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Jake Hill photo
Kazakhstan, Astana
1 Level
673 Review
41 Karma

Review on πŸ“· Sigma 402963 16mm f/1.4 DC DN Contemporary Lens for Micro Four Thirds, Black - High-quality Wide-angle Lens for Micro Four Thirds Cameras by Jake Hill

Revainrating 4 out of 5

Almost done, Sigma

I've had mixed results with Sigma lenses over the years, but it's fair to say that the Sigma lenses of my youth had nothing to do with the exceptional lenses the Art series are these days. . The less talked about the first Sigma lenses and quality control, the better. I was intrigued by the $300 16mm f/1.4 lens, and in many ways this lens is exceptional, but not in all. The first one I had was very sharp up to about f/4, but wide open (f.1.4) it completely lost focus. Now it is difficult to achieve perfect focus at f/1.4 even for a 16mm lens, and certainly not for an OEM lens designed for different cameras. I really liked the lens, especially the almost perfectly round out of focus highlights. (bokeh) and the incredible close focus, around 4 inches, was fun too. So I ordered a second lens and this one even focused wide open. To illustrate the difference, the first lens was best at f/5 but the second was amazing at f/2.2 which is excellent performance. (I should add that m43 users have a slight quality advantage as the lens covers the larger sensors from Fuji and Sony, so m43 users don't "see" even extreme angles.) Hence 5 stars for image quality and 4 for control the quality Sigma. It's also worth noting that this lens uses the now-popular 'focus by wire', which means there can be a lag when focusing manually since you're not moving the lens elements yourself; They send an electrical "instruction" to the lens motor. I don't know about video, but I can see how frustrating this lag can be when trying to focus and defocus during a video. That's a shame, too, because the out-of-focus behavior of the lens is really good. But for a photo photographer, this is a very good lens and a great thing.

Pros
  • Great overall performance
Cons
  • Anything else I can add?