My alternative to Sony’s intriguing new pancake zoom… is a Sony zoom: Sony FE 28-70mm f/3.5-5.6 OSS

For starters I likely will not buy the former lens alluded to in the subject and I have already had the latter. The former is the new Sony FE 28-60mm f/4-5.6 Lens. Very small and I like the sample photos I have seen so far.

This lens has only one key advantage over the other lens mentioned.

• When closed it is very compact.

And that is about it. Great for carrying it around but from what I can tell it loses that advantage a bit when manually extended for actual use.

For that reason alone I would not choose this lens if compactness were my greatest concern. I would choose a prime lens like the pancake Rokinon/Samyang 35mm f/2.8 or other small primes like the Rokinon/Samyang 45mm f/1.8 or Sigma 45mm f/2.8 Contemporary. But if I was intent on having a small-ish lightweight zoom there is another lens I would choose. The Sony FE 28-70mm f/3.5-5.6 OSS.

Why? I am glad you asked.

• At the wide end I note the same advantage it has over the Sony Zeiss constant 24-70mm f/4 variant. It goes to f/3.5.
• The 28-70mm f/3.5-5.6 does not collapse, but unlike any other wide to short tele zoom it also does not extend when zooming which I rather like.
• While larger than the 28-60mm it is considerably smaller than any of the other wide to short tele zooms.
• It has OSS which the 28-60mm does not have. Used in conjunction with IBIS that should be helpful at the long end with the smaller aperture. It was even very effective on the non IBIS A7 hand held during these long exposure night shots below.

• The 28-60mm runs $500 new and $300 if bought with the A7c. Technically the 28-70mm is more expensive if purchased alone new, but since they have been available for years you can readily find them used for less than $200 all day which would be my recommendation.
• While the aperture on the long end is the same the 28-70mm goes to… 70mm. Better for portraits and such.

• Swift, accurate, and silent AF including tracking focus.

• Great image quality and colors. Nothing stated above would matter if the 28-70mm did not perform. And it does.

Having said that the 28-60mm f/4-5.6 is a fine lens. But… if you want to save a bit of money I can highly recommend the 28-70mm f/3.5-5.6 OSS. I must really like this lens. This is at least the third post… I end this by repeating “I will not buy this lens again.” to myself over and over again.