Next Lens for a6000 - Currently have kit 16-50 & Sigma 30mm.... 55-210 next best?

Coming from the NEX-3N I just purchased the Sigma 30mm last week and today just picked up my a6000. I'm fairly new to all of this having only snapped casually for 1.5years with the 3N and the kit lens. For me, the sigma 30mm was a no brainer as I mainly snap indoor pics of friends/family and was seeking the best bang for the buck. For my 3rd lens I need to be able to sit across the room or across the yard or deck and capture a good picture of someone's facial expressions as the Sigma 30mm isn't quite long enough and the 16-50mm kit lens is, well, the kit lens so it needs to be phased out hah.

I've never had a long zoom on a camera so I have no idea if I'd use it a ton but I originally thought this was another "no brainer" situation where I should buy the Sony 55-210 as my 3rd lens after the Sigma 30mm but I'm very hesitant due to the the limitations of it's f4.5 max and it's low sharpness rating from dxomark.com. I'm really not that picky about my photos, I want something I can blow up to 8x10 if I have a great image but am uncertain if the 55-210 can give me consistently good results, especially indoors and with my soon to be walking infant child. I have no idea if I'd be able to personally tell the difference between my Sigma 30mm and 55-210 image quality when viewing the jpeg's on my ipad but I know I'd be very frustrated if there was a lot of blur from indoor medium light shooting but also frustrated if I can't quickly lock in the auto-focus to snap a shot.

The other 2 options I've thought about are the Sony 50mm and Sigma 60mm. The sony 50mm has the OSS, phase detection and f1.8 so those are huge benefits but 50mm doesn't exactly help me much I don't think, especially long term if I want to use this at my childs first swing ride or first soccer game. The Sigma 60mm gives me a little more length and f2.8 but does lack the OSS. I've also been under the impression there is no phase detection for that lens as well so that doesn't help with a fast moving child. In the end I need to find something new or used in the $200 range so these are the 3 lens choices with the 55-210 currently being my #1 choice but with many hesitations. Please convince me the 55-210 will suffice! haha joking, but not.

I've used the 55-210 in an indoor swimming pool. Mostly @210 mm for video, but photos are also okay. Didn't try 8 x 10 inch prints.

For the price paid as part of a combo kit ($150$) the 55-210 is quite a bargain and easy to like. It's okay except at either extreme end of its focal lengths. I've only had occasion to use it at sporting events and parades. And I got some decent shot. Some of the super zoom bridge cameras might be better if you shoot a lot at those focal lengths. But it sounds like you're more interested in shooting a fast moving kid. So I'm going lean towards no on the zoom.

Gundamit said:

For the price paid as part of a combo kit ($150$) the 55-210 is quite a bargain and easy to like. It's okay except at either extreme end of its focal lengths. I've only had occasion to use it at sporting events and parades. And I got some decent shot. Some of the super zoom bridge cameras might be better if you shoot a lot at those focal lengths. But it sounds like you're more interested in shooting a fast moving kid. So I'm going lean towards no on the zoom.

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I think I like the idea of being able to zoom in across the room and snap a picture of someone's face and shoulders instead of their whole torso and body which is what is making me lean towards the zoom. The moving child is just something I'd like to take in to consideration to avoid a lens that has a slow AF or inconsistent focusing in general. The added benefit of either of the Sony lenses as opposed to the Sigma 60mm would be taking advantage of the phase detection and OSS.

I guess I should strictly shoot at 50mm or 60mm (digital zoom) on my current 16-50mm zoom to see if that's enough zoom but since I'm somewhat confined to indoor shooting right now (I avoid outdoor shooting with Chicago's nasty winter weather) it's hard to tell how well it will work for me shooting family events outside. Having just shot with my in-laws Nikon, with a healthy zoom up to 135 or 145mm and a I believe a 1.5 crop factor, I have been let wanting more zoom, or so I think. I just don't want to throw away $200 if the lens is going to be more of a nuisance than a benefit.

