I just got this lens... It should be the perfect travel camera. 20mm is great for those wide landscape/architecture pics and 40mm is super ok for portrait, putting people in front of the landmarks. I will prob simply bring my 85mm prime for those 10% occasions where a narrow view is required. These 2 lens with the A7C should make this an unbeatable travel combo.
I never could get excited enough for the 17-28 because 35mm is my favorite focal length. The 16-35 gm is way too big and expensive so this is really marketed to people like me who are focused on portability, usefulness, and value. This lens paired with the 28-200 and you're ready for anything! Thanks for the great review as always Pav!
I am cinematographer cum photographer my budget is not so much planning to buy 20,35,85 and 28-75 Bt now i am moving to 20-40,50,85,135 i can get 2 extra lens 50 and 135 due to this lens
I can't tell you how happy I am to see manufacturers making lens like this. So, hats off to Tamron for investing in these lenses for production. I hope it's a huge success for them. With that being said. I think they missed the mark a little, "at least for me" I wish they could have made this lens at 20 - 50 f 2.8 In my mind the prefect travel/vacation lens would have been 20-50mm 2.8 - But maybe they choose 20-40 to keep it smaller and lighter. I'm not sure how the math of making lenes is and how much that would have affected the final product.
Another great review. This lens is amazing for what it is. I just wish Tamron pushed the narrow end to 50 or 60 instead of 40mm. Totally understand the compromise but to me 50mm f2.8 is where portraits start to look amazing.
I haven't been disappointed with Tamron lenses for some time now. I used the 35-150 on my Nikon D750, and the 18-400 on my Nikon D5300. On my Sony A7riii and A7Riiia, I have used the 17-28 f2.8, 28-75 f2.8, 70-300, 28-200 f2.8-5.6, and now the 20-40mm f2.8. I haven't had the opportunity to shoot for about six months due to a back injury, but I plan to this weekend for the first time with the 20-40mm that I bought a few weeks ago. Your review helped me with my latest Tamron purchase.
Great video. This lens is on my camera most of the time while travelling and always filming my family. It is portable and amazingly very sharp. The picture quality is outstanding. The other lens I carry around is the Tamron 35-150mm that is perfect for places of interest like zoo and parks where zoom is needed. Both of these lens combo are the only lens you need while travelling on holiday.
Pav, great stuff my man. If it's not too much trouble, could you indicate what focal length the photos were taken at in your zoom lens review videos (e.g. 20mm, 35mm, 40mm, etc.)? It would be really helpful! Thanks for all of your work.
Thank you! I can add that info now. all the photos in the video were taken at different focal lengths. Adding that info to every single photo in edit takes really long time - I only do it if the zoom setting is crucial to the lens' performance. Not the case here.
The Zeiss 16-35 f/4 has always been my go-to for a wide angle zoom but this lens really intrigues me for all the reasons you mention in your video. I've been wanting something faster and I'm thinking this is the one. I've always referred to Tamron as "the Toyota of lenses": solid, reliable, good value, etc. I've loved my 28-200 much more than I ever thought I would. Great review, beautiful footage, keep up the good work!
I would prefer prime lenses like 20, 28 and 35mm and could be f/1.8 or 2.0, so they are a good point between compact size, weight, price and a nice background isolation. But this 20-40 although 2.8 seems very interesting to a kind of walkaround. It's not easy to decide. Nice review!
I own the Tamron 35-150 2,8 and thinking for a lens for gimbal work, wondering if the sharpness in video is enough for professional work ? coz I was hesitating with the Sony 16-35 f2,8 but the price and the weight.. don't know if its worth
i own 70-180 which is a great lens but for my gimbal work i used to have 14mm 2.8 from samyang which used to struggle a lot to focus thats why i sold 14mm for 16-35 f/4 pz by sony
that depends how you define "sharp enough for proffessional work". If you mean if it does auto focus well, then it is as good as any sony lens in my opinion
thank you! It was not in the woods but just outside of my house 😂 This was filmed with Sony a7sIII and Sony 50mm f1.2 GM lens: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-FNhZ8s0hmI8.html
how long is a piece of string? They both are great lenses. Only you can decide which one is better for you based on the price and what you are going to use it for
I would love to see a lens with a very slightly larger range on the long end. Additional weight would be ok in that compromise. 50 or 60 mm would be perfect. I just don't know that this would be great for portraits.
