Nikon NIKKOR Z 24-70 mm f/4 S Mirrorless Camera Lens JMA704DA

Product Information

I use a clear (UV) protective filter instead of a cap. I only use a cap when I throw this in my bag, otherwise I leave a clear protective filter on my lens at all times so I'm ready to shoot instantly. S : Subliminally suggests sexual satisfaction. It has no other meaning; Nikon and car and every kind of marketer have been using letters like "S" and "X" in model numbers since the 1940s for this same reason for just about everything. These days, there are plenty of options for Nikon Z shooters who need a telephoto lens, even third-party optics like the Tamron 70-300mm f/4-6.3. So, I wouldn’t say that the 70mm long end of the 24-70mm f/4 S is a dealbreaker. It’s just something you need to be aware of, assuming that you want to shoot proper telephoto pictures. You’ll end up needing to add another lens to your bag one way or another, whereas with the 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR, you might be fine. NIKON Z 5 + NIKKOR Z 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR @ 200mm, ISO 200, 1/400, f/11.0

Bokeh: Significant but mostly mild onion skinning (due to the aspherical elements, for sure) with a bit of a neutral but bright rim. Not the creamy bokeh some seek, but actually pretty benign bokeh impacts overall. That benign bokeh continues further into the corners than usual due to the low coma and baffle impacts. For an f/4 lens, I’d judge the bokeh rendering to be better than you’d expect: not creamy, but not distracting. For context, anything under 2.5 pixels of CA by our measurements can be corrected pretty easily in post-processing. Anything under about 1.5 pixels of CA generally does not need to be corrected in post-processing. And under 1 pixel is almost completely negligible. 4. Sharpness Overall, I judge the sharpness to be quite good for a kit lens and its price. This small, light lens is performing in a category well above expectation. It’s just not perfect. There’s little astigmatism and coma in the corners, though, which means that corners do tend to sharpen up well, particularly with deconvolution sharpeners. Lens sharpness has nothing to do with picture sharpness; every lens made in the past 100 years is more than sharp enough to make super-sharp pictures if you know what you're doing. The only limitation to picture sharpness is your skill as a photographer. It's the least talented who spend the most time worrying about lens sharpness. Skilled photographers make great images with whatever camera is in their hands; I've made some of my best images of all time with an irreparably broken camera! Most pixels are thrown away before you see them, but camera makers don't want you to know that. It features a retractable design and adopts 14 elements in 11 groups, which include one aspherical extra-low dispersion (ED), one spherical ED, and three aspherical elements. It also has nano crystal and Nikon integrated coatings to help mitigate flare and ghosting, while it uses a fluorine coating to help keep the front element clean.Note that a lot of testers seem to be testing this lens only with the lens corrections in place—which I’m also doing for my primary results because that’s the way most people will shoot with it, JPEG or NEF—which tends to exaggerate any sharpness problems in the corners a bit. Nikon’s MTF charts suggest that the 24-70mm should be better than good in the corners, and 70mm probably should produce the worst corner performance. I see just that, but only when I test without lens corrections. So, how does the 24-70mm f/4 S hold up? Does it take advantage of the Nikon Z7’s 45-megapixel resolution, or fall short? Let’s take a look. NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-70mm f/4 S @ 52mm, ISO 64, 0.4 seconds, f/6.3 Build Quality

