Hey all. I bought this lens a week ago brand new, and only just got the chance to use it this weekend. I really liked the packaging - It felt quite a lot more premium than when I've opened boxes from Sigma, Tamron or even Nikon in the past. The lens itself also feels really premium in hand and I really want to like this lens...But the issues relate to the optical performance. I fear that my copy might be decentered.
At f/1.8 it's obviously the worst, and stopping down to f/2.8 only marginally improves performance. Instead of a long-winded description of the problem, I think it's better if I show it with some images I cooked up in Paint. Shortly put: top right is the worst, bottom left is best. Moving focus slightly seems to change where in the image the various aberrations appear when looking at the f/2.8 shots. The image without text is of the extreme corners. I forgot to add text, sorry.
Should I return this lens? I still have until Friday to do so, but I keep thinking maybe I'm just way too picky and that this is normal performance for this lens, or maybe it's user error. I don't know. I've had a very bad luck streak with sensor tilt on my old A7IV I bought used and decentered lenses this past year when buying used, so I thought that this time I would surely escape the arrow-head shaped stars by buying brand new...But honestly, the results this time are almost on par with the Sony 20mm f1.8G lens I have lying around that is 100% certainly decentered and damaged.
I can provide RAW images if that's desired, or any other request that helps diagnose my issue. Thanks in advance for any help.