Sony may never publicly own up to ending A mount development as much as their loyal user base deserves it, but the new LA-EA5 lens adapter is nevertheless a nice gesture.
Announced today, Sony’s new A mount to E mount LA-EA5 lens adapter will give a little more life to an aging collection of glass. This surprisingly compact adapter houses an aperture drive unit as well as a newly developed autofocus drive unit, yet there is no protrusion like seen in the older LA-EA4.
The LA-EA5 supports phase detect autofocus, Real-time Eye AF for humans and animals, Real-time Tracking, and when using the a7R IV or a6600, can even do it with autofocus lenses that do not feature internal focus motors such as the Sonnar T* 135mm f/1.8 ZA and Planar T* 85mm f/1.4 ZA. There is some fine print that needs to be examined such as autofocus not available for video, STF lenses being manual focus, no teleconverter support, and a particular set of Sony cameras that this will all work with. To make sure you’re getting what you hoped for, check back on this LA-EA5 compatibility page (as of publication time it is “coming soon”). See it in action below courtesy of Sony Artisan Patrick Murphy-Racey.
The Sony LA-EA5 is priced at $248 and will begin shipping in October 2020.
I'm waiting on them to update their compatibility list. I'm hoping this will work on my a7iii + Sony/Zeiss 135 f1.8.
That 135ZA f1.8 is one hell of a great lens.
Loved that lens when it was working well on my a77. It was dead on balls accurate. Sadly, after a firmware update on the a77, the focusing was just off. I had to set the micro af adjust to -10. Even then, it was very inconsistent.
I'm impressed that they priced it as low as they did relative to the previous LA-EA4.
I'd be all over this five years ago. The Sony/Zeiss ZA Planar 85mm f/1.4 was a step above other 85mm's at the time of its release.
...or, how to trash the A cameras once and for all...
Nice adapter, but autofocus with no-motor-lenses only works on A7rIV or A6600. It really limit the usage of this adapter.
They should offer this feature with other cameras imo.
Wtf Sony. You put a focus motor in, but it doesn’t work on most of the cameras?
Hey Nikon, you see this, this is what you need, an adapter from F to Z that supports screw drive autofocus. Thanks
The lack of video autofocus is a huuuuuuge red flag. Any indication as to whether or not video AF be introduced in a firmware update?
I think that one of the most useful lenses ever made was the Sony 70-400mm. This adaptor should allow it to be used with the latest Sony FF mirrorless, such as the A9, A92, A7R4, etc, right?
A 70-400mm focal length is so much more useful than 100-400mm. Almost a 6x zoom, compared to just 4x. The "x factor" really is what matters most for wildlife and nature photography, where there often isn't time to change lenses or switch from using one body to using another body. 100-400mm is so limiting, whereas 70-400mm opens up a huge array of opportunities that no other lenses facilitate. Really hope this adaptor lets Sony users take advantage of the much-needed range of that 70-400.
Very disappointed that the new E mount Sony was 100-400mm instead of 70-400mm. Maybe this will help make up for that poor decision.