SonyFE 35mm F1.8 Large Aperture Prime Lens (SEL35F18F)

The Sony FE 35mm F1.8 lens has quickly become my favorite travel companion! Its compact and lightweight design makes it incredibly easy to carry around, which is perfect for trips or exploring new places.The sharpness of the photos it produces is awesome. Every shot is crisp and detailed, even in low light, thanks to the large F1.8 aperture. It handles beautifully for a wide range of scenarios, from landscapes to portraits, making it versatile and reliable.I absolutely love this lens and can confidently say it’s a must-have for anyone looking to enhance their travel photography. It’s a perfect mix of portability, quality, and performance and affordable !

This is Harry typing, not Mary.This lens is freaking awesome, light, sharp and fast focus!!What I love about it:Its a really light and compact 35 mm lens. Very easy to carry around with you and not heavy on the hands. It produced very sharp photos, not as sharp as the G-master 85 mm or the Zeiss 55 mm, but close enough to it. It has great durability as everything is metal so you best be careful not to lay this lens down on cement or any surface that will scratch it. The autofocusing on this lens is insanely fast especially with eye-autofocus keeping focus on your subject right away.The other big reason why i bought this lens is for videography. Once again, crystal sharp videos and insane fast autofocus. It picks up the subjects face right away even on my Sony a7S ii that uses phase contract focus detection. And its a good for gimbals since i record events, i do need a lens that can capture a lot of light without raising the ISO too much, this lens is perfect for it. Its not too heavy on the gimbal and does great recording in low light settings.What I dislike about it:Would definitely love it to be f/1.4 but hey, that means another $300 more to reach that aperture. No Optical Steady Shot (OSS) but that means another $300 added or basically its almost not needed for a 35 mm.Overall, i chose this lens over the sigma art DG 35 mm f/1.4 lens because it is lighter and built for sony mirrorless cameas. I do love sigma lenses as well but i recommend you all wait til Sigma releases an actually 35 mm lens designed for mirrorless cameras. Sigma usually labels their mirrorless camera lenses as DN and not DG.And if you need more convincing about this Sony 35 mm lens, I recommend you to watch Gerald Undone's Sony 35 mm video about this lens on youtube. He goes into full details about it and definitely recommends it as well.

The good:1) Video AND stills autofocus performance is just as good as the Sony GM lenses, especially on the newer Sony cameras.2) Compact and lightweight form factor! Easy to travel with.3) Very high quality optical performance. Very sharp wide open. Well controlled CA and flaring. Quick, responsive and accurate autofocus even in challenging scenarios.4) Reasonably high build quality. The barrel and focusing ring feel all metal. The lens hood is a well finished and sturdy plastic.5) Weather sealing is good! It can withstand rain. Just exercise common sense and don't dunk it in water or leave it out in a heavy downpour.6) Custom control button on the side of the barrel is great for mapping additional functions.The bad:1) Only has a focusing ring. No aperture ring on this one.2) Not as fast as 1.4 Primes in this price range.3) Not exactly cheap for a 35mm prime, but not a bank breaker either.4) No OSS, that might be a consideration for Sony cameras that don't have IBIS.

Pro Photographer and Videographer here: One of my favorite lenses! 35mm is my favorite focal length. This lens has superior contrast and sharpness. I don't pixel peep, or look at corner sharpness. I just look at photos and know whether I like it or not. This lens has incredible autofocus, is super small on full frame sony cameras, looks great, feels great, is lightweight, and feels high quality. The Sony nifty fifty, is TRASH compared to this lens. The price being $650 is a good price! You can spend hundreds more on a 35mm f1.4 but all you're getting is slightly better low light, barely any more bokeh, and a heavier lens.Cons: I can honestly think of nothing as a con

So far, this lens has been the one attached the most to my Sony A7iii Camera when I have lens ranging from 20mm to 400mm. Just a great focal length for family get-togethers and street photography.Lens is very fast, great in low-light situations, quiet, extremely compact, and lightweight. Photos are amazingly sharp and the Bokeh is quite pleasing, better than I was anticipating.If you are looking for a one size fits all prime, I would use this over a nifty-fifty. With today's high resolution cameras and post-processing software, you can always crop to get the results of a 50mm lens, but you cannot use a 50mm to get the extra width of the 35mm.A little bit pricey especially when comparing to the Sony FE 85mm 1.8 prime. Build quality is mediocre and could be a little better, but the light weight and compactness makes up for it.

I am writing this review after returning this and getting the 35 GM from Adorama. Although the image quality of GM is superior I feel that for video it is a very good lens and definitely worth the $650. The GM has terrible focus breathing. Also check the 24 and 40mm G lenses when buying this. They are newer and from what I have heard better auto focus performance and Sony G image quality. This is a good prime lens for zoom lens users who want to get a prime lens feel. 35 mm you can use for landscape, portraits, product photography and video.

The media could not be loaded. Bought both a used one and a new one off of amazon. Both had this super loud noise during auto focus. Not a click here a whirr there. Listen yourself please.Not worth such a premium price at all.