THANK YOU for this review. I feel like you covered a lot of good points. The only thing you should have done to add more value to the vid, is mention other lenses in comparison. You could have went a little deeper with that part but besides that, this vid was perfect, sir. Liked and subbed. 📸💯💪
Thank you! It is very difficult to cover everything and talk about everything. I try to go with a feel I have about any given lens at the moment of making a review and see what comes out.
oh thank you very much! it was filmed with Sony a7sIII in s-log3 onto Atomos Ninja V in Apple ProRes and graded in Adobe Premiere. Lens used was Sony 50mm f1.2 G Master
I bought this lens too, can't seem to be able to take it off my camera tho 😅 It's good enough for dinner shots with my family as well as some landscape photography
there is only zoom and focus rings but you can change the focus ring to change the aperture via the Tamron Utility software, the lens has got USB-C socket on it to connect it to your computer. I talk about it in my video
Im a pixel peeper guilty as charged and a sucker for sharpness and cropping compositions on my a7riv..would sharpness of this lens be enough for me?didnt like cropped shots of the tamron 28-75 at all..
This is by far one of the best lens reviews i have seen! Im going to hong kong and bali on vacation this year with my a7c.. for that camera i have the 28-60 kitlens, the sony zeiss 24-70 f4(with broken autofocus), a canon fd 28mm f2.8, a pantax 28mm f2.8, and lastly a helios 44-2 (58mm) but i want a wide lens to film in hong kong (mostly at night with low light.. im really torn between the new viltrox 16mm f1.8 and the tamron 17-28.. but this review makes me want to just buy this 20-40 and take only this lens and the helios... man i still cant make up my mind😂 anyway, GREAT REVIEW!
I think my photo samples speak or themselves in my review. I really like it and I found no problems with it photo performance wise at all. Solid performer
They should make it 16-60 instead of cutting on each end . Wide not enough for landscaping,long end not tele at all at 40 .just too short a range with a relative big lens .i think u can just get a prime 20 & switch to ApsC 32will be fine & lighter .
16-60 would be a totally different lens. 20mm is more than wide enough for landscape photography and 40mm puts it in the 'standard' lens zone. Very small lens for a zoom with f2.8 aperture. Using 20mm and cropping to get reach might be ok for some but cropping will reduce the resolution.
why would any lens look too small? I guess if you don't like small lenses than this is not for you but .... it is not that small, there are smaller lenses out there
The one frustrating thing that isn't really Tamron's fault is on modern Sony video centric bodies, Dynamic Stabilisation has a 1.3x crop, so it turns the 20mm into a 26mm. This means the older Tamron 17-28mm F2.8 is a better choice for vlogs, or when ironically you need a 20mm with good stabilisation.
there are other forms of stabilisation, like gimbals. Also I think that standard stabilisation is good enough most of the time when vlogging. It's just acceptable to have some shake in hand held footage
there is no right answer to your question. yes, maybe, no. It all depends on your shooting style and the wedding venues. I have seen videographers making 24-70mm work for them just fine.
This is much more than a kit lens to be honest, I bought it just to mainly use it with my gimbal, for which I think that it is just the perfect gimbal lens for my DJI RS3, and I tested it against my GM 35mm and to be honest it is pretty close in terms of sharpness to that GM 35mm. This is crazy that it can compete with a GM, a prime no less.
I got this lens yesterday. I have it attached to a Sony FX3 on a Zhiyun Crane M3 gimbal. The lens is light and the external zoom is quite minimal so it doesn’t mess with the balance on the gimbal at all.
