24-70 f/4 - soft wide open?

So I got a 24-70 f/4 this week. I love the way the lens feels and the sealing, IS, zoom action, and AF are all great. Focus is spot on out of the box on my 7D2... But I feel like the lens is just soft wide open. I did some shots in portait and the face (along the top of the frame) was really soft and there is some strong CA. I haven't checked my 7D2 yet to make sure it has correction information for this lens, that may help some with the CA if I need to load that. If this lens is that soft I might consider sending it back, even though with the rebate at $800 it seems like a decent value.

maybe your expectations are a bit off:

the 17-55@f4 vs 24-70@f4, the 17-55 wins it:
http://www.the-digital-picture.com …omp=0&FLIComp=4​&APIComp=2

it is a tad soft, however, the lens is made for full frame, and it's not particularly bad, it's pretty good in it's range.

now compare it again with a full frame camera, and it does better than the 17-55 at the same aperture

http://www.the-digital-picture.com …omp=0&FLIComp=4​&APIComp=2

Thanks, that does help. The 70-300L also spoils me with its wide open performance. Wish the 17-55 was refreshed with some sealing and a bump up in build quality.

Keyan wrote in post #17495905
So I got a 24-70 f/4 this week. I love the way the lens feels and the sealing, IS, zoom action, and AF are all great. Focus is spot on out of the box on my 7D2... But I feel like the lens is just soft wide open. I did some shots in portait and the face (along the top of the frame) was really soft and there is some strong CA. I haven't checked my 7D2 yet to make sure it has correction information for this lens, that may help some with the CA if I need to load that. If this lens is that soft I might consider sending it back, even though with the rebate at $800 it seems like a decent value.

A FF lens on a cropped camera may not be that sharp. That might have something to do with it.

A full frame sensor makes any lens look better. Fact of physics.

that could possibly be it ..
when i upgraded to 5d3 from t4i is when i realized just how sharp my 24-70 really was
i mean it was sharp on the crop just that it wowed me more on the FF

Which clearly explains the ridiculous sharpness of my 70-300L on all of the crops I have used it on. So you are saying that crop cameras can only expect sharp results with EF-S lenses? Somehow I doubt that is true.

Tony Northrup did a video on using ef lenses vs. efs on crops ... interesting findings

i found the 24-70 to be much sharper on my t4i vs the kit lens.. but then on ff i see it even sharper.. if i can find the video i;ll link it

That makes complete sense, I understand the physics of it all, just making a blanket statement about EF lenses not being sharp on a crop struck me as odd - I get that an image made with a FF sensor will be sharper.

What I had was a more general softness to the degree that it surprised me a little. Some more testing is yielding better results.

Keyan wrote in post #17499839
Which clearly explains the ridiculous sharpness of my 70-300L on all of the crops I have used it on. So you are saying that crop cameras can only expect sharp results with EF-S lenses? Somehow I doubt that is true.

Nope. Just saying your 70-300L will perform better on full frame. Not knocking apsc at all. I own two of them. Ok, and two FF.

Just to close the loop, I used this lens a lot on vacation, and my initial impressions were wrong, it is nice and sharp, macro mode is fun too.

Glad you got it sorted. I find this lens to be very sharp on my 6D. In fact, I really like this lens.

Yeah it is nice. Very compact. Of course, now that I have this lens full frame is just one body away for me...