountry 51067])
Handevision Iberit APS-C manual focus 50mm f/2.4 ([shopcountry 51068])
Zeiss 50mm FE f/1.4 ([shopcountry 51069])
Rokinon (Samyang) APS-C manual focus 50mm f/1.2 ([shopcountry 51070])
Rokinon (Samyang) FE manual focus 50mm f/1.4 ([shopcountry 51071])
Zeiss Touit APS-C 50mm f/2.8 macro ([shopcountry 51072])
Mitakon FE manual focus 50mm f/0.95 ([shopcountry 51073])

Long list :)

Every week I do check the Amazon lens sales ranking (Click here) and through all the year 2016 one lens kept remaining steadily on top. It’s the Sony 18-105mm E-mount lens. Surprised?
If you wonder why this lens sells fine just read the review conclusions just posted by Photozone:

The broad zoom range is highly useful for applications such as travel photography. It’s also a natural mate to the Sony E 10-18mm f/4 OSS. And unlike Sony’s full format lenses, the Sony E 18-105mm f/4 G OSS is also surprisingly affordable (600US$/500EUR). So all in all we haven’t seen greatness in this lens but it is an attractive package nonetheless.

Reminder: Once again I ask Sony engineers and marketing guys to also focus on the development of new APS-C E-mount lenses. Thanks!