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Sigma 20mm f/1.8 EX AF Review Round-Up

April 3, 2009 By Leave a Comment

sigma-af-20mm-f-18-ex

If you own or have used this lens, let us know what you think! Leave your comments and thoughts below.

Digital Picture

One of the best situations in which to consider a third party lens is when the camera body manufacturer does not have an equivalent offering. Meet the Sigma 20mm f/1.8 EX DG Lens – as of this writing, Canon does not offer a lens this wide with an aperture this large. Unfortunately, I consider the Sigma 20mm f/1.8 EX DG Lens to be unusable at f/1.8 unless you are looking for a soft-focus effect. This lens is one of the softest I’ve seen wide open. Realistically, this will be an f/2.8 lens to most people as the center does not become decently sharp until this aperture. Sorry Sigma, this one is a dud. If you want a fast 20mm lens, I suggest saving for the Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8 L USM Lens. It far surpasses the performance of the current Sigma and Canon 20mm lenses in all regards. READ FULL REVIEW

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Sigma 400mm f/5.6 HSM APO Macro AF Review Round-Up

April 3, 2009 By 1 Comment

sigma-400mm-f56-hsm-apo-macro-af

If you own or have used this lens, let us know what you think! Leave your comments and thoughts below.

Photo Zone

The Sigma AF 400mm f/5.6 HSM APO macro may be discontinued but this surely doesn’t originate in performance factors. The lens is capable to delivery high quality images with very high resolution, low vignetting and insignificant distortions as well as a negligible degree of CAs. The build quality is also decent apart from the AF/MF switch and the focus limiter. Same goes for the focusing speed thanks to Sigma’s HSM (ultrasonic) AF drive. So if you’re looking for a high performance 400mm lens on a budget it is surely worth to check out the used market for this lens. However, you should make sure that the lens is still compatible to today’s DSLRs. The tested sample had no real issues on the EOS 350D but older samples with an old firmware may even lock up your camera. This is especially likely for the older variants with a conventional AF motor (non-HSM). Unfortunately Sigma doesn’t seem to be able to provide firmware updates for all these 400mm lenses anymore. “¦ READ FULL REVIEW

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Sigma 30mm f/1.4 EX HSM DC AF Review Round-Up

April 3, 2009 By 1 Comment

sigma-af-30mm-f-14-ex-hsm-dcIf you own or have used this lens, let us know what you think! Leave your comments and thoughts below.

Get information and user reviews for this lens from Amazon: Sigma 30mm f/1.4 EX DC HSM Autofocus Lens & Opteka Battery Pack Grip & 2 EN-EL3e Batteries (3400 mAh Total) & Filters & Accessories for Nikon D80 Digital SLR Camera

Photo Zone

We all know that zoom lenses are compromises regarding speed and performance but we expect fix-focals to perform better than that. Sigma AF 30mm f/1.4 EX HSM DC may perform pretty good in absolute terms but for a fix-focal the lens disappoints a little. The center performance is exceptionally high but the borders are not all that impressive. The other image parameters such as distortions, vignetting and CAs are Okay but nothing to rave about. So at the end of the day the only differentiator is its ultra-large aperture – it’s up to you whether this is good enough compared to classic 28mm or 35mm lenses. READ FULL REVIEW

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