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For the provided Sony E 4/PZ 18-105 G OSS lens many thanks the store ProFotoSalewhere you can find many new and used lenses for different systems, including similar lenses for Sony mirrorless cameras.

Navigation

1. In short
2. Main Specifications
3. Assembly
4. Stabilizer and Power Zoom
5. Focusing
6. Image quality
7. Sample Photos
8. My personal experience with the lens
9. All Sony E APS-C cameras
10. All Sony E APS-C Lenses
11. Lens prices
12. Results
13. User Comments
14. Add your review or question on the lens

In this review, Sony E 4/PZ 18-105 G. OSS (Optical Steady Shot, Power Zoom, SELP18105G, E-mount). I will call it Sony E 18-105 for short. This lens should not be confused with similar Sony E 4/PZ 18-110 G.OSS.

In short

Sony E 18-105 – a universal zoom lens for mirrorless cameras with a bayonet mount Sony E and an APS-C sensor. Key features are a constant 1:4 aperture throughout the focal length range, internal zoom and focus, and electronic focal length control, which is very important and useful during video shooting.

The Sony E 18-105 is well built, with a very quiet and fast focus motor and good image stabilization. The lens has a convenient range of focal lengths.

Among the obvious shortcomings are some frauds with auto-correction for vignetting/distortion.

Sony E 18-105 belongs to the line of lenses Sony G Lens, which is designed to ensure high optical quality of the lens. Typically, Sony G Lens refers to lenses intended for professional use. At the same time, Sony E 18-105 is not very expensive; its cost is around $ 600.

Alternatives to the Sony E 18-105 can be considered models Sony E 4/PZ 18-110G OSS, Sony E 3.5-6.3/18-200 OSS PZ, Sony E 3.5-5.6 / 18-135 OSS, Zeiss Vario-Tessar E 4/16-70 ZA OSS T*.

Main technical characteristics of Sony E 4/PZ 18-105 G. OSS:

Review Instance Name	Near the front lens: E 4/PZ 18-105 G OSS 0.45m/1.48ft -0.95m/3.12ft Ø72′ On the case '4/18-105 Optical Steady Shot E-mount' + information plate and sticker
Basic properties	APS-C E-mount – the lens is designed for Sony mirrorless cameras with APS-C SEL - Sony 'E' mount mirrorless lens. This lens has a short name and identifier 'SEL18135' Health Care (Optical Steady Shot) - built-in optical image stabilization G (Gold?) - a lens designed and manufactured to the highest standards of optical performance PZ (POWER ZOOM) - electronic zoom control W - T (Wide - Tele) - a dedicated slider to control the zoom from wide-angle (Wide) to tele (Tele) range Fast focusing motor, linear drive Internal focus Internal zoom (zoom) Electronic focus ring Electronic zoom ring (zoom), Sony Handycam technology DMF (DDirectly MAnnual Pass Focus) - direct manual focus Aspherical elements in the optical circuit Low dispersion elements in the optical circuit Rounded petals aperture
Front Filter Diameter	72 mm, plastic thread
Focal length	18-105 mm EGF for Sony cameras with APS-C sensor is 27-157.5 mm
Zoom ratio	5.8 x
Designed by	for Sony NEX/ALPHA digital mirrorless cameras
Number of aperture blades	7 rounded petals
Tags	bayonet mount mark hood attachment mark information plate-sticker
Diaphragm	F / 4 to F / 22 over the entire range of focal lengths
MDF (minimum focusing distance)	45 centimeters by 18 mm, 95 centimeters by 105 mm, the maximum magnification ratio is achieved at 105 mm and is 1:9.1
The weight	427 grams
Optical design	16 elements in 12 groups. The circuit includes 3 aspherical elements and 2 low dispersion elements The image of the optical circuit is clickable.
Lens hood	Bayonet, Sony ALC-SH128
Manufacturer country	Lens made in China
Period	Announced August 27, 2013. At the beginning of 2024 is the current model
Price	The real cost of this lens can be found at Aliexpress is here.

Unlike many other lenses, the Sony E 18-105 is available only in black.

Assembly

Sony E 18-105 is made in China. The lens feels pleasant and reliable to the touch. The front and rear lenses are always stationary. Uses internal zoom/zoom and internal focusing. The focus ring on the review sample has a small lateral play.

Lens uses metal mount. Most of the lens body is made of metal, including the zoom and focus rings are also metal. The weight of the lens is just over 400 grams.

On the case there is a bayonet mount mark and a mark for quick installation of the lens hood. The lens uses a plastic hood, which is fixed in special grooves located near the front lens of the lens. The hood can be installed in the reverse direction for transport. In this position, access to the zoom ring becomes difficult and access to the focus ring is completely lost.

