Sony has done a truly fantastic job building out their lens lineup over the last 5 years. Though I was a fan of Sony’s mirrorless innovation, I avoided the system until late 2017 because there were too many lens gaps for my personal needs. I made the plunge with the A7riii because it was such a fantastic camera and because the lenses I wanted were available. While the Sony lens selection is now pretty good, I’m greedy and will always want more. So these are 5 lenses that exist in other systems, that I wish Sony would emulate:
Nikon 300mm F/4 E PF
A top quality telephoto prime that weighs only 755 grams. This would be an ideal match for the Sony system combining top quality and small form factor. Even the price of $2000 can be considered quite reasonable. When I shot Nikon, I used this lens for all my wildlife shooting (sometime with teleconverter) for less than the price of a good 100-400, at a lower weight and higher quality.
Current Alternative:
For now, the only native Sony alternative is the Sony FE 100-400mm. I haven’t tried it yet, supposed to be a fantastic lens, but it is slower aperture and weighs 1395 grams. So faster aperture, higher IQ and practically half the weight. A Sony version of this lens would be a real winner.
Canon 135mm F2
Sony has a wealth of fantastic 85mm portrait lenses but some shooters just want something a bit longer. 85mm can be close working distance for headshots. The Canon 135mm f/2 is reasonably priced at $1000, reasonable weight and despite being a bit older, provides top image quality. In native FE mount, a lens like this would prove very popular.
Current Sony alternative
Sony shooters can go with the Zeiss Batis 135mm f/2.8. But it’s slower than the Canon and nearly twice the price.
Nikon 200-500mm F/5.6
We know Sony lacks telephoto options. Here is a lens that strikes a nice balance of speed, size , quality and price (at $1400), and provides a fantastic long telephoto option for advanced consumers.
Current Sony alternative
We are back to the Sony FE 100-400mm…..
Sigma 24mm F 1.4 ART
The Sony FE system has done a great job building out primes from 35mm to 100mm but they are lacking at the long and short ends. The shortest native prime is the Sony FE 28 F/2. So not quite so wide nor is it very fast. So the Sigma 24mm ART would be a great lens to emulate.
Current Sony Alternative
Sony doesn’t have a great completely native alternative but within the FE mount, Zeiss has the fantastic Zeiss Batis 25mm F/2.
Nikon 8-15mm fisheye
There are great ultrawide options available for the Sony system with 3 great zoom lenses in the FE 12-24mm, FE 16-35 f/4, and FE 16-35 f/2.8 GM. There are some good ultrawide primes from Voigtlander, Venus and Samyang but fisheye options are rather limited. The only fisheye directly from Sony is the 16mm Fisheye converter that gets attached to the Sony 28mm F/2.
The Nikon 8-15mm fisheye is a unique lens (for now). It can create traditional 15mm fisheye images as well as 180 degree circular images. At just 485 grams, it would match the Sony mirrorless bodies very well and would open additional artistic abilities.
Conclusion
Sony has done a fantastic job building out an almost complete lens lineup in under 4 years. In fact, Sony already has lenses that should be the envy of Canon and Nikon users such as the Sony 100mm F2.8 GM STF lens, and the Sony 12-24mm F/4 G lens (my review here).
This list represents 5 lenses I would love to see Sony emulate over the next 1 to 3 years. These are lenses I would consider purchasing for my own use and I expect all 5 of these lenses would be very popular with Sony shooters.
