I got my Sigma 300-600 in this morning and my initial impressions so far are just, WOW! I shoot "A LOT" on Canon and Nikon Super Teles, so I have a ton of time behind the best glass on earth to compare it too.
I'm shooting with an A1 II and will give it a go on the Z9 as well. I will be honing it in over the next few weeks getting ready for the winter Eagles and early spring Osprey season here on the river. We have some of the best Osprey action there is on the Rappahannock each spring during the Shad run starting late February.
The lens is extremely well built and the AF is really fast. I was doing near to far, far to near tests here around my shop and its basically instant and very confident on the focus hits. I tracked some song birds flying around and didn't notice any issues there as well, but I haven't run it through the gauntlet yet. Again, just my initial impressions so far but if I was handed this lens and it had one of the big 3 names on the side of it, you couldn't tell a difference in build. It's very very nice! It is heavier than the others and I handhold exclusively. I routinely carry my Canon or Nikon on long hikes so I'm curious to see how that is affected. The lens is well balanced and with the lightweight Sony body, it feels nearly identical to my R1 or Z9 with a 600 carrying it around. I'll weigh the different set ups and see how far apart they actually are.
I haven't loaded any images to my laptop yet but zooming in on the A1, the lens is sharp. We all know and can tell a sharp image or not when previewing, and its delivering.
I plan to do side by side comparisons with the Canons and Nikons, and I'll update the thread periodically as I go along. But so far I'm impressed. Hopefully that'll remain the case... First test tonight will be my 90lb lab running down a tennis ball!
I am VERY interested in this lens for photography and even more so for video. It is my understanding that the lens will not focus while zooming so looks like its best to just treat it like a prime. Look forward to hearing more feedback from you!
Care to share any focus settings? I feel like the AF is just subpar at best. it's getting few out of focus photos for seeming no reason (Athlete running in one direction, not changing direction) on top of the fact that it's shooting at 15fps instead of 30fps. My 300GM nails pretty much every shot, the sigma is definitely a tier or two behind in terms of AF in my experience.
Tom RC wrote:
I am VERY interested in this lens for photography and even more so for video. It is my understanding that the lens will not focus while zooming so looks like its best to just treat it like a prime. Look forward to hearing more feedback from you!
I tested that out last night very briefly, and it's a mixed bag. On a crash zoom either direction it will stop all together. Going from long to wide it would track my son, riding 18mph on his electric scooter, coming straight at me with a slow and consistent throw. Zooming out it had much more trouble.
The light was fading though and it was almost sunset when I got home from work. The OS on this lens is fantastic by the way!
Well, I didn't run into much as action this weekend as I had hoped, but I did carry the lens around for about 7 miles . I shot a few sequences of ducks, geese and a GBH flying all around the marsh. Birds coming at me, going away, panning, and with lots of static subjects too. Once on the Macbook, I'm seeing no noticeable difference in Image quality from my big primes. This lens renders beautifully and its incredibly sharp at all focal lengths. AF was again fast and confident and tracked with no issues at all. I only had maybe 10 or so shots slightly OOF out of 1500 images and none of them were complete misses. I'm shooting on the A1 II with firmware 4.0. I upgraded the firmware as soon as I pulled it out of the box last week. It tracked king fishers on the other side of the pond with incredible results even though they were super small in the frame. Handholding it is no issue for me and the versatility of a fast zoom, is simply awesome. Especially in the early morning light.
Here are some of the images I did like. None of these are world beaters as I was just shooting anything, everything, and as much as I could to get a feel for how the lens performs.
David83 wrote:
Well, I didn't run into much as action this weekend as I had hoped, but I did carry the lens around for about 7 miles . I shot a few sequences of ducks, geese and a GBH flying all around the marsh. Birds coming at me, going away, panning, and with lots of static subjects too. Once on the Macbook, I'm seeing no noticeable difference in Image quality from my big primes. This lens renders beautifully and its incredibly sharp at all focal lengths. AF was again fast and confident and tracked with no issues at all. I only had maybe 10 or so shots slightly OOF out of 1500 images and none of them were complete misses. I'm shooting on the A1 II with firmware 4.0. I upgraded the firmware as soon as I pulled it out of the box last week. It tracked king fishers on the other side of the pond with incredible results even though they were super small in the frame. Handholding it is no issue for me and the versatility of a fast zoom, is simply awesome. Especially in the early morning light.
Here are some of the images I did like. None of these are world beaters as I was just shooting anything, everything, and as much as I could to get a feel for how the lens performs.
ASC_1900 wrote:
Care to share any focus settings? I feel like the AF is just subpar at best. it's getting few out of focus photos for seeming no reason (Athlete running in one direction, not changing direction) on top of the fact that it's shooting at 15fps instead of 30fps. My 300GM nails pretty much every shot, the sigma is definitely a tier or two behind in terms of AF in my experience.
Just watched a review of this lens by Fro, just incase you were zooming while trying to focus that apparently does not work! Focus is not continuous while zooming. Might be a reason for some OOF images?
Karl
Karl Witt wrote:
Just watched a review of this lens by Fro, just incase you were zooming while trying to focus that apparently does not work! Focus is not continuous while zooming. Might be a reason for some OOF images?
Karl
I'm seeing the lens will focus while zooming if you do it slowly.
David83 wrote:
...I'm shooting with an A1 II and will give it a go on the Z9 as well.... I will be honing it in over the next few weeks getting ready for the winter Eagles and early spring Osprey season here on the river. We have some of the best Osprey action there is on the Rappahannock each spring during the Shad run starting late February.
Images look amazing! I was on the pre-order list for this lens originally and, ultimately, decided against it after the price increase. Now I'm considering it again for use on my Z8. Haven't been able to find much feedback from people who have this lens and have actually used it on a Nikon, just a bunch of pre-release videos saying that it should work.
