150-600mm F5/-6.3 DG DN for Sony E

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Isn’t 500mm too short? Sure, it can be. There will be times that you want to zoom in more. You have to take into consideration how often you intend to use the lens, and for what purpose exactly. With Mode 1 and Mode 2, you don’t see the stabilisation effect in the viewfinder until you press the focus button, or half press the shutter release button. In other words, stabilisation starts to work when you press either of these buttons. At 205mm the shapes stay just about the same, but the maximum aperture narrows to f/5.6 and distortion increases to about 1.5 percent. The numbers line up about the same at 250mm as well. Beyond that, I used an older, smaller test chart to evaluate lens performance, in concert with close examination of images shot in the field. At 300mm f/5.6, the lens remains crisp from edge to edge. Image quality is exceptional, with ultra-high-performance glass capable of delivering ultra-sharp results even on the highest resolution cameras. The lens displays beautiful bokeh throughout its zoom range, and optical aberrations are kept well under control. It can be used with SIGMA’s 1.4× and 2× L-Mount teleconverters, with AF effective up to 1200mm.

Put another way, the mirrorless lens and a fully-loaded Panasonic S5 or Sony a1 body would tip the scales at just a little less than the unmounted DSLR lens alone! But be that as it may, it still weighs 2.1kg (4.62lb) without the camera. So while you can certainly shoot with it handheld if needed, for extended shooting sessions you'll likely find yourself wanting some support. Then we have the Sigma and I’ll admit I’m a bit disappointed with it. Certainly, it delivers good optical quality overall, but the AF motor’s performance was slower than expected for fast moving subjects such as birds in flight. The lens’ design doesn’t offer a real advantage in terms of size and weight, and there are no teleconverters. The only area where it shows better capabilities is optical stabilisation, but not to the point of making a relevant difference. The Sigma offers excellent close-up capabilities at 150mm, outperforming the Tamron by a small margin. The Deko platform is provided by Pay4Later Ltd, t/a Deko which acts as a credit broker, not a lender and does not charge you for credit broking services. Pay4Later Limited is registered in England and Wales (company number 06447333) and is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (register number 728646). For more information please go to www.dekopay.com/support or visit www.dekopay.com.The focusing is extremely quiet. Never had a lens this quiet. You also don't feel the mechanism working which is a little strange at the beginning.

Sigma has finally come up with a modern mirrorless design for a super-telephoto lens with a 4x zoom range: They managed to make it much lighter, optically better, and also cheaper than its predecessor – not a small feat! Optical performance is the best I’ve seen so far on a zoom lens reaching beyond 400mm focal length. But 3 out of 3 copies of the lens could only reach these results when used in landscape orientation: As soon as I turned to portrait orientation corner sharpness deteriorated significantly. A serious fault that Sigma hopefully can remedy. But other than that Sigma has designed a very compelling super-telephoto zoom which clearly earns a Highly Recommended – with the caveat that you need to find a good copy! It offers an iris diaphragm with a rounded 9 blade diaphragm which creates an attractive blur to the out of focus areas of the image, 4 stops of built-in optical image stabilisation with 2 selectable OS modes, and a minimum focus distance of 58cm / 23in with a maximum magnification ratio of 1:2.9. According to a reader on Marc Alhadeff’s Sony Alpha Blog, the reason Sigma hasn’t release an E-mount version of its teleconverters is a simple question of agreement: Sigma is licensed from Sony to design E-mount lenses, but not E-mount teleconverters.I appreciate you sharing your experiences with your Sigma super telephoto too! Your example photos are great and in line with what I experienced. The rutting elk in the water photo is really something. I bet that was great to witness in person. I just saw elk rutting in Colorado but they were just in a field bugling, and not fighting like yours. The Tamron 150-500mm F5-6.7 is only slightly less of a handful than the Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3, even though it has less reach and is less bright at full telephoto. With tripod mounts attached, it's about 220g (7.8 ounces) lighter, and saves just 5.4cm (2.2") in length with a 1.6cm (0.6") narrower barrel. Yet despite being bigger, heavier and more expensive, Sony's lens has relatively few advantages. It's no brighter than the Sigma, and its focal range is quite similar too. In fact it's the 150-600mm which actually has a bit of an advantage at the wider end. A lens like this will likely see most use at the tele end which is identical for both lenses, though, so it's really something of a wash. I got a perfect score at 1/60s, both at 150mm and 600mm, so the Sigma seems to be 1 stop more efficient than the Sony lens overall. But with it mounted, you'll at least increase your chances of shielding the front of the lens from the sun in the first place.

