Sony - FE 50mm F1.8 Standard Lens (SEL50F18F)

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This was the first lens I got for my A7R II. I wanted a lens right away and this was cheap and available. Its a bright lens at F1.8, but its a bit soft at that aperture. Autofocus is not the fastest. And I was quite surprised by how loud it is. Probably one of the loudest, noisiest lenses Ive ever owned. Which probably makes the autofocus feel even slower, listening to it hunt around for focus. Manual focus is nice and smooth though. IQ is fine, especially for the price, and its a very lightweight lens for traveling. Overall, for the price, its fine, not exceptional, but fine. Id give it three stars but the price is just fantastic for a full frame 50mm f1.8. If youre on a budget, go for it. If youre not on a strict budget perhaps consider the Sony SEL28F20 FE 28mm f/2 or if money is no object, the Sony Sonnar T* FE 55mm F1.8 ZA Lens.

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This is a heck of a lens for $200. Lovely colors and depth of field. 50mm is a good length for a lot of subjects (it challenges you to choose what to include and what to leave out of the frame), and this guy performs it all beautifully. The minimum focus distance is somewhere around a foot and a half, so you can even do some light macro with it. Adding a polarizing filter really makes things pop. AF is a bit slow and tends to hunt and breathe, especially with moving subjects, or in low-contrast, low-light situations. However, these issues have noticeably improved thanks to the most recent (04/2019) software update. Its definitely not perfect, but the update really has made the lens more usable. Make sure you update both your camera body AND install the lens software update while the lens is attached to the camera. One note is that the focus drive system still makes a little bit of noise when you are in manual focus mode. Maybe not the best if you are planning on shooting video and using the built-in or on-camera mic.

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You get what you pay for. If you are not shooting pro shoots and just want to practice/everyday photos, this is a fine product. - Not for pixel peepers. If you are working or looking to become a professional photographer, I would not recommend this lens and would definitely recommend buying the best you can afford. Invest in quality.This lens is not sharp, although I did like that it was a very fast lens for the price. Pros - light weight - fast lens, cheap - Great for travel if you dont care about this lens getting beat up Cons - cheap build - images are not sharp - extremely slow and loud Auto focusing (compared to the Sony Zeiss, G, and Gmaster series)

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I ordered this lens after reading a mix of the Pros and Cons of it all. Despite the very superficial "Cons" of this lens, I have to say the quality is beautiful and looks extremely sleek on the A6XXX series (I personally shoot on an A6000). It has great depth of field, perfect for portraiture photos. The Cons? The two biggest cons Ive read are: 1.) The AF is slow, 2.) The AF is too loud. Ill only address #1 because I think a beep being too loud is beyond ridiculous to bump this lens down a star or so for it. The AF does take a little bit longer than what I think all of us would like. Sometimes itll snatch what youre not trying to get, so youre back to square one (something that can happen with any lens). Without a doubt though it is a valid argument to say that the AF takes a bit. By "a bit" Im talking milliseconds to maybe a second or so. But on the same token you never know what can be potentially missed if youre trying to fire off shots. The price is great, even better if you can find a gentle used one. I got mine from SaveCentral and shaved almost $100 off and the lens has absolutely no flaws. Of course people are going to unjustifiably compare this lens to higher-end lenses, but just focusing on this particular Sony - FE 50mm, get it! You definitely wont regret it and neither will your clients (if you shoot commercially or are looking to get into it).

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This lens is very light, size and weight are what is expected from a mirrorless lens. However, optical resolution and sharpness are subpar, never sharp enough even with no motion. I used it on A7RII and the lens can’t match 42MP, there’s just not enough optical quality. Autofocus is on the worse side among any other AF lens I experienced: it keeps hunting for focus, makes noises, slow. As a parent I have to shoot the kids running around and I expect the lens to freeze the moment right there but this one is too slow, by the time it focuses, the subject is gone. I understand this is one of the cheapest Sony AF lenses but after 1 days of shooting with it I learned even f/4 Olympus MFT system is sharper and has faster AF.