Have you had a chance to put it through the paces on your Z9 yet? If so, what adapter did you use and how did the experience differ between your A1 II and Z9?
Dameon wrote:
Images look amazing! I was on the pre-order list for this lens originally and, ultimately, decided against it after the price increase. Now I'm considering it again for use on my Z8. Haven't been able to find much feedback from people who have this lens and have actually used it on a Nikon, just a bunch of pre-release videos saying that it should work.
Have you had a chance to put it through the paces on your Z9 yet? If so, what adapter did you use and how did the experience differ between your A1 II and Z9?
I have used it on the Z9 but only for a few minutes (literally) and with the Sony 1.4 TC. to check IQ. I'm using the megadap pro adapter. This lens is exceptional with the Sony 1.4...I was blown away with how sharp it is. I did have my son run full speed directly at me down the driveway and it couldn't keep up. Many shots were slightly back focused. That was the only tracking test I did, it was generally close to me, i was using people and eye detect, and that was with the 1.4 TC on still. I didn't shoot any panning subjects or track in any other form so it wasn't really a fair test, yet. However, anything I pointed it at would lock on as good as any other lens I have. Big game and perched birds id say right now you'd be just fine. I plan to run it with different AF settings on the TC to see how it really does, and run it sans TC as i feel it'll be amazing just bare lens.
On the A1 II I'm blown away. Is it 100%, No, and there may be a shot or two slightly OOF here and there. but that's it! It is lightning fast to AF, tracks amazing and IQ is just awesome! I haven't had the best light when I've been out and the wildlife hasn't cooperated, but I'm just shooting everything to shake it down, and its delivering. I had high hopes when I bought it but fully expected to be disappointed. I do own both the Canon RF 400/600 super teles, and the Nikon 400/600 TC super teles to fairly compare too.
I'm looking to shoot soccer with it. Sometimes they're running straight at me, but most of the time I'm panning, they're running at an angle, or they're locked up in a challenge. I've been shooting the 180-600, but at the longer end of that range, you're at a f6.3. A constant f4 with some LR NR seems like a good plan to have the flexibility and cost of this lens.
David83 wrote:
I have used it on the Z9 but only for a few minutes (literally) and with the Sony 1.4 TC. to check IQ. I'm using the megadap pro adapter. This lens is exceptional with the Sony 1.4...I was blown away with how sharp it is. I did have my son run full speed directly at me down the driveway and it couldn't keep up. Many shots were slightly back focused. That was the only tracking test I did, it was generally close to me, i was using people and eye detect, and that was with the 1.4 TC on still. I didn't shoot any panning subjects or track in any other form so it wasn't really a fair test, yet. However, anything I pointed it at would lock on as good as any other lens I have. Big game and perched birds id say right now you'd be just fine. I plan to run it with different AF settings on the TC to see how it really does, and run it sans TC as i feel it'll be amazing just bare lens. ...Show more →
Next time you test, check if megadap adapter firmware is up to date. They have a recent firmware that lists TC compatibility improvements, but I have yet to get a chance to test it out.
When I heard about some of the early attempts to adapt the 300-600 + Sony TC to Nikon Z, the camera was not picking up the change in focal length or f stop. I wonder if that's still the case. If so, that could explain some of the issues with tracking a moving subject.
Wow, Those ospreys photos look very nice with this lens!!
How did you find the tracking with ospreys flying on the A1ii?
How fast did it get the subjects focused doing some blind shots?
David83 wrote:
I have used it on the Z9 but only for a few minutes (literally) and with the Sony 1.4 TC. to check IQ. I'm using the megadap pro adapter. This lens is exceptional with the Sony 1.4...I was blown away with how sharp it is. I did have my son run full speed directly at me down the driveway and it couldn't keep up. Many shots were slightly back focused. That was the only tracking test I did, it was generally close to me, i was using people and eye detect, and that was with the 1.4 TC on still. I didn't shoot any panning subjects or track in any other form so it wasn't really a fair test, yet. However, anything I pointed it at would lock on as good as any other lens I have. Big game and perched birds id say right now you'd be just fine. I plan to run it with different AF settings on the TC to see how it really does, and run it sans TC as i feel it'll be amazing just bare lens.
On the A1 II I'm blown away. Is it 100%, No, and there may be a shot or two slightly OOF here and there. but that's it! It is lightning fast to AF, tracks amazing and IQ is just awesome! I haven't had the best light when I've been out and the wildlife hasn't cooperated, but I'm just shooting everything to shake it down, and its delivering. I had high hopes when I bought it but fully expected to be disappointed. I do own both the Canon RF 400/600 super teles, and the Nikon 400/600 TC super teles to fairly compare too.
Sigma 300-600 F4 @ F4 and 600mm vs the Sony 600 F4 @ F4
Can you tell which is which? These are same settings taken within an a minute if each other and converted raw to Jpeg only. There is a color difference between these lenses. But overall the Sigma is unbelievable for a zoom at $6,500.00
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?s=eyJpIjo1NDk1NDE4NTMzMSwiZSI6MTc2NDQ2ODgyOCwicyI6ImQ1MzAxNzk3Y2EyM2VhNDI4OTAzNTJiZjlhNDU0OGZhZGZlZTU3MmUiLCJ2IjoxfQ">DSC05152 by D.C. 83, on Flickr
I'm going to guess the first one is the GM the second one is the sigma, based on the background and the color. Don't have much confidence on my guess though
Looks almost identical to me, both images are perfectly clear/crisp, one being better than the other is probably subjective. That there is a such a massive price difference is amazing, especially considering the flexibility of the Sigma.
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I like the natural warmth of the Sigma. Mine should arrive on Tuesday. Excited to try it out.