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Former Canon user moving to a77, question about lenses.

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CTR1

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So I am interested to moving the a77 for various already researched reasons and comparisons.

I am trying to learn the lens compatibilities of/with the a77 and possibly later on moving to the a99 or other future Sony full frame camera.

So far all I know is that the "DT" lenses don't work on FF, but how do you tell about the rest of the lenses? Is there a Canon or Nikon like marking/numbering/lettering to indicate this?

Thanks!

Calvin
There's always a catch. Life is a catch. You better catch it while you can.
 
Go the dyxum.com and you'll get information on all A mount lenses, both dx and ff, including old Minolta and 3rd party lenses.

As to your specific question I believe all non-dx lenses are full frame, but am not certain.
 
DT covers APC but works on FF cropped

Main thing is SEL / E or FE lenses are for mirrorless e-mount cameras don't buy them for a77

SAM/SAM II have internal focus motors but must be set to MF before you can turn the focus ring

SSM are faster usually guieter and you can turn focus ring at any time to manually adjust

G and Zeiss are the premium lenses optically, but some of the non G like the 16-55 f2.8 are really great lenses,

Some of the old Sony and Most of the older Minolta lenses are screw drive where the body drives the lens focus. If you turn on DMF direct manual focus. .. the body disengages after AF so you can like on SSM lenses tweak focus manually after AF complete s

Welcome to Sony shooting

Google "Friedman Archive" And buy his a77/a65 ebook requied good reading for any new Sony owner !!!
 
Hello there, welcome aboard (if you've already made up your mind heh)

Before I go into lenses, you might want to wait for a month or two before getting the cameras because the a79 successor is rumored to be around the corner, with the possibility of it being announced in March or April. I do hope Sony announce a cheaper full frame, or a successor to A800 though...

On the lenses, yes you're right, DT works on APS-C like the A77 you mentioned, mounting DT lenses on full frame will get you heavy vignetting. The good thing about a99 is that, is has an auto crop that gets rid of those vignetting and crop the frame like an APS-C camera would see, in the expense of losing megapixels.

But there are already a handful of full frame lenses for the alpha system out there, which have basically covered all your needs. You can also look in the old minolta lenses which is all full-frame capable, with half of the price!

There are also other letters in the alpha lens system that you should be aware of, such as SSM focusing which is super silent and faster autofocus. and the G series and Z (Zeiss) series lens, which is basically premium lenses, just like L lenses in Canon.

and yes, as stated by the previous user, check out the website for more info on that, or http://kurtmunger.com/

Hope it helps you~
 
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I debated on whether I should wait for the a77 replacement and for the price, reviews, etc I think I can live with having the a77 vs it's annoucement. Not to mention I just sold my camera body today and will be shipping my lenses tomorrow.

So from what I gather based on your post as well as the others' responses, I can't buy lenses that would work 100% on FF and crop sensor cameras?

Thanks!
 
CTR1 said:
So I am interested to moving the a77 for various already researched reasons and comparisons.

I am trying to learn the lens compatibilities of/with the a77 and possibly later on moving to the a99 or other future Sony full frame camera.

So far all I know is that the "DT" lenses don't work on FF, but how do you tell about the rest of the lenses? Is there a Canon or Nikon like marking/numbering/lettering to indicate this?

Thanks!

Calvin
There's always a catch. Life is a catch. You better catch it while you can.
Click to expand...
I believe that the Full Frame A mount lenses are the only lenses without a designation. Example
  • = Full Frame Amount.
  • DT = Crop Amount lens
  • E = Emount (not compatible with A77/A99)
  • FE = Full Frame Emount (not compatible with A77/A99)
All DT lenses work on the A99, but it will put the A99 in 10MP crop mode
All FF Minolta/Sony Amount lenses work on the A77 and A99

You can find a bunch of nice Minolta lenses for cheap. The 50mm 1.7 is also a good/cheap choice. The Minolta 28-105mm RS lens is also good... but it may be too long for indoor shots with the A77.
 
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The A77 is a hugely capable camera. I moved from Canon a couple of years ago (50D) and haven't looked back.

The IQ and handling of Sony's cameras really is first class and at the time I was upgrading the 7D was starting to look long in the tooth and I have never liked Nikon's (purely subjective - I am sure they are excellent cameras).

Just a note regarding the 'kit' 1650 lens that generally comes with the A77. I use the ' ' because this is not your usual cheapo kit lens, it is a very serious piece of glass. f2.8 across the range, weather sealing and a 72mm diameter front element. I shoot with it most of the time and rarely feel the need to stick a prime on.

Agree with the recommendation on the book, read it and learn all the features of the A77 and you will have a great time!
 
dannybgoode said:
The A77 is a hugely capable camera. I moved from Canon a couple of years ago (50D) and haven't looked back.

The IQ and handling of Sony's cameras really is first class and at the time I was upgrading the 7D was starting to look long in the tooth and I have never liked Nikon's (purely subjective - I am sure they are excellent cameras).

Just a note regarding the 'kit' 1650 lens that generally comes with the A77. I use the ' ' because this is not your usual cheapo kit lens, it is a very serious piece of glass. f2.8 across the range, weather sealing and a 72mm diameter front element. I shoot with it most of the time and rarely feel the need to stick a prime on.

