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Archive 2017 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Steve Spencer
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p.13 #1 · p.13 #1 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Bespoked wrote:
We just experienced the problems associated with the 85GM and sold one of them too.
We'll keep one because it has a killer look (bokeh).

I'll purchase again if Sony solve the issue. Forgive me if I've missed it, but did Sony ever explain why they don't allow all lenses to open up the iris for focus in low light?

As I understand it, they only prevent this for lenses with significant focus shift and the obvious reason to do so is focussing at open aperture would lead to focus errors if there is significant focus shift.

May 09, 2017 at 07:47 AM

GMPhotography
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p.13 #2 · p.13 #2 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Couple shots to add these are custom processing in C1

May 09, 2017 at 11:22 AM

GMPhotography
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p.13 #3 · p.13 #3 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Oh yea it can do landscape too.

May 09, 2017 at 11:32 AM

ecarlino
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p.13 #4 · p.13 #4 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

AGeoJO wrote:
I agree with you regarding the setup is not quite ready for prime time, at least not for paid gigs. As I mentioned in a different thread, the lock-on AF mode or face detection/eye-AF features of Canon/Sigma lenses on both the MC-11 and Metabones IV, tend to drift away more easily than a native FE lens. In addition, the area of the active PDAF to keep that AF feature working on the A7r II seems to be smaller than that using a native FE lens. The AF-S is definitely more sure-footed than the AF-C but a little bit restrictive at...Show more →

Joshua - it looks like you're having a lot of fun as usual -

if you have the time/inclination - given the batis 135 is about to hit the streets - could you post a few comparisons of the same shot (perhaps at different subject differences: head, half body, full body) at f/1.8 and f/2.8 so we're able to see the difference. the bokeh on the sigma @ f/1.8 is beautiful - it would be informative to see how it changes @ f/2.8 (i.e. what are Batis users giving up)

thanks.

May 09, 2017 at 12:48 PM

AGeoJO
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p.13 #5 · p.13 #5 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

ecarlino wrote:
Joshua - it looks like you're having a lot of fun as usual -

if you have the time/inclination - given the batis 135 is about to hit the streets - could you post a few comparisons of the same shot (perhaps at different subject differences: head, half body, full body) at f/1.8 and f/2.8 so we're able to see the difference. the bokeh on the sigma @ f/1.8 is beautiful - it would be informative to see how it changes @ f/2.8 (i.e. what are Batis users giving up)

thanks.

Hi Eric,
Thank you! I went through the images I took that day and there are two similar images in there; at f/2.0 (not quite f/1.8) and f/2.8. I can post them later on in the afternoon or evening. Yes, I took a lot images but I didn't have any comparison at various apertures in mind. It was more what looks best for that specific setting at that time. The reason I stopped down to f/2.8 because the images were of two people and not quite in the same plane and I wanted to make sure that there was enough depth of field for the two of them.

May 09, 2017 at 01:18 PM

ecarlino
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p.13 #6 · p.13 #6 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

AGeoJO wrote:
Hi Eric,
Thank you! I went through the images I took that day and there are two similar images in there; at f/2.0 (not quite f/1.8) and f/2.8. I can post them later on in the afternoon or evening. Yes, I took a lot images but I didn't have any comparison at various apertures in mind. It was more what looks best for that specific setting at that time. The reason I stopped down to f/2.8 because the images were of two people and not quite in the same plane and I wanted to make sure that there was enough depth...Show more →

to your point on DoF, one of the things i've noticed w/ these 135 lenses @ f/1.8 or f/2 is that i personally don't prefer a DoF equal to "less than half a head" - in other words, if the eyes are in focus and a portion of the hair is out of focus, it's not really my preference - or in a half-body shot one arm being in focus and the other not - sometimes it works, other not (and i'm not referring to any of your shots, btw, they're all perfect, rather shots i've reviewed on flickr; I just know myself that i won't be that careful and i won't like what i come home with)