On the side of the rear lens there is a rectangular “cinema” hood that cuts off excess light and prevents flare.

The front filter diameter is 72 mm.

Unfortunately, the lens does not have all-weather protection.

If you shake the lens lightly, you can hear something dangling in the middle, most likely this is the stabilizer mechanism and/or motors for the electromechanical zoom and this is not a problem. When you turn on the camera, this effect disappears.

Stabilizer and POWER ZOOM

Sony E 18-105 uses an integrated image stabilizer Sony OS (Optical Steady Shot). In practice, I was able to take sharp shots of stationary objects handheld at 105 mm only at shutter speeds no longer than 1/20 of a second.

There is no switch on the lens responsible for stabilizer operation. The stabilization function is turned on in the camera menu.

There is no noise from the stabilizer. When using the lens, it seems that the stabilizer does not work at all. Perhaps it turns on at full power only during shutter release.

In general, the stabilizer confidently holds two or three stops along shutter speed.

The slider for changing the focal length has two marks “W” and “T” (“Wide”, “Tele”), indicating the shift directions for the wide-angle (Wide) or tele (Tele) range.

You can change the focal length using either the zoom ring or the slider.

Changing the focal length using the main ring is very convenient. The focal length (zoom) control ring is electronic. The ring can respond to rotation speed and tries to imitate the operation of a conventional mechanical zoom ring.

Focal length control using the slider button is smoother than using the ring. In the range from 18 to 70 mm, you can change the focal length in 1 mm increments. In the range of 70-105 mm in increments of 2-5 mm.

It's important: After turning off the camera, the lens automatically parks the focal length at 18mm.

It's important: with some cameras, when using the slider, after reaching 105 mm focal length, additional electronic zoom in the image area may be activated, which simulates an extended zoom in the range of 105-210 mm (perhaps the range depends on the specific camera). This function is only available in photo mode. Sometimes this function cannot be disabled, but you can use a trick - use RAW/RAW+JPEG image quality, with such settings only the physical focal length range of 18-105 mm will be available.

It's important: With some cameras, the focal length can be controlled directly from the camera.

Focusing

The lens uses a built-in linear focus motor.

Auto focus speed high. Focusing speed will vary slightly depending on the camera you are using. First cameras SonyNEX used automatic contrast focusing, which is sometimes slower than hybrid focusing methods in subsequent generations Sony Alpha ILCE. Auto focus is very quiet.

While working with the camera Sony α3500 (Sony ILCE-3500) the focusing accuracy was high. In good lighting conditions, there are practically no problems with accuracy, tenacity and refocusing. But in poor lighting, especially in the tele range, the lens can scour for a long time in search of the correct focusing. It is also very difficult to get the lens to focus at close focusing distances for pseudo-macro photography, especially at 105mm focal lengths. Sony a3500 has a primitive autofocus system, everything should be much better on modern Sony cameras.

To focus manually, select the MF (Manual Focus) or DMF (Direct MF) focus mode in the camera menu, after which the focus ring will respond to rotation. With very smooth rotation, the focusing ring rotates several full revolutions (from MDF to infinity). Electronic focus ring reacts more to the speed of its rotation than to a specific angle of rotation, which sometimes creates a tactile inconvenience. During auto focus focus ring remains stationary.

During focusing, the front lens remains stationary, as the lens uses internal focus. Thus, it is possible to use any filters without problems, for example polarizing or gradient.

The minimum focusing distance is 45 centimeters by 18 mm and 95 centimeters by 105 mm, while you can get a maximum magnification for macro photography of 1:9.1, which is a weak indicator for such a lens.

Other focusing features:

• Focusing speed is practically independent of the selected focal length.
• After the lens has lost accurate focusing, refocusing is fast enough.
• The lens does not have a depth of field scale, focusing distance or mark for working in the infrared spectrum, and there are no marks for focal length values.
• Focus shift (shift-focus) was not noticed during operation and testing.
• The focusing speed depends heavily on the illumination, the selected focusing mode in the camera menu, and the focusing logic of each individual camera.
• There is no AF/MF focus mode switch or other auxiliary buttons/switches on the body.
• During manual focusing, the focus distance bar appears on the display of some cameras.
• When changing the focal length, focusing is lost.
• Sony E 18-105 very small effect 'Focus Breathing' (changes the viewing angle while focusing), which is very useful for video shooting.

Image quality

In general, the Sony E 18-105 is optically quite good, but only if you use a correction profile that allows you to correct some types of distortion.

