Along with the Sony 24-70mm f/2.8 G Master II and the Sony 70-200mm f/2.8 G Master II, the new Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II, rounds out the second-generation G Master "trinity." Many photographers embrace this kind of a three-zoom lens foundation for their bags because of the gapless range from 16mm to 200mm all with a fast f/2.8 maximum aperture. The G Master name is synonymous with both high image quality and high performance and the new Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II satisfies the needs of photographers and videographers seeking those aspects in their lenses. Paired up with a Sony Alpha camera, there’s no limit to what you can create. Below we take a closer look at the new zoom with a deep dive from Sony Artisan Miguel Quiles along with some thoughts from other creators who have put the lens to the test. Watch the videos to learn more and get your own Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II HERE.

Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II: Smaller, Lighter, Better

The Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II features a declickable aperture ring, an iris lock switch to make sure the aperture ring stays in the A position, two customizable focus hold buttons that can be customized to your camera menus, and a focus mode switch. It also features an 82mm filter thread that allows you to use screw-on filters like variable NDs and circular polarizers. Inside you’ll find 15 elements in 12 groups, along with four Extreme Dynamic Linear Motors which provide fast, accurate, and smooth autofocus and silent zooming when you’re shooting video.

As Quiles examines this second iteration of the G Master favorite, he notices just how light and durable it is. “The lens itself is compact and light, weighing only 19.3 ounces,” he explains. “It’s also dust and moisture resistant. You’ll notice too that as you move from 16 to 35 millimeters, the lens itself doesn’t extend out very far. Because of that, the center of gravity barely changes which makes this an awesome lens to use for video on a gimbal.”

With the descriptive power and high-speed autofocus unique to G Master lenses, it is possible to fully bring out the high performance of Sony’s most advanced camera bodies. “Having taken this on hikes to take some of these images,” Quiles explains, “I have to say that the lightweight and compact size of this lens really inspired me to take it with me on my adventures. The image quality was amazing as well paired up with the Sony Alpha 7R V for both stills and video.”

Real World Test With The Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II

Landscape and astro-photographer Albert Dros put the lens to the test over several weeks, taking it to a variety of locations to see how it would handle different scenes. Watch below as he shows his results of a sunrise windmill landscape using focus stacking, which he says this lens is incredible for because it has basically no focus breathing. He also photographs flowers to test bokeh and close focus distance, rainy cityscapes in the evening, starry night skies and other beautiful landscapes along the Dutch coast. If you want to see how the lens performed in a wide variety of situations, we highly recommend watching Dros share his experience below.

Because Dros mainly shoots landscapes, the lack of focus breathing and close focus distance really opens up a world of creative possibility for him. "It has some incredible functions for landscape photography,” he further explains. “The most important one, or actually two most important ones, is that it has no focus breathing which is very impressive. Then the close focus distance, you can get very close to your foreground to do this impressive focus stacking or to simply create kind of interesting close-up shots. Also great for product shots. You can create some very nice close-up shots with the close focus distance of this lens and the bokeh is also very nice. It's very soft, it just looks very good. And of course the sharpness of this lens, even at 2.8, is excellent."

Learn more about the new Sony 16-35mm f/2.8 G Master II HERE.