This lens does have some mild field curvature which can be visible under certain conditions, although is not especially objectionable. The field curvature is not particularly heavy, however, and it won’t be the primary cause of blurry photos even at its worst. You can minimize the problem by stopping down to f/5.6 or f/8 in critical cases. In short, if you’re getting blurry photos with this lens, it is much more likely to be a focusing error or a miscalculation of depth of field. Vignetting Anyway, the more expensive, heavier and larger lens won't result in "wow" images taken with your camera, unless you yourself have what it takes, and you can really (and objectively) say that "this image does not have the wow factor because I used the wrong lens". So in my opinion, self improvement is more important than more expensive lens. I would get a fast prime (and I mean fast like f2 or faster) to practice with it. The story is basically the same. I prefer the 24-120mm f/4 S in the center and midframes, while the 24-70mm f/4 S has an advantage in the corners. Both lenses are quite sharp throughout, though, and by f/11, the differences have basically vanished. Using the 24-70 on the z50 gives you a slightly faster lens at the expense of the wider angle of the 16-50, and you won't notice the gain on the long end. You're trading the field of view of a wide angle lens (16 equiv to 24 fov) for a slightly wider than normal (24 equiv to 36 fov), and gaining a slightly longer short tele fov on the long end. And that's at the expense of image stabilization. Unusually, I didn’t get a sense that this lens performs better at any particular focus distance. Most of the time, I’ll see lenses that perform better close to their closest focus distance or perform better closer to infinity; one or the other, not both. But the 24-70mm f/4 S seems to be immune to that. At its maximum magnification it was performing much like it did at “regular” shooting distances and even infinity. By comparison, the excellent Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8E F-mount lens is somewhat soft at minimum focus distance (i.e. it seems designed for mid-to-long distance use).

New is that the control ring is programmable. It defaults to Manual Focus, or make it control aperture or exposure compensation if you prefer.

These caveats aside, this 24-70 is ultra-ultra sharp, especially wide-open at f/4 where lenses are at their softest.

A versatile lens offering excellent image quality

The lens has been constructed to the same weatherproofing standards as the Nikon Z 7 and Z 6 cameras, meaning you can be confident using the lens when working in inclement wether conditions. The Nikon Z 24-70mm f/4 S lens also has fluorine coatings to repel water, dust and dirt. Measuring 77.5 mm x 88.5 mm (3.07” x 3.5”) when retracted, and weighing 500 grams (1 lb, 1.7 oz), the new Nikkor Z 24-70mm F4 S is a relatively compact model. The Nikon Z 24-70mm f/4 S has high levels of distortion, although, interestingly, not all photographers who use this lens will ever notice it. In Lightroom, as well as Nikon’s own post-processing software, an automatic lens profile is applied, without any software option to remove it. This practically eliminates a photo’s distortion, making it appear as though the lens has little to no distortion at all. (You can change the image’s metadata to cheat around this in Lightroom, but few photographers will ever do so.)

Focus: Fast and precise. I know of no better way to describe this. More words and I'll just confuse you. So let me just phrase it a different way: within the constrains of the Z6/Z7 autofocus system, the lens is not slowing anything down or making it less precise. There's no distance scale (and obviously no DOF markings). Curiously, the lens has a very close focus point of 12" (0.3m), which produces a maximum reproduction ratio of 1:3.3, which is nearing macro range. Red Maple, Yosemite Valley, October 2018, 12:19 P.M. Nikon Z7, Nikon 24-70mm f/4 Z at 70mm, f/4 hand-held at 1/200 at Auto ISO 64, Perfectly Clear v3.6. bigger or full-resolution. Center and mid-frame sharpness gets even better at 50mm, although at the expense of the extreme edges due to field curvature. Stopping down the lens to f/5.6 makes things look drastically better though, so keep this in mind when shooting in the field. While this lens has no Image Stabilization (IS or Vibration Reduction (VR)) of its own, it only works on Nikon's Z cameras, which have their own stabilization designed to work in concert with this lens.

Image Quality

Chromatic aberration: I’m tempted to say there isn’t any, Neither longitudinal, which is very nicely corrected, nor latitudinal, which is also nicely corrected. What’s left is easily correctable. The Z6/Z7 body and the 24-70mm f/4 make for a very compact full frame solution. A fraction bigger than the Sony alternative, but as you'll discover later in this review, much more than a fraction better. Bridgeport Shop Window at Night, October 2018, 8:01 P.M. Nikon Z7, Nikon 24-70mm f/4 Z at 32mm, f/4 hand-held at 1/30 at Auto ISO 18,000, Perfectly Clear v3.6. bigger.