Sony's full-frame mirrorless models are wonderfully lightweight and compact. but the body is only half the equation. While the collaboration with Zeiss has delivered some equally compact models, this new lens is at odds with the small size of the bodies. Despite the size, it handles well on the Sony
a7R body used during testing.
Ergonomics are generally good and there's no lens extension, but some aspects could divide opinion. A large focus-hold button and the controls for the built-in stabiliser and focus limiter fall naturally under your left thumb, but the push-pull feature of the focus ring for de-clutching the AF mechanism is the kind of thing you'll either love or hate. Still, the manual focus ring has hard stops at either end, even if it focuses past infinity, as lenses like this are inclined to do. It also has a very short throw from the three-metre mark onwards, making manual focusing on distant scenes quite tricky.
Using autofocus for portraits is mainly worry-free, however, and surprisingly quick on the a7R, with the right settings and good light. While stablisation isn't much help for macro work, it's still a nice option for more general use.
Without a doubt, its best feature is ultimately its image quality. It has low axial and lateral chromatic aberration and excellent detail resolution at the initial aperture of f2.8 and through the aperture range, though the effects of diffraction can just about be seen from f11 onwards, but then that's expected.