Overall, we'd term its autofocus performance as merely adequate. Unless you're on L-mount, where there are no close alternatives, you may want to consider a rival if you'll predominantly be shooting more active subjects. But if your subjects mostly won't vary significantly in distance from frame to frame, the Sigma 150-600mm will certainly do the job. elements in 15 groups includes a range of special types of high-performance glass that ensures thorough control of different types of aberrations. This helps give images the resolution and clearest detail – not only at the tele end around 600mm, Close-up comparison: Photos taken at minimum focus distance at 150mm (left) and 600mm (right). Images edited in Capture One 21. It's also quite a bit larger and heavier than the Sigma. Its barrel diameter is close enough that you won't notice the difference, but it's a full 5.2cm (2.0") longer. And it weighs 2.12kg (4.66lb), which sounds almost the same as the 2.1kg (4.63lb) Sigma unless you note the fact that Sigma includes its non-removable tripod mount in the weight figure, whereas Sony doesn't.The lens has a Focus Limiter switch offering three-zone AF modification, which helps to speed up AF performance. The With a lens this size you don't want to mount your camera directly on a tripod, as gravity will put some unnecessary stress on the lens mount. To that end, Sigma includes a removable tripod collar. Its sits near the base of the lens and has a thumb screw to tighten to set it in position; loosening the screw allows you to twist the collar, so you can switch between portrait and landscape orientation when working from a tripod or monopod. Sigma includes a rubber ring to cover the indentation in which the collar sits for protection if you opt to remove it.

When the lens profiles are enabled on the RAW file, vignetting is well corrected on the Sony and Tamron, at the shortest and longest focal length. The Sigma still has some left at 150mm and f/5, but you can easily correct it in post. There is just a small amount of pincushion distortion at 150mm, but overall the effect is well controlled and can be eliminated in editing software without a compromise on final image quality. As noted earlier, the manual focus ring is extremely smooth and well-damped – on a Panasonic L-mount body, you can tell the camera whether you want the focus movement to respond to the speed that you turn the lens ring (non-linear response), or you can have it set so that whatever speed you turn it, the focus shifts proportionally and repeatedly to the amount of turn (linear response).

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Price: The Sigma 150-600 DN comes at a recommended retail price of 1399 EUR (incl. 19% VAT) / 1499 USD / 1199 GBP. The Tamron 150-500 is 1499 EUR / 1399 USD / 1379 GBP, the Sony 200-600 is 1670 EUR / 2000 USD / 1500 GBP. The older DSLR designs currently sell for 1650 EUR / 1850 USD / 1330 GBP (Sigma 150-600 HSM Sports) and 1000 EUR / 1200 USD / 850 GBP (Tamron 150-600). [0] Since the Sigma 150-600mm F5-6.3 DG DN OS | Sports is available on both the Sony E-mount as well as for L-mount cameras from Leica, Panasonic and Sigma, our conclusions will differ depending upon the mount, even though it's basically the same lens for both platforms. The focus ring is 15mm wide and is located just in front of the tripod mount. It also has a rubberized surface, moves smoothly, and can easily be operated with one finger. AF-operation and image stabilization of the Sigma 150-600 DN is inaudible if you record video with the built-in microphone.