I had the long zoom for a couple of years but was ultimately disappointed with the low light performance and switched to the 18-105. An awesome lens if you can afford it (some good deals at the moment). After experiencing the fast AF with Sony lenses I sold my Sigma 30mm and will be going for a Sony prime for portraits.

Appreciate cost is a factor here but this has taken me 3 years to get here.

SpamJavelin said:

I had the long zoom for a couple of years but was ultimately disappointed with the low light performance and switched to the 18-105. An awesome lens if you can afford it (some good deals at the moment). After experiencing the fast AF with Sony lenses I sold my Sigma 30mm and will be going for a Sony prime for portraits.

Appreciate cost is a factor here but this has taken me 3 years to get here.

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I was afraid of what you just mentioned, the low light performance would be disappointing / similar to the 16-50mm kit lens, which is the very reason I bought the Sigma 30mm. With the exception of the not so great low-light performance would a casual shooter be happy with the autofocus speed and overall value or is the outdoor performance still lacking and leaving people wanting more?

Again, for this lens I'm not overly concerned about the perfect IQ, more so just decent enough sharpness to warrant an 8x10. I will probably delay my 3rd lens purchase until I gain more experience with the a6000 and how it works in conjunction with the 2 lenses I currently have. I just can't fathom spending more for the lens than I did for the camera (just bought an opens box a6000 with the 16-50 lens from Best Buy for $323) so although the 18-105 would be the perfect addition I highly doubt I can find that used for nearly the same price as the 55-210.

Mcb345 said:

Again, for this lens I'm not overly concerned about the perfect IQ, more so just decent enough sharpness to warrant an 8x10. I will probably delay my 3rd lens purchase until I gain more experience with the a6000 and how it works in conjunction with the 2 lenses I currently have. I just can't fathom spending more for the lens than I did for the camera (just bought an opens box a6000 with the 16-50 lens from Best Buy for $323) so although the 18-105 would be the perfect addition I highly doubt I can find that used for nearly the same price as the 55-210.

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So, they're giving away the a6000 in your neck of the woods? Lucky you.

The Nikon gear that you tried was probably a 18-140mm on a DX body such as a D5500 or D7200, which has the same crop factor as the a6000. Although I have seen some good shots posted from the Sony 55-210mm, I don't think that it is in the same class as the Nikon zoom.

I would consider the Sony 50mm f/1.8 OSS as your "next" lens. It's a convenient focal length for when the Sigma 30mm isn't quite enough, and you can always crop the images for that "special" shot. I suggest that you test the 50mm focal length with you kit lens to get a feel for the framing possibilities.

Speaking of "framing", are you aware of the a6000 feature known as "Auto Object Framing"? This will intelligently crop the image in-camera and save a second version for you. Definitely worth a try.

See the example in this post, and follow the rest of the thread...

http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/56988623

-

Just for interest, this is a PP crop from the Sony 50mm...




Low resolution version of original shot across the garden.

The 55-210 works well for candid portraits, if that is what you are looking for. I use it during school activities to get candid photos of my students. If we are outside, I often get a nice bokeh and separation. It is a little trickier inside just because I am more limited in where I can stand to compose my shot. Classrooms are not big places. Still, I have some great keepers. I wish I could share a few. The students enjoy seeing them when I teach our photography unit. In particular, I shot many photos at a walk-a-thon we sponsored at our school. Kids walked a track while I wandered, setting up from a vantage point that allowed me good lighting. Many beautiful photos of my students.

That being said, I don't pixel peep. I have printed some of my photos at 8 x 10 and was pleased with the results in terms of sharpness and bokeh. At 24 MP, and slightly smaller after cropping for 4:5 ratio, there's still plenty of pixels there to print a nice 8x10.

I wanted to hate on the kit lenses when I bought my a6000, too, but as I've shot with the 55-210, I've found that it's quite decent for the price.

