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

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Note that the rest of the image is extremely high in contrast, meaning there is very little veiling flare. Try as I might, I couldn’t get anything worse than this in a real-world image. The 24-70mm f/4 just has very impressive flare performance. Starburst Performance

Vignetting is something you might expect to be lower with a wider mount, but that’s not necessarily the case. Both mirrorless models have higher levels of corner shading than the Canon EF lens; and although the Sony zoom has higher vignetting on average, the Nikkor reaches well over –2EV at 70mm when set to the initial aperture, and the vignetting never really disappears even when stopped down. At its lowest, it measures around –0.5 EV, and that’s not just visible in the corners but at the widest edges as well. Fortunately, this can be easily removed in-camera or after capture via software, but if it’s particularly heavy, it can reveal noise that can lead to a loss of detail after removal. Yes, there are a few things about the 24-70mm f/4 S I wish were different. I’m not a fan of the rotate-before-using-lens thing Nikon does to make lenses travel smaller. I wish that I didn’t have to use the lens corrections—you pretty much have to at 24mm to deal with the linearity and vignetting, unfortunately. But in terms of the basics, this is a quite sharp lens with few worrisome attributes. Moreover, it’s the right size and weight for the Z6/Z7 bodies and makes a svelte travel companion. 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.)Both lenses have some pretty substantial distortion. Although this is correctible in post-processing software, I still prefer lenses with low distortion – it makes the files easier to work with in obscure software, and it also means less “stretching” in the corners of the frame when fixing distortion. That can have a minor, but visible effect on lens sharpness. The Nikon Z 24-70mm f/4 S has hardly any visible chromatic aberration, even when left uncorrected. It takes up just a pixel or so at most, a small enough amount that automatic correction in post-processing software will rarely leave any detectable traces. Here is a graph showing the focal lengths and apertures with the highest levels of lateral chromatic aberration (red/green fringing): Even more importantly – since it’s harder to correct – is that the 24-70mm f/4 has almost nonexistent levels of longitudinal chromatic aberration (color fringing in out-of-focus regions). This can be a major problem in some lenses, harming the quality of bokeh and making defocused lights look strange. The sample photos in the following section demonstrate practically nonexistent longitudinal chromatic aberration. Bokeh 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. I can see only the very faintest spherochromatism in this lens, and only if I go out of my way to see it.

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. By that standard, the 24-70mm f/4 S is well-built. It fits snugly on the Nikon Z6 / Z7 cameras, with absolutely no detectable wobble on the mount. The lens does extend when zooming from 24mm to 70mm, using a two-stage telescoping barrel. Zoom lenses of this design frequently wobble at their longest setting, and I was worried the 24-70mm f/4 S would be the same. However, up to about 60mm, the lens cannot be wobbled at all, and 70mm only allows the slightest amount – not anything objectionable, and better than expected. NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-70mm f/4 S @ 31.5mm, ISO 400, 1/30, f/5.6 But the basic idea is that the two lenses are about the same price. Which one is the better value? To me, the 24-200mm f/4-6.3 VR stands out in this comparison. No, it doesn’t have the nice, constant f/4 maximum aperture. But it is only a bit worse optically, while covering far more focal lengths than the 24-70mm f/4 S. For most genres of photography, it will make a bigger difference to be able to shoot at 200mm than to have a little more corner sharpness wide open! 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. That is quite close, although not necessarily uncommon for a standard zoom today. For example, the Panasonic 24-105mm f/4 lens for their full-frame mirrorless lineup focuses a bit closer than this – a maximum reproduction ratio of 1:2 rather than 1:3.33 on this lens. I think that most photographers will be quite happy with the 24-70mm’s performance, however, which is close enough for any normal subjects.

The other reason is that you already have a telephoto lens to cover the over-70mm focal lengths (something like the Tamron 70-300mm f/4.5-6.3), so the 24-120mm f/4 S is redundant to you. If this is your situation, I still think you should consider the 24-120mm f/4 S in case you ever want to travel light and just bring one lens. But if a 70-200mm or 70-300mm is always going to be in your bag anyway, maybe you just save the money and size/weight by going with the 24-70mm f/4 instead. The graph below shows light fall-off for each of the three lenses set to 70mm at their widest aperture, when it would be at its most noticeable. ED extra-low dispersion elements, one of which is also aspherical. These help reduce secondary axial chromatic aberration. As for used prices, the same thing applies! However, the Z 28-75mm f/2.8 generally has cheaper used prices than the Z 24-120mm f/4 S.

