Sigma 340101 35mm F1.4 DG HSM Lens for Canon, Black

Product Information

Narrowing the aperture to f/2 improves overall score to 3,100 lines, with strong performance in the middle and edges of the frame (2,400 lines). There's further improvement at f/2.8 (3,226 lines), f/4 (3,809 lines), and f/5.6 (4,386 lines). Diffraction sets in at f/8 with the 5DS R sensor, cutting the resolution a bit, but still managing a superb 3,985-line score. It's more of an issue at f/11 (3,630 lines) and f/16 (2,966 lines). The Art designation is Sigma’s way of declaring this line of lenses as their high-end portrait lenses. (Sigma also offers Sport lenses designed for action and a contemporary line, which is their budget line). First Impressions And the speed of this lens is impressive. At f/1.4 you get loads of light in. I shot my weddings pretty much with available light only and the option to keep a reasonable shutter speed in dim churches was amazing. And for those who love a shallow depth of field, there is plenty to play with. The shot below is at f/2.2.

Above: Next up the Sony 35 1.4 G Master at f1.4 which is delivering similarly-sized blobs to the Sigma 35 1.4 which are also mostly bereft of textures within – note any dots on the Sony blobs are due to some dust on the lens, sorry. The Sony blobs also have less outlining which may have you preferring one result over the other, but both lenses here are rendering very attractive blurred areas – a good result for the Sigma given its cheaper price, although note the Sony can focus a bit closer, allowing it to deliver bigger blobs if you prefer.Again you stripped the exif data from the sample but if you were really at 1/30 that is way too slow. I mean way, way too slow. I would "guess" 1/1000 would be more where you should be. Give or take a stop or two. You need to select an aperture and ISO that lets you maintain that SS. Smaller the better, IE. f8+. Cat's eye effect is an issue, though, yielding football-shaped (or for non-Americans, rugby ball-shaped) bokeh, and not just in the corners but almost to the center of the frame at F1.4. I reviewed the new Tamron SP 35mm f/1.8 VC a few months and was very impressed by it. It has a somewhat smaller aperture value (f/1.8) but offers up a professional grade, weather sealed build quality, great optics, and adds an image stabilizer to the mix. It also retails for three hundred dollars less. The pictures below illustrate the angle of view on full frame and APS-C. On full frame the 35mm offers a moderate wideangle; on APS-C it behaves as a slightly long 'normal' lens. If you're an L-mount shooter, the Sigma 35mm F1.4 represents a very nice option for achieving a shallow depth-of-field and overall good image quality while staying on a reasonable budget. The Sigma 35mm F1.2 DG DN is also worthy of consideration, but you'll have to spend a lot more and work out your biceps for the benefits it can bring.

I’ve been shooting the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 Art lens for several months now and I’ve changed my tune. I love how this lens performs, its sharpness and contrast. And I love that I have a professional caliber 35mm lens for a fraction of what the name brand lens would cost. Why do you need a 35mm lens? The Tamron SP 35mm f/1.8 VC takes a different route. First, it has a somewhat smaller aperture (and thus a little less glass to move), but it adds a much bigger focus range with a good 180 degrees of focus throw (basically double that of the Sigma). The Tamron takes a perception hit in its overall focus speed (which is just a tiny bit slower), but the trade off is that you can both manually focus and autofocus with a bit more precision. This is even more pronounced in the 45mm VC vs. the Sigma 50mm f/1.4 ART. Which approach is better? The answer will probably change from photographer to photographer.Macro focusing is possible to a respectable minimum distance of 30 cm (11.8"), which is sufficient to provide a maximum magnification of 0.19x (1:5.4). Little changes at f/2.8, although now both lenses show the slight shape of their aperture blades at a 1:1 level to a similar degree. I calibrated both the Sigma and the Canon 35L II on the same day, and eventually settled on a -2 for the Sigma and a +2 for the Canon. I had a little more variability in hunting down the Sigma value, but was confident with the figure I produced. Throughout the period of my review I used the lenses in a variety of settings, from general purpose shooting to events (church, school, and family) along with some portraits. While impossible to encompass every type of shooting situation in a 4-5 week period, I feel that I used the lenses in enough of a variety of settings to be confident in my findings. The Sigma 35mm lens has 9 rounded diaphragm blades, so sunstars take some work to achieve. I have to stop down to f/16 and hit it just right to get one, and they aren’t as “wow” as I’d like. If you’re a landscape shooter who loves sunstars, this isn’t the lens you’d want. Distortion

When focused in the center of the frame, the Sigma 35mm F1.4 delivers great detail and even the corners are only very slightly softer wide open. There's a slight haze to the image, or loss of contrast, wide open, but stopping down just slightly to F2.8 is sufficient to get a beautifully sharp image across the whole frame. Peak sharpness is reached by F4. Above: Measuring 76x110mm and weighing 645g, Sigma’s mirrorless 35 1.4 is actually 16mm longer and 20g heavier than the previous DSLR version. That said, if you’re comparing the DSLR version with the built-in e-mount adapter, the new lens becomes 10mm shorter and 110g lighter.Determining a lens’ bokeh quality is somewhat challenging because bokeh is both a subjective measure (the Helios 44-2 “swirly” bokeh is either wonderful or terrible depending on your perspective) and it is also notoriously difficult to demonstrate in a controlled test. Since its introduction there has been some debate about the bokeh quality from the Sigma. I myself have referred to it as being somewhat “clinical”, and feel that the lens tipped the scales more towards sharpness than overall drawing. The reality is that while the lens is perhaps not exceptional in this regard, it is in no way objectionable either. I’ve been using the lens side by side with the Canon 35L II over the past five weeks, and while I instinctively prefer the “look” of the images from the 35L II, the reality is that the differences are subtle at most. Above: Sigma describes the design as dust and splashproof, including a rubber grommet on the mount. You’d expect weather-sealing on a high-end lens, but remember the original DSLR version of the lens was not sealed so this is an important upgrade. Photographers everywhere rave about their Sigma Art lenses. But is the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 Art lens worth the hype?