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09/27/2005 09:29:34 AM · #1 |
Ok, I know the obvious. The Canon is better. Better value for the money. Holds its value better. Produces consistenly sharper images, is faster, and better built. But I'm on a budget. And at less than half the price, how close of a competitor is the Sigma? Most of my shots will be water sports, volleyball, and various other outdoor activities. The occasional indoor volleyball game, and every once in awhile a football game at night. I will probably never buy a lens solely for macro, and I like the fact that the Sigma is capable of macro. So, for what I'm using it for, will the Sigma produce sharp photos? Thanks!
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09/27/2005 09:57:27 AM · #2 |
| You mean Sigma 70-300mm f/4-5.6 APO DG? I have the non-DG version and i quite like it. never tried the canon though.. |
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09/27/2005 09:58:07 AM · #3 |
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09/27/2005 10:04:07 AM · #4 |
Buy the Sigma without any worries, you will be delighted with it. Then you get to play with the Macro setting which zooms thru from 200 to 300mm range.
Steve |
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09/27/2005 10:13:21 AM · #5 |
No proibs with the Sigma. The constant 4.0 f-stop might some in handy at night or indoors, but the Sigma has more range and at 200 is 5.0 (5.0 from about 150mm to 235) so it is NOT that much faster at the same range.
Sorta water sports..
  
and a macro
taken with my rebel and the sigma (non-DG version). |
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09/27/2005 10:19:56 AM · #6 |
I owned that Sigma lens for awhile, but sold it because of softness in the images, especially at the end of the zoom reach or wide open. But it is a great lens for the money and should take excellent pictures if you give it plenty of light and stop down your aperture a bit, maybe to around f/8 or f/11 whenever possible.
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09/27/2005 10:51:29 AM · #7 |
Here's my $0.02 (can$):
I've owned both. I had the sigma for about 1 year when I used my DRebel. I liked it the first little while, but quickly realized that I could not get consistant results with it. I found that the images were often soft, especially at the long end. I quickly developed a hatred for the lens, and used it very rarely. That's not to say that I didn't use it, and sometimes got some great results:
Many others of mine in here: //www.dpchallenge.com/lens.php?LENS_ID=1110&view=submissions
That being said, I eventually upgraded to the 70-200 f/4 L and boy what a difference. I love having that lens on the camera, and I'm certainly not fearful of using it at full zoom. The colour and contrast is much better, and the sharpness of that lens is sometimes astounding. I'd never think of going back.
Budget is definitely not the same, but think of this: If you're serious about photography, and think that one day you'll want to get better lenses, then make the move now. Save up if you have to and wait until you have more money, because otherwise you'll buy the Sigma and want to sell it later on to get a better lens. At that point you'll not get back full value on the Sigma, and the Canon will utimately cost you more.
Good luck.
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09/27/2005 11:31:01 AM · #8 |
Originally posted by mariomel:
Here's my $0.02 (can$):
I've owned both. I had the sigma for about 1 year when I used my DRebel. I liked it the first little while, but quickly realized that I could not get consistant results with it. I found that the images were often soft, especially at the long end. I quickly developed a hatred for the lens, and used it very rarely. That's not to say that I didn't use it, and sometimes got some great results:
Many others of mine in here: //www.dpchallenge.com/lens.php?LENS_ID=1110&view=submissions
That being said, I eventually upgraded to the 70-200 f/4 L and boy what a difference. I love having that lens on the camera, and I'm certainly not fearful of using it at full zoom. The colour and contrast is much better, and the sharpness of that lens is sometimes astounding. I'd never think of going back.
Budget is definitely not the same, but think of this: If you're serious about photography, and think that one day you'll want to get better lenses, then make the move now. Save up if you have to and wait until you have more money, because otherwise you'll buy the Sigma and want to sell it later on to get a better lens. At that point you'll not get back full value on the Sigma, and the Canon will utimately cost you more.
Good luck. |
This has been my experience, as well.
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09/27/2005 04:46:45 PM · #9 |
A year old sigma 70-300 is not the same as the 70-300mm APO DG Macro, the latest version. It's a whole different beast.
Steve |
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10/02/2005 02:24:23 AM · #10 |
I placed an order for one of these DG beasts just today. The word is that the lack of sharpenss on the long end has been corrected a great deal, so that overall the lens is much more usuable at 300mm.
We'll see! |
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10/02/2005 03:38:06 AM · #11 |
| u wont have luck shootin indoors with either of those lenses really, so you probably made the right choice. |
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10/02/2005 05:02:16 AM · #12 |
Buy the Sigma, you will have to compensate for the slower apeture by pushing up the ISO rating. But, if your budget limits you, then the Sigma is the clear choice, plus you will have the extra reach. 300mm on the XT Rebel is like a 480mm lense:)
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10/02/2005 06:05:49 AM · #13 |
For most "Canon vs quality 3rd Party Lens" debates, the difference is not all that profound. In this particular case it's complicated by the fact that Canon's 70-200mm f/4L and its f/2.8 sibling are almost universally acknowledged as by far the sharpest zoom lenses in their range. I was using a loaner Sigma 70-300 for a little while while waiting on my 70-200 backorder, and the difference is like night and day. However, this was not the APO DG version, so I don't knwo how much better that is.
But the 70-200mm Canon is just about as good as a lens can get in this range, and the f/4.0 version just isn't that pricy in absolute terms... I'd save and wait, if it were my choice to make...
R. |
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10/11/2005 02:17:37 PM · #14 |
Well, my 70-300mm DG for my Sigma came in last week and I was able to get out and use it an airshow this past weekend. And I must say that, image quality wise, this lens rocks. (And I don't typically like zooms.) AF is pretty typical for a consumer zoom--it sux. I was only able to use MF at the airshow, but MF is well damped and easy to use.
(EXIF data should be intact for most images.--most are moderate crops.)
//www.pbase.com/mcmurma/airshow
This is a Lockheed PV-2 Harpoon cruising before some smoke stirred up by the airshow pyrotecnics. I havn't got around to naming the images in the gallery yet, but I'll get to it. I'm still wading through over 600 shots taken at the airshow! |
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10/11/2005 02:33:32 PM · #15 |
Impressive for a $220 lens (at least for the Canon version)! Great job and thanks for sharing.
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10/11/2005 03:31:19 PM · #16 |
Those are certainly better than my 70-300 APO was ever able to do, on a regular basis, anyway.
Good on you.
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10/11/2005 03:43:54 PM · #17 |
For What its worth, I have had the DG for a while now and am delighted with it! 
both these (and most of the other stuff in my people portfolio) were taken @ 300 |
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