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This is a lightweight, plastic lens. It shoots beautifully, though I do see what some other reviewers are talking about with regards to sharpness at the lower stops. It’s nice for gimbal use, if you’re looking for a lightweight, tighter lens. I had actually bought this used from Amazon Warehouse, and the day after I received it the price for a new one dropped to below what I hadn’t paid for a used one, which is annoying. Regardless, this is a nice, inexpensive lens that’s a good part of a lower-end kit. I think you can pull off most of what you’d need with this and not need the $1K Zeiss. The construction seems to be about the same as the Sony 10-18mm, for reference.

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I bought this already expecting it to have a loud auto focus from reading a few reviews that have addressed the topic. I assumed for the price I would be able to ignore the noise. Unfortunately that was not the case and I returned the lens to Amazon.* The image quality was great, especially for the price, with better than expected bokeh. The auto focus was a little slow and could make quick shooting a problem. If you want a portrait lens or one for landscape photography I would recommend this for the money but I do mostly amateur level street photography when I travel and the auto focus issue was a deal killer for me. The sound was loud enough to draw attention to the camera and pulled people and worse (for me) wildlife out of the moment. This is very unfortunate as the Sony FE 50mm F1.8 was small and lightweight, something I look for due to me mostly using while traveling. If you need a good prime in the 50mm range this really is a great lens for the price. But for my use, it was a poor fit. I do recommend the lens. It is possible I just got a bad one. *The return process was fast and smooth. For me Amazon has one of the easiest return services of any online marketplace.

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There is a lot of unwarranted criticism when it comes to this lens. Personally, I find this lens to be an absolute gem for the price. Sure its not metal, but its lightweight and very affordable for what you get. This lens is very capable of capturing high quality images if the person operating the camera understands its limitations. There are chromatic aberrations that appear when shooting at 1.8 but this is easily fixed in post. Ive read people have has difficulty with autofocus on this lens, but I have yet to encounter any such issues. Prior to purchasing this lens I had the Sigma MC-11 adapter with the Canon 50mm 1.8 STM mounted on my Sony a7iii and it struggled big time! For the price, I would argue that this holds its own against both the Canon and Nikon 50mm 1.8s I would not recommend this lens for video work as it does focus a but loudly, but not insanely so. If you shoot portraits, and you are looking for a 50mm focal length this is a good buy. If you need something sturdy for professional work and you will be working in challenging situations, or shooting video then I would recommend getting the 50mm 1.4.

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I have a Sony A7ii and tried a Canon 50mm with the Sigma adapter. Thats not function for my need. Sometimes it focus well and sometimes not like 50/50. So I decided to buy the Sony 50mm f1.8 FE after reading a lot of reviews and looked a lot of videos. I wasnt expecting a reliable lens but my surprise it is and works very well for the price of $200. I bought it from Cameta Camera on Amazon. They sent it and arrived in 3 days in a very protective box. The Sony 50mm f1.8 its very light and the construction its completely plastic. Excellent for travel. I used it last weekend in a Family Photoshoot and the results was very good. Its not very sharp compare to a Sigma 50 f1.4 art lens or the Sony 55mm but for the price its a win win. With this 50mm f1.8 FE you get better sharpness at f2.8 Autofocus... sometimes its fast sometimes it struggle a little but for my type of Photoshoots I do it works very good. It has firmware version 0.3 so its not the same as 2 or 3 years ago. Try it....you will like it for the price. For Weddings better select de Sony 55mm or the G Master.

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Decent lens, the AF is OKAY but I ended up returning it, I am just used to higher end lenses. The bokeh is VERY good and I actually liked it even better than the Zeiss 55 1.8 which I own now. The AF just wasnt consistent enough for me to use it and it was way to soft wide open for my taste but still had pretty good contrast despite it being soft. Great lens to walk around and travel. Did the lens wow me, NO but I rate a lens based on price point and purpose and this lens does what it should at the price it does it.

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