The Sigma 60 and Sony 50 are both supposed to be gems, but at longer distances from your subject, you'd have to crop quite a bit to get the composition you're looking for.
--
Mary

*kids always in tow*

BCshutterbug said:

The 55-210 works well for candid portraits, if that is what you are looking for. I use it during school activities to get candid photos of my students. If we are outside, I often get a nice bokeh and separation. It is a little trickier inside just because I am more limited in where I can stand to compose my shot. Classrooms are not big places. Still, I have some great keepers. I wish I could share a few. The students enjoy seeing them when I teach our photography unit. In particular, I shot many photos at a walk-a-thon we sponsored at our school. Kids walked a track while I wandered, setting up from a vantage point that allowed me good lighting. Many beautiful photos of my students.

That being said, I don't pixel peep. I have printed some of my photos at 8 x 10 and was pleased with the results in terms of sharpness and bokeh. At 24 MP, and slightly smaller after cropping for 4:5 ratio, there's still plenty of pixels there to print a nice 8x10.

I wanted to hate on the kit lenses when I bought my a6000, too, but as I've shot with the 55-210, I've found that it's quite decent for the price.

The Sigma 60 and Sony 50 are both supposed to be gems, but at longer distances from your subject, you'd have to crop quite a bit to get the composition you're looking for.
--
Mary

*kids always in tow*
https://www.flickr.com/photos/131584018@N07/

Click to expand...

I believe I am looking for the "candid portrait" you are speaking of. After taking a few test shots last night with the a6000 16-50 kit lens at both 50mm and zoomed in to 60mm (with ditigal zoom) I feel both likely wouldn't have quite enough zoom, especially when I'm trying to frame a tiny baby's body or adult's face in to a good portion of the frame from 10-15 feet away, which I believe is what I'm trying to achieve with the next lens. I feel I can just use the Sigma 30mm and crop half the image to zoom in and still achieve good IQ results (maybe not 8x10 but 5x7 I'm sure).

Question, if I'm trying to get a feel for what the Sony 18-105 lens zoom capabilities would be, is it safe to say going to 2x digital zoom with the 16-50mm lens gives me roughly a 100mm zoom or is there some hidden math going on there that I'm unaware of?

I'm just trying to see if the 105mm zoom would be sufficient. I'm sure I could live with that considering it's twice the zoom I currently have with much better optics but buying the slightly slower/lesser quality 55-210mm has it's advantages of saving a few hundred $$ and having 2x the zoom of the 18-105.

Also, since I'm not so well versed with shutter speeds vs motion blur quite yet, shooting the 55-210mm about halfway through it's zoom range (I'd assume I'd be forced to shoot somewhere in the mid f/5 range give or take) would this give me some pretty slow or unusable shots of semi-static people indoors under "medium/normal" lighting with no flash? I'm pretty sure shooting a moving child would be nearly impossible unless at it's most wide open 55m zoom but would the lens around 100-150mm give me some terrible results?

Thank you all for your opinions and help here by the way!

Mcb345 said:

BCshutterbug said:

The 55-210 works well for candid portraits, if that is what you are looking for. I use it during school activities to get candid photos of my students. If we are outside, I often get a nice bokeh and separation. It is a little trickier inside just because I am more limited in where I can stand to compose my shot. Classrooms are not big places. Still, I have some great keepers. I wish I could share a few. The students enjoy seeing them when I teach our photography unit. In particular, I shot many photos at a walk-a-thon we sponsored at our school. Kids walked a track while I wandered, setting up from a vantage point that allowed me good lighting. Many beautiful photos of my students.

That being said, I don't pixel peep. I have printed some of my photos at 8 x 10 and was pleased with the results in terms of sharpness and bokeh. At 24 MP, and slightly smaller after cropping for 4:5 ratio, there's still plenty of pixels there to print a nice 8x10.

I wanted to hate on the kit lenses when I bought my a6000, too, but as I've shot with the 55-210, I've found that it's quite decent for the price.

