Here’s a selection of photos I’ve taken using the Sony FE 24-70mm Æ’/2.8 GM zoom lens. I’m sharing them here in the hope they might be helpful to others who are curious about how it performs in real-world shooting conditions.
First, a quick overview: The Sony FE 24-70mm f/2.8 GM lens is an E-mount lens designed for Sony’s full-frame cameras. It has an aperture range of Æ’/2.8 to Æ’/22 (with apertures constant throughout the zoom range), a 9-blade circular diaphragm, two aspherical and one XA elements, and is ruggedized with dust- and moisture-resistant construction. It’s one of the lenses in Sony’s G Master series of high-end lenses that work especially well on the Alpha series of cameras.
The 24-70mm performs very well in lab tests, but I wanted to see how that translated into real-world shooting. So I shot some photos to try it out, mounting it on a Sony a7III body.
I’ve tried to include in this selection a range of subjects, apertures, focal lengths, and lighting conditions in the hope it gives at least some kind of representative idea of how it performs for general travel photography (even though I was shooting these close to home).
These were all shot in RAW, and most of them have only been very lightly processed in Lightroom. For nearly all of them, I haven’t applied any extra sharpening or lens profile corrections such as fixing chromatic aberration (there’s basically none to fix, anyway). There are a few exceptions, mostly noted in the captions.
Sample Photos Taken with a Sony FE 24-70mm f/2.8 GM Lens
You can find the aperture each was taken with in the captions below each photo. If you’d like a closer look, you can click on each image to open a full-size version.
I deliberately haven’t applied extensive corrections to these images. And the general rule of thumb in photography is that it’s better to get the shot right at the time of capture rather than trying to fix it after. That’s a great aspiration, but it’s not always possible to do if you’re bumping up against limitations or flaws in gear, conditions, or technique.
But it’s worth mentioning that there are some excellent tools available to help address common issues with lenses, such as distortion, chromatic aberration, and lens vignetting when editing the images. All-round image processing apps like Lightroom Classic and Capture One have solid tools built in already that often cater to specific lens profiles (or you can make your own).
Some more specialized tools can take it even further. DxO, in particular, sets the gold standard.Their software is built on the foundation of their incredibly deep archive of data from their extensive lab testing of the optical performance of lenses and cameras. But there are some other excellent specialized tools available. These are well worth a look (and have free trials):
DxO Pure RAW (for a suite of automatic RAW file corrections enhancement)
DxO ViewPoint (correcting for distortion and geometry)
Topaz Labs Sharpen AI (in addition to standard unsharp tools, includes focus correction and shake reduction)
Price & Availability of the Sony FE 24-70mm f/2.8 GM Lens
Check the current price and availability of the Sony FE 24-70mm Æ’/2.8 GM at:
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David Coleman
I'm a professional freelance travel photographer based in Washington DC. Seven continents, up mountains, underwater, and a bunch of places in between. My images have appeared in numerous publications, and you can check out some of my travel photography here. More »