The Zeiss 55mm f/1.8 lens after 19,684 wedding images

For the last 18 months, the Sony Sonnar T* FE 55mm f/1.8 ZA has been my workhorse lens. I spend a lot of time on a 50mm (ish) focal length and I've come to really love this one.

Yes, 55mm is a bit of an unusual focal length but it's close enough to 50mm that I don't mind it. In fact, the slightly more telephoto characteristic helps the lens get a shallower depth of field and maybe split the difference between a 50mm f1.8 and f1.4 lens.

The good:

The lens is very sharp at any aperture, without being clinical.

For a professional quality lens it is incredibly compact and lightweight. I constantly strive to have a small, fast kit on wedding days so this is a huge plus for me. 8 hours spent holding the camera and my hand doesn't get tired.

The autofocus is as lightening fast as you'd expect from a modern lens.

It might not be technically water-sealed but mine got drenched in an Icelandic waterfall and it still works like new!

The out of focus areas are VERY smooth for such a small lens. Maybe not quite as melty as one of the Sony G-Master 50mm lenses, but much smoother than you'll find in almost any other 50mm (ish) f1.8 lenses.

The not-so-good:

In some situations you can see chromatic aberration on out of focus edges. If you're obsessed with the most technically perfect lenses, this could be an issue. Honestly, this doesn't bother me much at all. I love older film cameras and vintage lenses and I think this specific characteristic help lend towards that vintage lens look. I would certainly not call it distracting though. I suspect any non-photographer, not used to looking at thousands of images, doesn't even notice this.

Overall I think this lens is an absolute triumph for Sony photographers that enjoy a 50mm focal length. I've recently purchased the new Sony 50mm f1.4 G-Master which is technically a better lens but is significantly bigger and heavier. I have no plans to sell the 55mm Zeiss and I anticipate continuing to use it regularly as part of my lightweight and fast kit.