Sigma lens

[gonzalu]

William, I am interested for a friend of mine who keeps asking me (different hobby, also needs magnification of small subjects)

Would you be so kind and show me a full resolution original RAW or JPG of one of your best images for inspection? You can send me via E-mail and will be discarded of course :-) I would prefer a shot of a wall at say 200 yards or 1000 feet :-) but if of an airplane, all the better. Something that actually fills the frame.

Thanks

[megatop412]

I shot a wall with the lens the day I bought it then deleted the shot. But I'd be happy to send you a RAW of an airplane. PM me your email and I'll gladly send it. All of the images I've shot with it are of aircraft.

[gonzalu]

Awesome man... I'd love to see the potential ... rarely does one appreciate originals on the web :-)

manny (at) manny (dot) org

or IM me ... all in my profile.. .contact form also on my website etc.

[njgtr82]

Also most people in this hobby seem to prefer a body with a crop factor(7D, 40D, 50D, etc) so that your 100-400mm lens is now a 160-640mm lens. The 5D is a full frame sensor

[gonzalu]

Also most people in this hobby seem to prefer a body with a crop factor(7D, 40D, 50D, etc) so that your 100-400mm lens is now a 160-640mm lens. The 5D is a full frame sensor

Well not quite... no disrespect but the 400mm will still be 400mm no matter how you crop it :-) If you say you have more pixels in the center of the frame, so be it. The image projected on the sensor is exactly 400mm ...

To put it another way, If I put a 400mm lens on a 12MP 1.5x crop sensor or a 400mm on a 30MP 1.0x sensor the resulting central portion of the image will be identical on screen. The crop sensor just take care of some cropping :-)

Seriously, I know how people think it is acting like a teleconverter but it is not.. .it is just more pixels on the same space. The magnification of the image optically has not changed and this is important in our hobby because of atmospheric compression. You want to be physically as close as possible, not magnify the distance optically.

A big advantage of a crop sensor is the idea that it concentrates more pixels in the center of the frame where the optical qualities of a lens are at their best. Corners are usually not as good on lenses designed for crop sensors. This is the case with most super-zooms and you will get better performance from them on a crop sensor as it ignores the edges/corners of the projection ...

I say if I had a choice of a Full Frame camera with the same pixel depth as a crop sensor and a lens that has good edge-to-edge sharpness and contrast and overall quality, I 'd chose the Full Frame camera becuase of the benefits of the larger frame coverage. With the crop area having more pixels, you also get the benefit of a more croppable image... (is that even a real word?)

[megatop412]

Awesome man... I'd love to see the potential ... rarely does one appreciate originals on the web :-)

manny (at) manny (dot) org

or IM me ... all in my profile.. .contact form also on my website etc.

2 RAW's sent

[Nathan McGrew]

I had to decide between the 100-400 and the Sigma 150-500 last year. The price difference and the fact that Dell only carried the Sigma (only place I have credit these days...) made me pick up the Sigma. Almost returned it right away, but I stuck with it. It's a bit tricky to use on my XSi. Waiting to see how well it works with my incoming 1D MKII. I say, if you can afford it, go with the Canon. But the Sigma is not a waste of money.

Here are a few albums from this summer with the Sigma. Note: 99% of these shots are with the Sigma. Only a few wide shots with my old 18-55 kit lens.

http://s1046.photobucket.com/albums/...20a%20Russian/

http://s1046.photobucket.com/albums/...Fighter%20Day/

http://s1046.photobucket.com/albums/...0Engine%20Day/

http://s1046.photobucket.com/albums/...e%20Fly%20Day/

http://s1046.photobucket.com/albums/...%20Helicopter/

Any out of focus shots are directly the fault of the operator and the XSi focus system.

[flyingwithfish]

I demo'd the Sigma 150-500f5-6.3 a few years back (and I believe they just released a new generation of the lens) and quite frankly it was not a lens I'd want to use.

I used the lens exclusively on the Canon EOS 1D/1Ds series bodies and it consistently had focusing issues. These issues were not limited to low light or back lit situations … but while shooting in bright contrasty situations in the early-mid afternoon during the fall. These lighting conditions are ideal for auto focus and it just couldn't get a lock on.

While my kit contains more than a dozen Canon lenses, nearly all L series lenses, I ended up with the Sigma 120-300f2.8 after I sold my Canon 400f2.8 (when I stopped covering pro and NCAA D1 sports for a living) and I am happy. I've also owned, and enjoyed the Sigma 20f1.8, used the and loved the Sigma 500f4.5 and now use a Canon 12-24f4.5-5.6 regularly … so I am not a Canon lens snob … but the 150-500f5-6.3 just wasn't for me, or even close to close to my standards

[megatop412]

Fish- sorry you seem to have gotten a 'bad' copy of the Sigma, they seem to have quality consistency issues at Sigma. I picked mine up from a local shop instead of one of the major retailers and while not a 2.8 tele it certainly has the required sharpness if used properly. My D40x only has 3 focus points and it's never had a problem locking on with this lens.