The Sigma 60 and Sony 50 are both supposed to be gems, but at longer distances from your subject, you'd have to crop quite a bit to get the composition you're looking for.
--
Mary

*kids always in tow*
https://www.flickr.com/photos/131584018@N07/

Click to expand...

I believe I am looking for the "candid portrait" you are speaking of. After taking a few test shots last night with the a6000 16-50 kit lens at both 50mm and zoomed in to 60mm (with ditigal zoom) I feel both likely wouldn't have quite enough zoom, especially when I'm trying to frame a tiny baby's body or adult's face in to a good portion of the frame from 10-15 feet away, which I believe is what I'm trying to achieve with the next lens. I feel I can just use the Sigma 30mm and crop half the image to zoom in and still achieve good IQ results (maybe not 8x10 but 5x7 I'm sure).

Question, if I'm trying to get a feel for what the Sony 18-105 lens zoom capabilities would be, is it safe to say going to 2x digital zoom with the 16-50mm lens gives me roughly a 100mm zoom or is there some hidden math going on there that I'm unaware of?

Click to expand...

I'd have to check my camera on that one, but I'm 90% sure the answer is yes, it should be a 100mm zoom.

Mcb345 said:

I'm just trying to see if the 105mm zoom would be sufficient. I'm sure I could live with that considering it's twice the zoom I currently have with much better optics but buying the slightly slower/lesser quality 55-210mm has it's advantages of saving a few hundred $$ and having 2x the zoom of the 18-105.

Click to expand...

The 55-210 has some advantages, but they revolve around being the cheapest Tele Zoom for the system. I prefer my 18-105 for most shooting, to the point I'd rather crop in post unless it's something I'd be past ~225 equiv (~150 on the SEL55210). More of my shots are in a closer range, and while it's not MUCH brighter than the 55-210 on the short end, it is appreciable on the longer end. Also, the bokeh at just about every FL is pleasant to me, same for the color rendition.

Nowadays, the 55-210 is mostly used when I feel like doing some long-end photography; I keep a teleconverter on it at all times so I can get more reach when desired.

If you're building out a 'full kit', the 55-210 isn't a bad choice by any measure. But if most of your shooting is in the sub-100mm range, you may want to consider other options (like the 18105 or the 1670Z, which gets an honorable mention here since Hasselblad variants are selling for 700$ right now, putting it from way overpriced to reasonably overpriced.)

That said, while I haven't payed close attention to the newest firmware, I found that shooting with the 18-105 on the a6000 benefited greatly from shooting RAW and correcting in Post, rather than letting the camera do so for photos; the distortion difference between In-Camera correction and out-of-camera correction at some focal lengths is noticable at full-size viewing. Doesn't change my assessment of the lens one bit.

Mcb345 said:

Also, since I'm not so well versed with shutter speeds vs motion blur quite yet, shooting the 55-210mm about halfway through it's zoom range (I'd assume I'd be forced to shoot somewhere in the mid f/5 range give or take) would this give me some pretty slow or unusable shots of semi-static people indoors under "medium/normal" lighting with no flash? I'm pretty sure shooting a moving child would be nearly impossible unless at it's most wide open 55m zoom but would the lens around 100-150mm give me some terrible results?

Click to expand...

Depends on the sort of indoors; If you're talking plays/school events, you'd probably be OK. If you're talking indoor sports, I'd not be as optimistic. If you're talking household, I'm not sure what you'd be shooting at those focal lengths, unless your house is big enough you could afford to just buy both lenses.

Mcb345 said:

Thank you all for your opinions and help here by the way!

Click to expand...

I'll try to find some samples from both lenses to toss on here.

TO11MTM said:

The 55-210 has some advantages, but they revolve around being the cheapest Tele Zoom for the system. I prefer my 18-105 for most shooting, to the point I'd rather crop in post unless it's something I'd be past ~225 equiv (~150 on the SEL55210). More of my shots are in a closer range, and while it's not MUCH brighter than the 55-210 on the short end, it is appreciable on the longer end. Also, the bokeh at just about every FL is pleasant to me, same for the color rendition.

