Review on Sigma 16Mm Contemporary Lens Sony by Michael Baek ᠌

Name: Sigma 16Mm Contemporary Lens Sony
Item: Sigma 16Mm Contemporary Lens Sony
Rating: 5

September 13, 2022

The best thing I've ever used, a great item for everyone!

Unique super-fast AF wide. A must-have device for the UPC of crops. Record speed for this focal length on APS-C cameras. There are no direct AF analogues in nature, except for the manual Samyang 16 F2 and some kind of Olympus, 17 \ 1.2, it seems. Why Sigma did not make this for mirror crops is not clear.

As for the incorrect operation of AF - the lens is fresh - the firmware is raw - there are no ates yet - it is sharpened for cameras starting with a6000 and newer.
The owners of the a6300-6500 are absolutely delighted and swear that the AF is perfect.

I really want to personally compare it head-on with 19mm \ 2.8 DN Art (it costs a penny and the sharpness is no worse), if, what if she burrows, buries 16 \ 1.4 alive, then there will be a reason to think hard, after she gets up 60 \\ 2.8 (I didn’t see anything sharper) I won’t be surprised at anything

As for the price: I really want that for the price that it is offered in stores, it was all made of aircraft-grade aluminum + during the shooting, I would like for this price to have pink elephants running along the ceiling, I was entertained by whistling and cheering .

And, I would not be in a hurry to call it uniquely outstanding, given the extremely boring optical design, mechanical defenselessness

Pros

1) Crazy sharp and technical picture. F1.4 working all over the field even at infinity. From F2 sharpness rings, from F2.8 it rings in the corners. Very good for astroscape On this lens, closing the hole more than 5.6 makes sense only to increase the depth of field, after 5.6 sharpness and resolution do not increase. 2) There is no chromaticity from F2 at all and it is very low at 1.4 3) Record light transmission of the optical design - I have not seen a lens with F1.4 lighter than this. It gathers more light even than, for example, Zenitar 50\1.2, a little bit lighter than Kamlan 50\F1.1, and more than THREE STOPS lighter than Samyang 35\1.4, which is just darker! I compared it on three different cameras at equal settings, in terms of exposure on screens at ISO 100. It is clear that the focal length is different and the comparison is not entirely fair, but Sigma at 1.4 at ISO 100 gives a correctly exposed image of the test scene, but Samyang 35 \ 1.4 for to obtain equal brightness of the same scene, on the same camera, it requires setting it to 1.4 ISO 800 at the same shutter speed ! 4) High-quality, pleasant, tightly knit assembly. Minimalistic high-end design. 5) Comfortable, wide, smoothest focus ring - ideal for video 6) Focuses very close from the front lens - almost point-blank - allows you to make a very interesting wide-angle macro - with background blur in the trash

Cons

1) Rough, hard technical rendering - I really don't like the picture of this glass, there is no picture as such - it gives an interesting blur only at 1.4. Even Sony E 16-50 OSS (whale) produces a more plastic texture 2) Terribly - it fills up the geometry, verticals along the edges, and it is very difficult to straighten it out - even with Sony 16-50 blockages are easier to straighten. From such a terrible story, my eyes twitch 3) INSANE autofocus work! In particular, on the a5000 camera - when focusing on the horizon, it's just a wild back focus with a run somewhere beyond infinity on the magnifying glass scale. Sometimes there is a front focus anywhere but not in the center. The same problem is described on the forum - on a hole 1.6-1.7, 2.5 AF generally ceases to cling in all modes. In any does not want to focus exactly in the center. If it suddenly hooks on the horizon by 1.4, then everything will be abrupt, if you set 2-2.8-4 without changing the camera position, there will be a 100% micro run in the center, therefore the entire left or right edge will fall out of the depth of field with a terrible comatose soap. If you accurately hit with a magnifying glass manually in the center on the horizon on the horizon, then on all apertures there will be a razor-sharp frame from edge to edge! Moreover, a paradoxically delusional situation: on the old NEX 3N it focuses perfectly and constantly monitors in AF-S mode. On a5000 tracking focus only works on video, slow and inaccurate 4) Strong motor noise on the video (different nature of noise in AF-S and AF-C - most buyers of this glass are videographers. But for the pros this is not a problem - they use an external recorder 5) Price in the store 6) Mechanical vulnerability - the reliability of the motor and electronics is also questionable. Attention - I strongly advise against using this glass and in general all similar Sigmas for a long time at sub-zero temperatures! In the cold -5, the motor is already starting to freeze during manual focusing - it stops moving the lenses smoothly - how it can end at a lower temperature and subsequent warming up is better to think in advance