Z5's little kit lens isn't bad. Sure faster or longer are good things, but it comes in over 300g / 11oz lighter than the 24-70 f/4 at 880g vs 1200g combined on a Z5/Z6. IQ seems reasonably good as well, and it's clear they're using all of the real estate the Z mount gives them, rear element is fixed and very nearly protrudes from the back of the lens.
I do like the 24-70mm f/4 as well but I could see this replacing it. It makes a very obvious difference in hand, and makes for easy 1 handed operation (zoom aside) where as the 24-70 is a bit heavy for 1 hand. I kind of expected to replace this with the 24-70 on the Z5 but not so sure now...
lukemeup wrote:
For a cheap non-S kit... it looks pretty damn good.
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jrscls wrote:
Looks good to me and seems like a good lightweight lens for the Z system.
I rather like this lens very much. Finally a nice a small zoom lens for my walking around with my Z7.
I may end up selling my Z50 as now Z7 +24-50 is light and small enough for me to bring anywhere.
AdaptedLenses wrote:
I do like the 24-70mm f/4 as well but I could see this replacing it. It makes a very obvious difference in hand, and makes for easy 1 handed operation (zoom aside) where as the 24-70 is a bit heavy for 1 hand. I kind of expected to replace this with the 24-70 on the Z5 but not so sure now...
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I also own the 24-70 f/4 but am really excited to add this small lens to my collection for when I want to go small and light. This lens plus the (some day) 28 and 40mm compacts will keep me from getting a Z50 because I'll have the option of making my Z6 small when I want that, but also larger and high performing with S-Line lenses when I'm going for best IQ. A very versatile system, I'm envisioning.
I preordered the 24-50 soon after it was announced, and now your images have me feeling pretty anxious to get my hands on it.
I got this lens with my Z5, mine is an excellent copy with very little variance throughout. I also had a damn near-perfect copy of the 24-70 f4, as well as an average copy 24-70 f4 that's slightly decentered, to compare it with.
At 24mm - The perfect 24-70 might be ever-so-slightly sharper closed down to f/8 but it's too close to call on 24mp. Vs the average 24-70 copy, the 24-50mm is clearly sharper at 24mm all around.
At 35mm - Both copies of the 24-70 seem to have a slight to very-slight sharpness advantage at every aperture, though the average 24-70 is softer in some places/apertures due to variance.
At 50mm - Same as the 35mm position.
So, I'm pretty impressed with the quality of this non-S lens. I think for many people it will be more than sharp enough, including me. My only complaint is that I think 6.3 was too dark for the Z5's reduced low-light AF performance compared to the other Z cameras - at 50mm I've seen AF-C miss or get confused even in good light when the subject is shadowed/heavy backlighting. I can only hope that Nikon will keep with updating the AF in these Z cameras, the Z5 included.
Now if you're on a high-res sensor and you're used to the look of the 24-70 f4, you may lose some sharpness when switching. Granted I was never able to test on the 45mp sensor, but it would make sense that the S zoom would outperform there. But as I said above, this lens is a very good performer for a low-cost option, and I think it would be more than sharp enough for most people.