Agree with the recommendation on the book, read it and learn all the features of the A77 and you will have a great time!
Click to expand...
 
CTR1 said:
So from what I gather based on your post as well as the others' responses, I can't buy lenses that would work 100% on FF and crop sensor cameras?
Click to expand...
Um, no. All the A mount lenses work on all the A mount cameras with near universal compatibility. No screwy software limitations, except for the lenses designed specifically for the smaller sensor not covering the whole full frame sensor, but the camera has some functions to make up for that. (the biggest exceptions to the rule is a 20 year old Sigma lens)

All of the A mount lenses will work on the A77. The full frame lenses will work just fine on the crop sensor, the only real downside is they may be heavier or larger than necessary, but there is no loss of functionality.

On the A99, all the full frame lenses will work as expected. The DT, crop frame lenses, will work in a crop mode on the camera. With Sony's lenses it will use this mode automatically when the lens is mounted, with Sigma or other 3rt party lenses there is a menu option to use the crop sensor mode.

The full frame lenses work on both, no hindrances or issues.

Sony "E" mount, SEL model lenses are made for the NEX, ILCE cameras, and won't fit the A mount A77 or A99, entirely different mount / flange distance. (there is a adapter to put the A mount on the E amount cameras, but not the other direction).
 
The only thing I'd add to what the others have written, is that if you buy second hand lenses you have to be careful with Sigma A-mount lenses. Those made before the SLT cameras were introduced can be incompatible with SLTs (they might work fine in single shot mode, but not in continuous shooting) unless they've been re-chipped.

Later Sigmas work fine.


All Tamrons work fine in SLTs.
Regards,
Renato
 
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CTR1 said:
I debated on whether I should wait for the a77 replacement and for the price, reviews, etc I think I can live with having the a77 vs it's annoucement. Not to mention I just sold my camera body today and will be shipping my lenses tomorrow.

So from what I gather based on your post as well as the others' responses, I can't buy lenses that would work 100% on FF and crop sensor cameras?

Thanks!

--
Calvin
There's always a catch. Life is a catch. You better catch it while you can.
Click to expand...
Sensible. I very much doubt that the A77 successor will be available to purchase before October, given Sony's past history with bringing A700, A77 & A99 to market.

As others have said, make sure you buy the A77 with the "kit" 16-50mm f2.8 lens. Had this been a FF lens, it would have been given a G designation.
 
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If you want lenses to use on the A77 and on a ff camera later, you can buy lenses that give full game coverage. These include all the Carl Zeiss lenses (except the DT 16-80mm f/3.5-4.5 Carl Zeiss), Sony G-series lenses, Minolta AF lenses, the Sony 85mm f/2.8 SAM, 28-75mm SAM, 50mm f/1.4, and 75-300mm f/4.5-5.6.

Any lens marked DT does not provide full frame coverage and is meant to be used with APS-C cameras. You can use these on the A99, but the camera automatically applies the 1.5x crop you normally get with APS-C bodies and drops the resolution to 10mp instead of the normal 24mp because it's using a smaller part of the full frame sensor. I think you can turn that off, but you'll get vignetting because DT lenses are designed to only fully cover APS-C sized sensors.

Some lenses I'd suggest:

DT 16-50mm f/2.8 SSM

DT 35mm f/1.8 SAM

Minolta AF 50mm f/1.7 (full frame coverage)

Minolta AF 70-210mm f/4 "beercan" (full frame coverage)
 
Welcome to Sony (if you have made up your mind)

Well I think people have generally covered most points on how to identify lenses. One other thing I would add is you can generally guess by the specs and/or focal range of lenses.

Eg:

Sigma 12-24mm (APS-C equivalent is sigma 8-16mm)

CZ 24-70 f/2.8 (APS-C equivalent is sony 16-50 f/2.8)

Sony 28-75 (APS-C equivalent is 18-55)

CZ 16-35mm f/2.8 (APS-C doesn't really have a equivalent afaik but there is tokina 11-16 f/2.8, sigma 10-20mm or tamron 10-24mm)

So you can notice the general trend in focal ranges. If in doubt look up dyxum. The old minolta lenses will be FF.

So I would suggest investing in FF lenses from the start if you have future plans to go FF.
 
When looking at third party lenses, keep this in mind:

Sigma Lenses:
  • Lenses labeled as DC are crop sensor lenses.
  • Lenses labeled as DG are full frame lenses.
Tamron Lenses:
  • Lenses labeled as Di are full frame lenses.
  • Lenses labeled as Di-II are crop sensor lenses.
For other, smaller third parties they may use the DX designation to indicate the lens is for crop sensors.
 
I'm glad you mention the 'kit' lens since I had a couple questions about it.

I tried an in store demo version of the a77 + kit lens and when adjusting focal length during photos or video taking, the lens was quite stiff to adjust - is there a certain mode/function/etc to enable/disable to make it smooth?

Regarding 16-50 f2.8 lens choices, is the Sony one the best to go with or is there a better/equal for less $$?

Thanks.
 
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