New Sigma WA finally looms

David Ruether wrote:
Paul Furman wrote
David Ruether wrote:

OT, but Nikon now has a 10-24mm f3.5-4.5G ED-IF S available for
not a lot more money...
http://www.nikonusa.com/Find-Your-Ni...5-4.5G-ED.html

$830 street price is not cheap.

But neither is the price for the Sigma...

Sigma f/4-5.6 $480
new Sigma f/3.5 $650
new Nikon f/3.5 $830


The commenter on the following page says it's soft in the corners:
http://reviews.photographyreview.com...5-45g-ed-lens/

...snip [sample variation]...

The lens test distance was far different than that of the others
from the brick wall, and focus distance with wide angle zooms
generally makes a big difference in performance

This is true, my Sigma 12-24 varies a lot by distance & aperture and who
knows what voodoo - I've never tested it methodically through the whole
range of possibilities. I think shake takes more of a toll in the
corners too, sometimes I'll get these atrocious corners & other times
crisp & clean all the way.

I'd expect the Nikkor to be better overall but who knows, the new Sigma
50/1.4 is supposed to do better than the new Nikon AF-S in some
conditions, by some evaluations.


(I prefer to
test with finely detailed infinity subjects, where slight parallelism
errors can have no influence and where I will use a wide angle
most of the time. Also, the Nikkor was shot using very low
contrast lighting on the brick wall, whereas the others were shot
under contrasty sunlight. This can make a BIG difference in the
appearance of sharpness with any lens. Shot under the worst
possible conditions (except for aperture) for any wide angle
zoom, it is not surprising to see such poor-looking performance.
I would still want to see the results from another sample, shot
under the same conditions as the other lenses, and then with all
used to shoot distant material with the same very detailed
material in the corners. I would also like to see "10mm
compared with 10mm", since lens performance varies with
zooming.

All good points!


A good example is here, where the sample of the
excellent Nikkor 17-35mm unexpectedly "fell down" at 28mm.
See: http://www.donferrario.com/ruether/wa-zooms.htm
While there, compare the 5' results with the infinity results
(the corners are noticeably worse at the same stop...). While
it is difficult to check lenses reliably, I've found method I've
used is here to be good (and while it was used for FF film lens
checking, it is easily adapted to digital photography) - see:
http://www.donferrario.com/ruether/lens-testing.htm
--DR




--
Paul Furman
www.edgehill.net
www.baynatives.com

all google groups messages filtered due to spam

On Sat, 11 Jul 2009, Paul Furman wrote:

The new IE really hosed one of my web pages... it was my syntax error
but didn't show until this last update ack! I'm not sure how long it
had been that way because I don't use IE.

You should test your pages with: http://validator.w3.org/

Don www.donwiss.com (e-mail link at home page bottom).

On Sat, 11 Jul 2009 10:50:54 -0700, John McWilliams wrote:

Thanks, but I tried it using the link in your post, and the usual Nikon-site
originated notice, "Page Not Found, etc.", still came up... (Latest version of I.E.)
W e i r d . . . .

It's a function of the news client. OE pretty well sucks, according to
some who've used it.

True, some news clients can, some can't. Agent had no problem
launching the original URL.