My old Nikon 24-70 f2.8 needs replacing.... or does it? Trying out the Z24mm-70mm f2.8 24mm-70mm f2.8 VR 24mm-70mm f2.8G To see which one suits my needs best seancameronpho...
All modern lenses are sharp. It's how you use them. I own Zeiss prime lenses and Nikon prime lenses. The 24-70G 2.8 I own but have only done some test shots with it so far. I think it's a great lens and it is sharp enough to my eyes on my D700. When shooting portraits it's more flattering to shoot with a less sharp lens. Over sharpened portraits look awful, personally. People are just being duped into the marketing hype of new gear these days.
Fascinating comparison. Well done! I think this comparison somewhat emphasizes why I usually dim the highlights a bit in Lightroom when shooting with my Z lenses. I like the sharpness of the Z, but it does seem to gather more light. which is possibly problematic with highlights. I have zero interest in moving backwards in technology thanks to my abilities in post-processing, so I'll be sticking with Z's and using the skin-softening feature of my Z8 and Z9 when I remember to switch it on. 🙂
Thanks for taking the time to prepare and film what was a very interesting comparison. To my eyes seeing your images the Z reveals much more detail and that is great for enlarged landscape or cityscape shots. The modelling images are more subjective and seemed to depend on the pose and loft of the models hair. Though overall there seemed a harshness to the Z images, a preciseness that you either like or you don't. The G brought out the colour of lipstick and skin, and was more complementary. So in my HO: Z for landscape and cityscape shots and for someone has money to throw at a new system. VR for anyone doing wedding videos and anyone who wants real low light performance G for portrait and to save money and Tamron for anyone who wants a bit of all three - its VC seems to allow a D850 to hold the image steady when the VR will lose it.
🤣🤣🤣Thank you Sean for the laughs in the beginning.. I understand the glass of wine and hair trimmer issue... But you're a handsome bloke whereas I don't show my face if I can help it... But fully agree with your conclusions. My G lens will be going for a tune-up but Ill be purchasing the Z. Three prime ministers ago... Syrian hamster... thanks for introducing us to Melanie. is she a relation?
I love this review ! Thanks for the hard work to do it. Yes the last generation of Z mount lenses are incredibly sharp. Do they also have micro contrast and pleasing looking ? Apparently yes also. I personally own the VR version because I use the VR in city scapes photography on my D3X which doesn’t have any sort of IBIS obviously! And the results are excellent on 24Mpx sensor Maybe on higher resolution sensor it is a little soft as you seems to show on the Z9 I will check it soon on the Z6 II to see if AF is more accurate.
I don’t understand why anyone needs AF and VR on a studio portrait lens but whatever floats the boat. You’ve dove into the Z pool already so the question is do you plan to keep running F mount? I’m running F, Sony FE, and Leica M mount cameras. ALL OF THEM can use the original 24-70mm G lens (non VR) and the AF isn’t something I use for portraits. Any colour differences you see can be eliminated by doing a custom white balance with a grey card. Blown highlights are caused by incorrect exposure. Maybe rethink the premise of this comparison. I can’t adapt the Z lens to any other system without adding glass correction and the IQ degradation that leads to. No secret for me the original G is the keeper.
VR is good when using for other stuff like events, night photography, anything low light where subjects are still. I just wish Nikon would design a new lens - 20 to 50 VR for DSLR. There's still demand. Event shooters need it.
Sean is a pro so his old 24-70 G lens has been hammered with 7 years use, and needs replacement. I can see that the Z lens will work with Z9 tracking to catch action portraits, but if you didn't need tracking then that's not a worry. I can see that if you want/need VR then you need to buy a lens with VR. However I'm a cheapskate and don't need those things. I was able to buy a nearly mint, boxed plain old G version for £495 (with guarantee) from LCE last summer - and it seems pretty nice to me. There's a thought, Sean: why not buy a £500 used replacement for your knackered G lens (and sell it on again when you decided splash out 2 grand for the Z lens?)
Yeah I was thinking the new Z version would be leaps sharper than the old G. Not really. Prob could’ve done without buying it other than nice to not have deal with adapters.
Shooting vertical with a camera with a built in grip without using the grip does my head in... nice comparison though, the G lens still holds it's own imo
Hi Sean, If there were a ZTF adapter it would be interesting to rerun the test on your D5 to decide if the Z sensor or the D sensor produces the best images. Nice comparison BTW.
That would be interesting Michael, my gut feeling is that both the D5 and Z24-70 are quite contrasty so I think the images would be a little high in tonal contrast.
Nikon shouldn't abandon DSLR users. They've stopped designing new lenses for DSLR. Very sad. I never loved Nikon. And now they want me to buy 15 grand in new mirrorless camera and lenses? There's mirrors in life, baby. Mama don't take my mirror away a hey .. . . also, 24 isn't wide enough. And it isn't internal focusing, the dslr version. I need a 20 to 50. at 70, I start using the 70-200 e FL.
I didnt like the z cameras , im and old Die hard , i bought another nikon d850 and new grip in 2024 , wild shizny eh ! And a 24-70 nikon vr lens , the last of nikons great DSLR's ( i have to many pro nikon lenses out to 600 to) weigh in for z glass And electric viewfinders