one thing i liked about the 100 STF was the f/2.8 DoF (but not the T5.6 light restriction) yet there was still seperation with the background. i enjoyed seeing subjects sharp and fully in focus but with nice separation and smooth OOF. it's one of the reasons the batis is still on my RADAR - but i'm still unclear on how much separation and how smooth the background will be @ f/2.8 vs f/1.8

however, i'd more likely use a 135 at full body distances or longer where f/1.8 may actually be necessary for the separation (and at that distance, DoF will be sufficient to cover the subject's full depth). i'm probably going to have to use the sigma for a while to find out and then decide if f/2.8 will work or not.

May 09, 2017 at 01:42 PM

ecarlino
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p.13 #7 · p.13 #7 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

to my point about f/2.8 -

Guy's grandson on the 1st post of this thread was shot at f/2.8 - it looks great - he's in focus, but subject is still very nicely separated. not sure f/1.8 would have improved things on that shot and may have made getting the subject well within DoF quite difficult.

May 09, 2017 at 02:37 PM

GMPhotography
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p.13 #8 · p.13 #8 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Probably would have been better if I had EFSC off

May 09, 2017 at 02:59 PM

a2rob
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p.13 #9 · p.13 #9 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

GMPhotography wrote:
Probably would have been better if I had EFSC off

I placed my EFSC in the off position on the A7II and a7rII the night before my shoot. It was off through the day and still off. I simply forget to turn it off so it just stays off. I really with that you could customize a button for this function. In the on position, the banding is horrible with anything over 1/1000..

May 09, 2017 at 03:38 PM

AGeoJO
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p.13 #10 · p.13 #10 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Eric, here are two similar images I took on Sunday. You can see the exif to figure out which is which. I was shooting at f/1.8 and probably by accident, I nudged the aperture dial and it turned into f/2. Oh, well, that's the only explanation I could come up with. After I took the first image, I realized that the aperture wasn't probably enough to render both of them sharp as they were not quite in the same focus plane. So, I stopped it down to f/2.8 and that was a deliberate move on my part. Neither images did make it in the first selection. I took more images at f/2.8 and composed them differently and I like the other images better. Again, I am posting these only for comparison purposes; both files were processed for all intents and purposes using the same workflow.

As you can tell the extended depth of field (the girl in the back is rendered sharp judging by the eye lashes) resulted in a slight change of the background bokeh. You can use the lily in the pond to see the difference better. I don't think the bokeh of the f/2.8 image is bad though but not as smooth as that of the f/2, that's for sure.

Hope this helps,
Joshua

GMPhotography wrote:
Probably would have been better if I had EFSC off

You know what Guy, the EFSC was off throughout the entire session and I did it before hand. I simply didn't want to remember to do it. The shutter makes a louder noise but that's about it. And I did come across situation where shutter speed was in excess of 1/1000 sec where it could make a difference.


	© AGeoJO 2017

Sisters


	© AGeoJO 2017

Sisters

May 09, 2017 at 03:45 PM

tn1krr
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p.13 #11 · p.13 #11 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Steve Spencer wrote:
As I understand it, they only prevent this for lenses with significant focus shift and the obvious reason to do so is focussing at open aperture would lead to focus errors if there is significant focus shift.

Sony AF with certain lenses has some way (maybe a small CDAF pass after stopping down) of compensating focus shift even when lens focuses opened up. For example Batis 85 has real/measurable focus shift, but AF compensates it despite lens focusing opened up to F/2. So there seems to more to this than simply "focus stopped down with lenses with focus shift"

Jim Kasson has tested this with his usual solid methodology and his conclusion is: The good news is that the camera’s AF system is compensating for the lens’ focus shift quite successfully.

Jim's test

http://blog.kasson.com/the-last-word/another-medium-tele-test-batis-af/

May 10, 2017 at 02:21 AM

ecarlino
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p.13 #12 · p.13 #12 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

AGeoJO wrote:
Eric, here are two similar images I took on Sunday.

As you can tell the extended depth of field (the girl in the back is rendered sharp judging by the eye lashes) resulted in a slight change of the background bokeh. You can use the lily in the pond to see the difference better. I don't think the bokeh of the f/2.8 image is bad though but not as smooth as that of the f/2, that's for sure.

Hope this helps,
Joshua

Joshua - thank you for taking the time to find/post that comparison - both shots are lovely - but that has as much to do with the quality of light as anything else. I also like the DoF for both subjects - tough choice - but more to the intent of this - the backgrounds are close but it's also clear the difference that stopping down to f/2.8 makes.

thanks again, have a great day, eric.

May 10, 2017 at 08:15 AM

nampramos
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p.13 #13 · p.13 #13 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

It is really tough to shoot 135mm at f/1.8 and get two faces (not even saying eyes) in sharp focus, unless they are exactly at the same distance to the camera. That's another reason I would take the slower Batis 135 over this one (although size and weight beat any other reason

).

Great portraits nonetheless!

May 10, 2017 at 08:41 AM

AGeoJO
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p.13 #14 · p.13 #14 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

ecarlino wrote:
Joshua - thank you for taking the time to find/post that comparison - both shots are lovely - but that has as much to do with the quality of light as anything else. I also like the DoF for both subjects - tough choice - but more to the intent of this - the backgrounds are close but it's also clear the difference that stopping down to f/2.8 makes.

thanks again, have a great day, eric.

My pleasure, Eric! And the same to you.

nampramos wrote:
It is really tough to shoot 135mm at f/1.8 and get two faces (not even saying eyes) in sharp focus, unless they are exactly at the same distance to the camera. That's another reason I would take the slower Batis 135 over this one (although size and weight beat any other reason

).

Great portraits nonetheless!

Thank you! Yes, that's true, it is tough and sometimes the composition is more pleasing to get a little bit of staggering of the models, putting them not on the same focus plane. During the same session, I did that and although I managed to get both of them, and more importantly of their 4 eyes, to be in critical focus but the composition is a tad too stiff for my taste.

The luxury of having a maximum aperture of f/1.8 is tangible. It is better to be able to stop down to f/2.8 if there is a need to rather than having to use f/2.8 all the time as the maximum aperture. The additional weight and bulk? Well, that's something that you have to put up with, if you are after that kind of aperture in a 135mm lens. Except for the AF for not being at the same level to that of the native FE lens, I am very pleased with the Sigma. But I realize that it is not a travel lens, which the Batis tends to be more suitable for. In an ideal world having the two would be awesome, if you use that FL a lot, that is.

May 10, 2017 at 09:46 AM

ecarlino
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p.13 #15 · p.13 #15 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Well, i don't like bothering other people to do tests for me - although I appreciated Joshua's quick reply above. So i borrowed a 70-200GM and picked up the Sigma 135/1.8 and the Batis 135/2.8 is arriving tomorrow.

For me, the Batis is the preordained winner. I just can't see myself carrying around anything bigger/heavier than the 85GM - that's sort of what i've had in my head as my absolute max. I adopted the sony a7r originally b/c of the 35/2.8 and 55/1.8 - after years of big Nikon glass, it was once again a joy to travel and take photos. I've slowly crept back towards bigger glass, but i need to stick to my limits on this.

The 70-200GM is absolutely fantastic, but also absolutely out of the question for me.

But the nagging question for me has been and remains - how much do i lose if i don't have f/1.8 on the Batis? So, i wanted to go through this process and find out - and my back-up plan, should i decide that f/2.8 just isn't enough - is that I'll sell the 85GM and have the 135 be my 'BIG' lens. I also have a sneaking feeling that I may end up going this route b/c i like the expanding spread between focal lengths - i just don't use 85 that much, even though it's probably the best lens. So, for me, the 135 decision is as much about the 'kit' as it is the lens.

When the Batis 135 was first announced, people suggested that the Samyang and Canon were better - but I'm not into MF and the Canon seems past its expiration date compared to any of these recent lenses. This thread has done a fantastic job showing off the Sigma, which opened the door (just a crack) in my mind that maybe a fast 135 was the way to go.

So, 2 kit options are (and a pipe-dream):
http://www.ecarlino.net/share/sig135b/kit3.JPG

Edited on May 11, 2017 at 01:49 PM · View previous versions

May 11, 2017 at 11:38 AM

ecarlino
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p.13 #16 · p.13 #16 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

So, thankfully after 2 months of rain/cold, this morning the sun is out and i walked around the yard with the Sigma and shot everything at f/1.8 and f/2.8 so i could compare things at various subject distances - i'm going to spend the next week doing this along with f/2.8 on the Batis starting tomorrow and will post the comparisons:

here's just a quick run around the house w/ the Sigma, 1.8 vs 2.8

(you can scroll down or open up 2 tabs/windows to view side-by-side)

May 11, 2017 at 11:40 AM

Fred Miranda
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p.13 #17 · p.13 #17 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

ecarlino wrote:
So, thankfully after 2 months of rain/cold, this morning the sun is out and i walked around the yard with the Sigma and shot everything at f/1.8 and f/2.8 so i could compare things at various subject distances - i'm going to spend the next week doing this along with f/2.8 on the Batis starting tomorrow and will post the comparisons:

here's just a quick run around the house w/ the Sigma, 1.8 vs 2.8

(you can scroll down or open up 2 tabs/windows to view side-by-side)

Thanks for the samples! Did you remembered to turn EFCS 'off'?

May 11, 2017 at 11:49 AM

ecarlino
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p.13 #18 · p.13 #18 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

Fred Miranda wrote:
Thanks for the samples! Did you remembered to turn EFCS 'off'?

d@mn it! (oops, sorry - i'll go back out - stupid EFCS!)

May 11, 2017 at 11:49 AM

ecarlino
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p.13 #19 · p.13 #19 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

OK, here's another set of 30 pairs of shots (f/1.8 then f/2.8)

this time with EFCS set to OFF on all

given that subject distance is as much a factor as aperture for background separation/blur, i shot several sequences where i backed up about 12 feet between shots to see how that changed the background.

i will say this about the Sigma - it's bokeh is quite creamy - this is one of the primary reasons i am giving it a serious look (i really hate buying/trying/returning) so unless i am serious, i won't bother - but besides the f/2.8 on the Batis the other major concern i have is the potential for 'swirly' backgrounds - which i hated about the Batis 85 and unfortunately, there haven't been enough samples with the Batis 135 yet, but i've seen a few shots that have raised a red flag for me.

This Sigma does seem very silky smooth....giving the 85GM a run for its money (but not quite)

re: AF, i have it on AF-S and snaps on right away 80% of the time and other times it goes back and forth but that was more a function of a tricky subject and any native lens would have done the same - so, after 100 shots, i'd say for a single-focus-point on AF-S, it's on par with native lenses. haven't tried faces/eyes nor AF-C yet

Edited on May 11, 2017 at 12:40 PM · View previous versions

May 11, 2017 at 12:31 PM

GMPhotography
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p.13 #20 · p.13 #20 · Sigma 135mm F1.8 Tests and Review Ongoing

It would beat the GM on sharpness. Bokeh no to a certain degree

ecarlino wrote:
OK, here's another set of 30 pairs of shots (f/1.8 then f/2.8)

this time with EFCS set to OFF on all

given that subject distance is as much a factor as aperture for background separation/blur, i shot several sequences where i backed up about 12 feet between shots to see how that changed the background.

i will say this about the Sigma - it's bokeh is quite creamy - this is one of the primary reasons i am giving it a serious look (i really hate buying/trying/returning) so unless i am serious, i won't bother - but besides the f/2.8 on the Batis...Show more →

May 11, 2017 at 12:39 PM

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