Sharpness

• confident sharpness with an open aperture in the center of the frame throughout the entire range of focal lengths
• poor sharpness at the edges and corners of the frame over the entire range of focal lengths; at the edges of the frame, sharpness becomes acceptable after F/11
• high contrast
  

Distortion

• strong pillow-shaped distortion across the entire focal length range when shooting in RAW
• the nature of distortion is unified, easily corrected in the editor
• it's important: some cameras do not allow you to disable automatic distortion correction
• it's important: The lens was immediately developed taking into account the future forced use of distortion correction

Vignetting

• low level of vignetting at F/4 across the entire focal length range
• vignetting is easily fixable in the editor
• it's important: some cameras use “hidden” automatic vignetting correction (in both 'JPEG' and 'RAW'), even if this correction is forced to be disabled in the camera menu

Aberration

• lens suffers from a small amount of chromatic aberrationespecially at extreme zoom positions
  
• small freezing

Rest

• The lens behaves well in side and backlight, only in very difficult cases can you get significant artifacts
• you can quite easily get the effect of a 14-ray star from bright point light sources
• sometimes you can get neutral and even pleasant bokeh (especially at 105/4)

For Sony E 18-105, there is a lens profile in popular RAW converters.

Sample Photos

Camera used Sony α3500 (Sony ILCE-3500) based on the EXMOR APS-C CMOS 20 MP sensor. All photos in this review are shown without processing, according to the principles ZEROJPEG.

RAW source files '.ARW' can be download / watch this link (29 photos, 600 MB, Google Drive gallery).

My experience

Sony E 18-105 – a budget alternative for a “real” cinema lens Sony E 4/PZ 18-110G OSS. Overall, I think the Sony E 18-105 is a wonderful find for budget video shooting.

For photography, the Sony E 18-105 is also very good. I really liked this lens. The internal zoom is a very tempting option. I would prefer Sony E 18-105 over Zeiss Vario-Tessar E 4/16-70 ZA OSS T* и Tamron 17-70mm F / 2.8 Di III-A VC RXD Model B070.

3 years after the announcement, Sony E 18-105 was released Sony E 4/PZ 18-110G OSS, which is even better suited for amateur and professional film and video shooting. And only in 2022 a similar one came out FUJINON ASPHERICAL LENS SUPER EBC XF 18-120mm 1:4 LM PZ WR for fujifilm x. Other popular mirrorless crop systems (Canon EF-M, Canon RF-S, Nikon Z, Leica T/CL/TL, Samsung NX, Olympus MFT, Panasonic MFT, Nikon 1) do not have similar solutions.

Results

The Sony E 18-105 is perfect for those who need a not too expensive zoom lens for video shooting. For photography, the Sony E 18-105 is also a very good solution, primarily due to its convenient range of focal lengths and constant maximum aperture of F/4.

10 main advantages:

1. convenient set of focal lengths paired with a constant maximum aperture of F/4
2. quality assembly
3. internal focusing, electronic focusing ring, focusing is very quiet and fast
4. internal zoom, electronic, quiet, smooth (using slider), fast (using ring)
5. Built-in image stabilizer, works efficiently and quietly
6. no 'Focus Breathing' effect
7. under this lens there are profiles for popular RAW converters that can quickly eliminate some optical flaws
8. low cost, component about 600 dollars
9. sharp image in the center of the frame wide open across the entire focal length range
10. There are practically no analogues or alternatives (I only remember a very expensive Sony E 4/PZ 18-110G OSS or new FUJINON 18-120mm 1:4 LM PZ WR)

10 main disadvantages:

1. there is no OSS ON/OFF switch (for example, Sony E 70-350 / 4.5–6.3 it is available)
2. there is no AF/MF switch (for example, Sony E 3.5-5.6 / 18-135 OSS it is available)
3. there is no aperture control ring (for example, Sony E 1.4/15G it exists, but this is important for convenience during video shooting)
4. there are no programmable “temporal buttons” (for example, Sony E 4/10-20G PZ they are)
5. there are no additional marks, such as focal length or aperture values ​​(for example, a similar Sony E 4/PZ 18-110G OSS they are available)
6. large MDF and not particularly comfortable maximum magnification ratio of 1:9.1 (for example, Sony E 3.5-6.3 / 18-200 OSS it is 1:2.86)
7. only 7 aperture blades (for example, Sony E 2.8 / 16-55G there are 9 of them)
8. no all-weather protection (including rubber seal on the bayonet side)
9. metal painted focus and zoom rings have small notched ribs that are easily rubbed down to bare metal and lose their entire attractive appearance
10. the lens was designed taking into account the forced use of some automatic corrections (distortion, vignetting, etc.), and therefore from birth these shortcomings are built into its optical design (my video on this topic)

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Material prepared Arkady Shapoval.