Note that this auto distortion profile also, as a side effect, makes the extreme corners of an image look less vignetted, since you are essentially cropping out the darkest portions. My opinion is that this distortion correction is one of the reasons behind the differing opinions online about whether the 24-70mm f/4 has normal vs high levels of vignetting. There is relatively high vignetting on the 24-70mm f/4 S, particularly at 24mm, but also at 70mm when focused at infinity. Here is a chart showing the stops of vignetting at each focal length and aperture, both close focus (CF) and infinity focus (IF): 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. The “S” line is the very first line of proprietary lenses for the Z mount, with speculation that there will be other lines available at some point. The S line is designed to be the sharpest and best available, which goes some way to explaining their high asking price. I happen to have both 24-70mm S lenses, the f4 and f2.8. The f4 is very fine but f2.8 is excellent. However, I am not sure exactly what "WOW" is, but I agree that is probably more the result of lighting and composition, and maybe shallower depth of field.

Vignetting

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. While it’s usually the shorter focal lengths that are the sharpest, the new Nikon’s peak sharpness is at 35mm f/5.6, but it is at its best at 50mm overall. Even then, however, it isn’t the sharpest of the three, but it isn’t far off; moreover, the Sony is the least impressive of the three at 70mm. While the Sony and Canon outshine the Nikon at some focal lengths, neither comes close in with respect to uniformity.

The f/4 version is a great way to test the water on the Z cameras. The lens is sharper than any of the F-mount versions, so the quality illustrated how good the Z lenses can be. Add to that, the lens is remarkably small and light, so it's the perfect lens for travel, street, etc. The Nikon Z 24-70mm f/4 S and Nikon Z 24-120mm f/4 S are well-controlled for chromatic aberration. The 24-70mm f/4 S has slightly better performance of the two, never reaching above 1.22 pixels of CA, while the 24-120mm f/4 S maxes out at 1.76 pixels – still not bad for a zoom lens at all. Top of a Fence Post, Happy Isles, Yosemite Valley, October 2018, 12:26 P.M. Nikon Z7, Nikon 24-70mm f/4 Z at 30mm, f/6.3 hand-held at 1/30 at Auto ISO 400, Perfectly Clear v3.6. split-toned print. bigger. Because of the 24-70mm’s 7-blade aperture, you will end up with 14-point starbursts/sunstars in your photos. The starburst overall is quite well-defined with this lens, although individual blades are wider than on most other Nikon lenses. This leads to a rather unique look to starburst effects: NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-70mm f/4 S @ 24mm, ISO 64, 1/13, f/16.0 Ultimately, even though I’d give the nod to the Nikon Z 24-70mm f/4 S, it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to see these differences even in a large print, except at 24mm and f/4 specifically.In practice, an image with uncorrected vignetting at 24mm and f/4 – the worst levels – looks like this: NIKON Z 7 + NIKKOR Z 24-70mm f/4 S @ 24mm, ISO 1600, 15 seconds, f/4.0 As you can see, this is a very strong lens. It looks like the sweet spot of the lens is at f/5.6 for landscape and architecture photography, although when shooting at longer focal lengths, you might want to stop down between f/5.6 and f/8 to get the best results. When photographing people, you don’t need to stop the lens down at all – this is one of the sharpest zoom lenses out there in terms of its wide open performance in the center. To understand how good this lens is, you really need to look at the comparisons with other Nikon F-mount lenses. Lens Construction Best focal length appears to be 35mm, and best aperture is either f/5.6 or f/8 (the Z7 will have diffraction by f/8). The Nikon Z 24-70mm f/4 S is a compact high-performance ultra-ultra sharp lens for Nikon's new full-frame mirrorless cameras. I easily get sharp 45MP images hand-held at all focal lengths at 1/8 of a second with the Z7's great VR, no tripods needed! It works great at 1/4 second at the wide end.