Sigma 321954 85 mm F1.4 DG HSM Art Canon Mount Lens - Black

Product Information

The Sigma 85mm Art is up against several lenses in it’s same class, considered alternatives. Although Canon doesn’t have an identical f/1.4 equivalent, there are still options that it can be weighed against: What a great lens...From the moment I mounted it on my 7D until now (about a week later) I've been blown away...first, by the build...It's solid and has a new rubberlike coating that just feels really good. We've almost completely stopped recommending fast third-party lenses because the AF is inconsistent. Yes, the optical quality of the Sigma Art lenses is UNBEATABLE... but every single time we've tested them against native lenses, they miss focus far more. In our 85mm f/1.4 comparison, the Sigma missed focus so much that it was more accurate to simply manually focus it. Same applies to the Sigma 18-35 and 50-100 f/1.8 lenses. Focus calibration can't fix it; it's the result of camera manufacturer's not testing and optimizing the camera bodies for those lenses. The Sony 85mm ƒ/1.4 provides excellent results for sharpness. The Sigma produces images with slightly more central sharpness when used at large apertures, but the Sony has better edge-to-edge performance; its corners are sharper at wider apertures. Corner shading is similar between the two lenses; the Sony has slightly more CA in the corner regions, and distorts slightly more than the Sigma.

His expertise with equipment doesn’t end there, though. He is also an encyclopedia when it comes to all manner of cameras, camera holsters and bags, flashguns, tripods and heads, printers, papers and inks, and just about anything imaging-related. I've appreciated this lens together with the Nikon D700, and I think it's a very good choice to spare money (in comparison with the double costly Nikkor), keeping an high quality. The new "EX" is very different from the previous, and the feeling touching the lens is far better than before (the body is metallic, no plastic). The above images are SOOC JPEGs and you can see that there is also a bit of a color difference between the Canon & Sigma images. You’ll notice that Sigma produces more of a contrasted image with darker shadows and truer skintones, while the Canon appears to have more of a faded color look, even though both images were shot at f/1.4. Skimming through the juxtaposed images in the article you will see a similar characteristic among the images. 14-image Brenizer Panoramic Stitch – 1/8000th of a second, f/1.8, ISO 100It requires no focus adjustment on my d300. Focus accuracy equal to nikkors. I like the new finish of sigma. I had 10-20 from sigma previously, which indeed was a great buy. The great thing about the Sigma lenses is that I can calibrate the AFMA on different focal distances, where the Canons can only be calibrated at one distance. In this review, popular photographer Julia Trotti takes the Sigma 85mm f/1.4 Art lens and puts it through some tests in a variety of situations and scenarios. In the first section, she pairs the lens with a Sony a7 III and a Metabones adapter for Canon mounts and shoots a model in good light during the day. Some of her key observations were that the lens worked flawlessly with the adapter and was super fast to focus. Interestingly, she noted that when she'd tried some native Canon lenses paired with the Sony a7 III and an adaptor, she'd experienced some lag issues with them. As borne out by our practically perfect lab score, the Sigma is essentially a zero-distortion lens. Verdict Every maker has sample variations and third party variations are exaggerated as they stand against a pool of expensive counter parts. So often victims of suspicion : so folks who are result oriented will enjoy the benefits of this lens.

Autofocus is both very fast and extremely accurate, making the lens equally viable as a short telephoto for action photography, rather than just being a ’portrait lens’. Ghosting and flare are very well controlled, living up to Canon’s claims. In our test, the image stabilizer enabled us to get consistently sharp handheld shots at around 1/10 sec, matching the benefit of the Tamron’s VC system. Verdict The reason my eyes lit up when I saw this is that I recently got my hands on the Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art Lens. I debated long and hard whether to go with that or the Canon EF 50mm f/1.2L USM lens. I opted for the Sigma, but in my limited use so far, I've found that it misses focus more than I like in certain scenarios. I've played with all manner of settings but haven't been able to nail down settings to guarantee a 95 percent or greater keeper rate on shots just yet. I’ve used the Nikon 85mm D and 85mm G for 3 years, and I can personally say that this lens is most probably the best lens I’ve ever used. The results also show us that lens is very sharp at all aperture values. No C/A issues and stays sharp at larger f-stops.

If you'd calibrate the lenses "from zero" on two bodies, you'd get two parallel curves. FYI, the AFMA on my 5D4 is 0 (since the lens was programmed using this body), and the AFMA value on my 5D3 is -2. This value is the same for my 35, 50 and 85 Art lenses. Shivani wants to live in a world where laughter is the cure to pretty much everything. Since she can't claim "Serial Bingewatcher" as an occupation, she'll settle for wedding/portrait photographer at Lin and Jirsa & marketing coordinator here at SLR Lounge. For those rare moments when you won't find a camera in her hand, she will be dancing, eating a donut, or most likely watching Seinfeld.

Since the Samyang lenses are manual focus, I personally prefer not to use them. I wear glasses and I don’t trust my eyes, and I’m also not very fast at focusing with manual lenses. Anyway, for this lens I’ve used Canon 5D Mark III’s 100% manual focus feature to focus on the subject. This was a most surprising result for me: the Samyang is really sharp after f/1.8. Great lens for the price, but just not one for me.

Lenses with a fast, f/1.4 aperture are often quite soft when shooting wide-open, but this Sigma retains superb sharpness and contrast. At f/2, sharpness across most of the image frame becomes spectacular, and it’s excellent at the extreme edges and corners by the time you hit f/2.8. The big difference is that the in-camera AFMA calibration is very limited. You can only enter one value (for one focal distance). My Canon EF 135/2.0 for example needs very different AFMA values depending on the focal distance. By heart, the AFMA values change from around -10 at 3m to 0 at 9m. Nobody can refute the value and image quality that Sigma is offering in their new Art and Sports series lenses. However, I think it’s important to note that over time I have experienced significant Auto-Focus drifting in Art series lenses. Far more than I would notice in Canon and Nikon Professional lenses. Sigma has produced an excellent lens here: as sharp as any of its contemporaries, even wide open at ƒ/1.4. As well, the lens offers remarkable tolerance to chromatic aberration, marred only by the presence of longitudinal chromatic aberration that seems to be common with fast glass. Distortion and corner shading are also excellent. With the Sigma 85mm ƒ/1.4 producing results on par with its competitors, it's easy to recommend, especially given the cost savings that will result. However, its build quality isn't as strong as some, so how you use a lens in this category, and what environments you'll take it into, should be a factor in your purchasing decision. Lastly, I compared all the lenses at f/2.8. We expect nearly the best results, and all the lenses are really sharp now. The Canon 85mm f/1.8 seems like the softest one.