Sigma Lens Tests – Take 2
Posted on 04. Aug, 2009 by Thomas in Blog, Gear, Photography
My first attempt at trying out my new (well, second hand) sigma lens didn’t go too well, thanks to some rather silly decisions on my part, and by the uncooperative Irish weather. However, this weekend I took another shot at it and headed into the city to see what the ultra wide sigma could do, and if it is worth it. I headed in early in the morning wile the light was still good and took a random assortment of building shots. Why buildings I hear you ask? Well, it’s simple: Buildings are like giant test charts. They have lots of detail and patterns. they show up artifacts quite well, making it easy to spot things like chromatic aberration and barrel distortion. The horizontal and vertical lines of bricks and masonry show off sharpness and focus. All in all, I was much more impressed with the lens this time out.
So what is it like? Over all it’s a good performer, especially for the price I got it at. It is generally sharp, although there is some fall off at the edges. Still it shows up an impressive amount of detail.
You can see that there is some barrel distortion, especially at 10mm, but then this is to be expected. It’s easily fixed in photoshop. Also, there is some chromatic aberration, but again, this is relatively mild considering the price of the lens. I’m more than happy with my purchase now. It is great value. I paid €399 for it used (in mint condition). It’s €549 new. The nearest Nikon branded lens in the same focal range is over €800 and I doubt it is substantially sharper as this is pretty damn sharp. Other reviews of the Sigma rate it roughly on a par with the Nikon, so I definitely got a good deal. It just goes to show you, it’s worth keeping an eye out for second hand deals on lenses and other camera equipment. Here are a few more images taken with it
I’ve put all these and a few more up on flickr at full resolution if you want to pixel peep and check out the quality for yourself.
Related posts:
