What attracts me the most about these lenses is like Pav there in his 65mm review said: "You get a consistent look, regardless of which lens you are using". Finally a pretty complete set of compact high quality lenses (similar in fashion to Voigtländers which I also love) that all have very similar signature look and cover all the main FL's I mostly use. And it seems like they will work really great in tandem with my Sigma 105mm f/2.8. Sure, you can argue about their rendering all day long, but so far what I've seen is that they perform admirably and the overall rendering is even better than I really hoped for. I would call them "well balanced".
Sigma CEO presented all the new apparel in the Japanese version of the Sigma Stage presentation for the new lenses:
You can see the new apparel selection from around 51:00 to 56:00. Lens Otaku (nerd) T-Shirt comes up at 53:40. It has the 45/2.8 DG DN lens diagram. There are also black and white face masks with Lens Otaku theme.
These seem to be all made in small limited volumes only so once they are sold out there's no new supply.
imagesfromobjects wrote:
That's really cool!! I saw they also have one for the 24mm, as well as a cryptic "lens nerd" t-shirt which they're not going to show us until release time. May just have to order one, I feel very much kinship with Sigma and I'm proud to be one of the few (primarily) still photographers who uses the fp exclusively.
Looking forward to your samples as always - enjoy!!
Tonzah78 wrote:
What attracts me the most about these lenses is like Pav there in his 65mm review said: "You get a consistent look, regardless of which lens you are using". Finally a pretty complete set of compact high quality lenses (similar in fashion to Voigtländers which I also love) that all have very similar signature look and cover all the main FL's I mostly use. And it seems like they will work really great in tandem with my Sigma 105mm f/2.8. Sure, you can argue about their rendering all day long, but so far what I've seen is that they perform admirably and the overall rendering is even better than I really hoped for. I would call them "well balanced"....Show more →
Indeed they make for a nice 4-lens set. I'm not decided on 65mm yet but I've already preordered 24/3.5 and I just received shipping notice for the 35/2. Might get into buying the 65mm as well after some time especially if I'm really impressed by 35/2 after using it for a while.
The 24mm is the first one on my personal list to get. Currently Samyang 35mm is the widest I own (which I'm just about to sell) and before Sigma's announcement I was pretty much set on getting a Voigtländer 21mm f/3.5 once again. But I think I will prefer the Sigma's autofocusing 24mm as my only wide angle and the close-up capabilities are a nice bonus.
The 65mm will be the next one to get. My current "on the camera 90% of the time" lens is the 40mm Nokton, so 24mm and 65mm will complement it quite perfectly. And I guess I will eventually get the Sigma's 35mm as well. Will not replace my Nokton, but will serve as an autofocusing option when needed.
Just ordered the 35/2, for about 600 CHF it offers too much to resist, especially as 35mm is my favourite FL. Will compare it against my excellent copy of the 35mm 1.4 ZA. I have as well the 45mm F2.8, it is bit unfortunate that it is winter, otherwise I would have used the mid-distance backlit foliage torture test on all three
The 24mm and 65mm have somewhat less appeal to me, would have preferred them to be 20mm and 75mm.
So I have some testing to do over the holidays, good to keep me busy. Might sell off both the Sigma and Sony ZA 35s to fund the new 35 1.4 GM though, if that is smaller in weight and size than the 35mm F1.4 ZA, while at least maintaining its optical characteristics
Their MTFs look rather similar, maybe the Sigma drops of slightly faster from a 15mm image height and into the periphery. Also tangential and sagittal curves cross each other in similar places and show a similar behaviour. These two lenses should share many of the same strengths as well as flaws.
The Leica Elmar-M 24/3.8 improves upon stopping down to f/5.6 according to the MTF chart and gets slightly worse at f/8. There’s no great difference in performance among the steps f/3.8 - f/5.6 - f/8. The Sigma 24/3.5 is a sixth of a stop faster than the Leica lens and might improve slightly when stopping down to f/3.8, which must also be accounted for in comparing MTFs.
Caveat: My comparison is of course based on comparing MTFs created in different ways from different manufacturers.
I think there is reason to hope the Sigma 24/3.5 will turn out good in real tests.
Their MTFs look rather similar, maybe the Sigma drops of slightly faster from a 15mm image height and into the periphery. Also tangential and sagittal curves cross each other in similar places and show a similar behaviour. These two lenses should share many of the same strengths as well as flaws.
The Leica Elmar-M 24/3.8 improves upon stopping down to f/5.6 according to the MTF chart and gets slightly worse at f/8. There’s no great difference in performance among the steps f/3.8 - f/5.6 - f/8. The Sigma 24/3.5 is a sixth of a stop faster than the Leica lens and might improve slightly when stopping down to f/3.8, which must also be accounted for in comparing MTFs.
Caveat: My comparison is of course based on comparing MTFs created in different ways from different manufacturers.
I think there is reason to hope the Sigma 24/3.5 will turn out good in real tests.
MTF does however not say anything about bokeh, LoCA, flare resistance, vignetting, distortion, color and lots of other properties of a lens. Sure, if you're only interested in resolution, they might be similar. But saying they have "similar behaviour" is really stretching it IMO.
Makten wrote:
MTF does however not say anything about bokeh, LoCA, flare resistance, vignetting, distortion, color and lots of other properties of a lens. Sure, if you're only interested in resolution, they might be similar. But saying they have "similar behaviour" is really stretching it IMO.
I only said that the sagittal and tangential show a similar behaviour, and this is in regard to their shape, when they cross each other. I have not said anything about vignetting, flare resistance etc, only about the MTF curves.
Their MTFs look rather similar, maybe the Sigma drops of slightly faster from a 15mm image height and into the periphery. Also tangential and sagittal curves cross each other in similar places and show a similar behaviour. These two lenses should share many of the same strengths as well as flaws.
The Leica Elmar-M 24/3.8 improves upon stopping down to f/5.6 according to the MTF chart and gets slightly worse at f/8. There’s no great difference in performance among the steps f/3.8 - f/5.6 - f/8. The Sigma 24/3.5 is a sixth of a stop faster than the Leica lens and might improve slightly when stopping down to f/3.8, which must also be accounted for in comparing MTFs.
Caveat: My comparison is of course based on comparing MTFs created in different ways from different manufacturers.
I think there is reason to hope the Sigma 24/3.5 will turn out good in real tests.
Quite apart from the methods, the Leica bottom pair is MTF 40 whereas sigma follows the Japanese practice of only going to MTF 30. So you need to imagine a line somewhere between the Leica mtf20 and mtf40 line to be comparable with sigma. And then, as you say, compensate for the speed difference.
DavidBM wrote:
Quite apart from the methods, the Leica bottom pair is MTF 40 whereas sigma follows the Japanese practice of only going to MTF 30. So you need to imagine a line somewhere between the Leica mtf20 and mtf40 line to be comparable with sigma. And then, as you say, compensate for the speed difference.
Exactly, I did consider that Sigma uses 30 lpmm MTF and Leica 5, 10, 20, 40 lpmm MTF. This is already stated by Sigma and Leica. Sigma,s 30 lpmm pairs is between Leica’s 20 and 40 lpmm pairs in the left part and drops faster, to approx reach Leica’s 40 lpmm pair in the right part of the diagram. This is the slightly worrying part to me. But then again the Sigma lens is slightly faster than the Leica lens, but not by much.
I received my 35/2 DG DN this morning and I took some shots during lunch break with my A7C. Most were taken at f2 (bokeh shots at closer distances) or at f5.6 (long distance / infinity shots).
I kept the lens distortion and color fringing correction settings at auto as I usually do, but vignetting compensation was turned off in camera.
The lens balances very nicely with the camera and feels very good in use. So far I've been pleased with it I'm looking forward to using it more in the coming days.
I found one curious problem in C1 Pro 21 when checking shots taken with A7C + this new lens. The lens correction profile for Zeiss Loxia 2/35 got selected by default all the time and I had to manually switch to Manufacturer Profile. There's a big difference between those profiles. I don't even have Loxia 35/2 and have never used it. In Metadata view C1 Pro also claims that the lens is Zeiss Loxia 2/35. It must be making some wrong interpretations from EXIF data.
I checked the EXIF from RAW with exiftool and found the following Lens info metadata:
Lens Info : 35mm f/2
Lens Model : 35mm F2 DG DN | Contemporary 020
Lens Type : E-Mount, T-Mount, Other Lens or no lens
Lens Spec : E 35mm F2
Lens ID : 35mm F2 DG DN | Contemporary 020
I guess some of those fields (other than Lens Model and Lens ID) match with Loxia's metadata and C1 Pro makes wrong interpretations based on that. I hope they can fix it in the future (in some C1 SW update)
JVan_02 wrote:
@Juha Kannisto@ get some pics of the lens on the camera haha.
Photos look pretty great, imo. Bokeh looks really great here. Thanks for the samples!
Thanks I'm very happy with the bokeh rendering as well based on today's shooting.
I though that there are already quite many photos showing the lens on A7C so I didn't take any lens on camera shots yet. E.g. Yodobashi Camera has a new article showing the lens on A7C (same black version as I have) here: http://photo.yodobashi.com/sony/lens/35_f2dgdncontemporary/
(Link seems not working when clicked directly, but should work if you copy-paste it to browser.)
Anyway, I'll take some lens on camera shots this weekend too and will share them here later along with more samples
I just raised a "submit a new request" bugreport to C1 team as well about the lens recognition issue. Hopefully they react to it.
A couple of random thoughts. First, on the magnet lens cap, I love the idea but perhaps they can modify the design just slightly with a small nob in the middle that would let you grab it when the hood is on so you could use this lens cap and the hood at the same time.
Second, I was thinking that a Batis 18 f/2.8 and a Batis 135 f/2.8 would go nicely with these three lenses to make an 18, 24, 35, 65, 135 five lens kit. Perhaps Sigma will make a 17 or 18 f/3.5 or f/4 and a 135 f/2.8 in this series to make a wonderful small three lens kit.
Third, these I series lenses remind me of the Contax G series of lenses. Which made me think that in that series I alway thought the 21, 28, 45, 90 four lens set was pretty compelling. I could see those focal lengths all with a max f/2.8 aperture (well maybe keep the 21 to f/3.5 to keep it small) and a rendering like the 45, might be a great small four lens kit that I might like even more.
You’re samples look quite good Juha—thanks for posting as always. You’re the real sample gallery
How is the AF on your A7c? Both speed and focus acquisition.
It looks much better (less offensive really) than the FE 35 and Samy the more photos I see. Especially bokeh and rendering...all 3 are easily sharp enough for me.
I am trying to wait for the GM 35...but this is so comparatively compact and competent.
