aztecthrush
Super sharp, and great for those willing to use manual focus most of the time. I bought this mainly to photograph herptiles on SW desert roads. Ive been using a Canon 100mm IS macro for this purpose but read about the sharpness of this one and decided to give it a shot. I focus on often-moving snakes and other small herps using a very bright headlamp, generally with spot autofocus, always with flash. With the Canon the focus has been near-instantaneous--necessary because the darned critters wont stay still (also why I shy from using manual focus). With this Sony macro, there was constant hunting under these conditions (I even tried it in hotel room lamplight and got the same result). Didnt matter which distance-restriction setting was on, it did the same thing regardless. I got a few tarantula and toad shots that were very sharp, though it "pumped" focus the entire time but somehow zeroed in at the last second before firing. Many other images were unfocused, though, something that virtually never happened with the Canon macro. At home I mounted the Canon macro on my Sony A7RII, using an off-market adapter, and the focus was actually faster and more accurate with that setup. So despite the amazing sharpness of this lens, and its ability to take advantage of the 42mp Sony camera, I sadly had to return it. Actually the Canon is plenty sharp for what I do anyway, so though disappointing, this was no huge loss for my work. Your results with this lens might be very different--I know it gets great reviews overall. Just didnt function well enough for what I do.