Sigma 18-35mm DC HSM mini-review and first impressions

First off many thanks to James from Castle Cameras for letting me have a quick test of this lens and of course for being the model. If you want to buy a Sigma 18-35mm I suggest you ring castle cameras and order one. You can also buy the sigma 18-35mm online.

Now we’ve got the how out of the way we have the what to consider. First impressions are the Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 is a solid lens, it balances nicely on a 60D and a 5D mark 2 so no issues weight wise really. This is a f/1.8 zoom for a start. The zoom mechanism feels great nice amount of damping just like the focus ring too. Sigma have seriously stepped up their game with the ART range of lenses. I can’t wait to get my hands on a Nikon fit one, but, as I was passing and a Canon one was available I’d be silly not to take a look. You can see all the specs on the Sigma website: List of full specs for sigma 18-35mm f/1.8.

Now I was interested how it would fare on full frame as unlike canons EF-S lenses it WILL mount on the full frame 5D mark 2. The answer is that you do get some pretty extreme vignetting as you’d expect at the wider angles. but after about 28mm or so it’s not that bad – certainly usable in a pinch. Did I mention it is f/1.8 and a zoom! Incredible!

I’m sharing below so resized and sharpened images at various focal lengths on the Canon EOS 5D mark 2, so you can just take a look at the middle if you want to see how it compares on a cropped EF-S body. I’m expecting very little to none on DX/EF-S cameras. Good job sigma!

Hope you find this little review helpful and don’t forget to leave your comments below. Again many thanks to Castle cameras (and to James for modelling)

You can find full size non sharpened images on skydrive here.

All images are taken in Aperture priority mode at f/1.8 at around ISO800.

Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens on Full frame Canon EOS 5D mark II at 18mm

Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens on Full frame Canon EOS 5D mark II at 20mm

Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens on Full frame Canon EOS 5D mark II at 23mm

Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens on Full frame Canon EOS 5D mark II at 28mm

Sigma 18-35mm f/1.8 lens on Full frame Canon EOS 5D mark II at 35mm

You can see some other Equipment reviews I have written.

Dorset Wedding Photographer Equipment – Nikon D7100 – mini review and comparison

As a wedding photographer it’s always good to see what other equipment is available and what is and isn’t going to work in terms of equipment. Although there is a large amount of ‘if it ain’t broke’ mentality that goes into choosing equipment for a wedding and familiarity is a great bonus when it comes to photographing situations that are fast changing and you need quick reflexes to capture whats happening. The last thing you want to be doing at a wedding is scratching your head working out what works and what what you need to change to do X. As well as weddings I also photograph in the studio and when I saw the Nikon D7100 announced I thought this could be a great studio camera. First off it have enough resolution to allow cropping (24 megapixels) it lacks an AA filter to enhance sharpness – again another bonus. It also features some other nice things such as dual SD card slots (no more worrying about losing images because a card fails. It also boasts the same AF as the flagship D4, and weather sealing the same as the D800, D600, so it’s also good to take outside of the studio. So I wanted to see how it would respond both in the studio and in the field. I’ve already written some first impressions here about the Nikon D7100.

dorset wedding photographer equipment d7100, d600 and d800

Is the D7100 any good?

Of course and modern camera is probably not going to be rubbish, but, can it be used for a multitude of jobs? Is it a one trick pony? So the best way is to use it on actual jobs. Of course testing at a wedding would be risky without getting to know the camera first. So I did a fair number of boring test type shoots to see how it performed (again see previous article) then I did a few studio shoots that i thought would benefit from the class leading resolution and sharpness. I then did a few personal shoots of helicopters and go-karting to test the AF and tracking performance. After all this has the famous D4 level AF system available!

Pros of the Nikon D7100

After having used the d7100 at various places now including a challenging go-karting event ( must be challenging as that’s where canon launched some Canon 1DX testing ) and many studio shoots.

• AF is great and the AF points cover most of the frame this is a real bonus over any other FX camera and over the very similar D600 it’s night and day in terms of coverage and speed.
• Image quality is fantastic and although you need the best lenses at the best apertures to make the most of the sensor it’s output is very similar to the other modern Nikon digital SLRs like the d800, d600.
• Dual card slots is great – both SD cards too which are cheap for fast cards. I use a couple of 32GB cards and get loads of images (over 1000+) on them. Again a real bonus
• weather sealing – great to know it won’t need to go away in drizzles or even downpours
• Great HD movies. and a 1.3x too gives you some good quality options too
• Decent burst rate of 6fps (7fps in 1.3 crop mode)

As you can see plenty of great points what about the downsides? there’s always some of those right?

Cons for the Nikon D7100

• Burst rate shows the buffer up. you don’t get many – about 6 or 7 before the buffer fills in raw. No big deal but a couple of seconds would be nice for confetti shots.
• HD movies – wish this had the 50/60p options to allow slow-motion afterwards.
• Can’t change aperture in movie mode. This can be overcome but is still a weird ommission

Is the Nikon D7100 for me?

Well I suppose there should be some conclusions and photos next. There are some non wedding photographs below. Though stay tuned for some wedding images taken with it soon. For the money you get a lot of camera. The image quality isn’t quite the same as the D3s or the D600, but it’s only at the higher ISO’s you’ll notice any difference. Until ISO 1600/3200 you’ll likely see no difference at all. It has the same weather sealing as the D800 and D600, a better AF coverage and system than the d600. In fact I’d say this is a bargain camera that although doesn’t sit in the official professinal line (same as the d600 doesn’t) is more than up to the job of a working professional photographer be it for weddings, sports, events anything. There are a whole raft of accessories to bolt on that will help with wifi transfer, gps location or simple file browsing from your smartphone. All in all for under £1000 a bargain!
A real hidden gem.. the d600, and d7100 is a real professional kit on a budget. Brilliant stuff Nikon.

Example Nikon D7100 Images

Baby portrait shot with d7100

Karting action shot with nikon d7100

Karting action shot with nikon d7100 again

Karting action shot with nikon d7100 again winning

Other D7100 Reviews

Dpreview D7100 review
PhotographyBLOG Review
Popular Photo D7100 Review
Cameralabs D7100 review
DXOMark Sensor Review of D7100

I love the Nikon D7100 where should I buy it?

You can buy it from the awesome Castle Cameras.

OR

Amazon (I get cash if you buy from amazon)

Other D7100 Links

The official Nikon D7100 page is here.
There is a facebook Nikon D7100 Group here.
Flickr Groups for the D7100 can be found here and here.
And a new google+ community here.