Nowadays, the 55-210 is mostly used when I feel like doing some long-end photography; I keep a teleconverter on it at all times so I can get more reach when desired.

Click to expand...

How do you find the bokeh on the 55-210? I'd assume I'd be shooting anywhere from 55mm to 100, 150mm with it most of the time.

TO11MTM said:

If you're building out a 'full kit', the 55-210 isn't a bad choice by any measure. But if most of your shooting is in the sub-100mm range, you may want to consider other options (like the 18105 or the 1670Z, which gets an honorable mention here since Hasselblad variants are selling for 700$ right now, putting it from way overpriced to reasonably overpriced.)

Click to expand...

I am aiming for that "full kit" but I haven't really figured out what my needs are but likely won't know what my needs are until I've already bought one of the zooms lenses and used it for a while. I know 70mm wouldn't quite be enough for what I would want long term and I'd prefer not to spend anymore money on lenses after this one. I guess the benefit of the 55-210 is I can comfortably afford that now and it gives me the long zoom, plus, my wife might kill me if I bought the 18-105, even used, since it will be well over $400.

TO11MTM said:

That said, while I haven't payed close attention to the newest firmware, I found that shooting with the 18-105 on the a6000 benefited greatly from shooting RAW and correcting in Post, rather than letting the camera do so for photos; the distortion difference between In-Camera correction and out-of-camera correction at some focal lengths is noticable at full-size viewing. Doesn't change my assessment of the lens one bit.

Click to expand...

TO11MTM said:

TO11MTM said:

Also, since I'm not so well versed with shutter speeds vs motion blur quite yet, shooting the 55-210mm about halfway through it's zoom range (I'd assume I'd be forced to shoot somewhere in the mid f/5 range give or take) would this give me some pretty slow or unusable shots of semi-static people indoors under "medium/normal" lighting with no flash? I'm pretty sure shooting a moving child would be nearly impossible unless at it's most wide open 55m zoom but would the lens around 100-150mm give me some terrible results?

Click to expand...

Depends on the sort of indoors; If you're talking plays/school events, you'd probably be OK. If you're talking indoor sports, I'd not be as optimistic. If you're talking household, I'm not sure what you'd be shooting at those focal lengths, unless your house is big enough you could afford to just buy both lenses.

Click to expand...

I wouldnt be shooting indoors sports but just your typical infant/toddler doing whatever it is they like to do hah. I'd imagine most of my use for this zoom though would be when they're sitting down reading a book or being held by someone or something of that nature. As for outdoor shots, playgrounds, scenery, city shots, long distance portrait, basically anything I can shoot. I know for fast moving shots of kids I'll have to throw on my Sigma 30mm but I just don't want to buy the 55-210 if it's going to be so slow at 100mm that even moving your arm to itch your nose or something of that nature results in a huge blur.

TO11MTM said:

TO11MTM said:

Thank you all for your opinions and help here by the way!

Click to expand...

I'll try to find some samples from both lenses to toss on here.

Click to expand...

Would love to see examples of the 55-210 without the teleconverter and perhaps with your shutter speed/f stop listed on there?? Would be a HUGE HUGE help.

Mcb345 said:

Mcb345 said:

The 55-210 has some advantages, but they revolve around being the cheapest Tele Zoom for the system. I prefer my 18-105 for most shooting, to the point I'd rather crop in post unless it's something I'd be past ~225 equiv (~150 on the SEL55210). More of my shots are in a closer range, and while it's not MUCH brighter than the 55-210 on the short end, it is appreciable on the longer end. Also, the bokeh at just about every FL is pleasant to me, same for the color rendition.

Nowadays, the 55-210 is mostly used when I feel like doing some long-end photography; I keep a teleconverter on it at all times so I can get more reach when desired.

Click to expand...

How do you find the bokeh on the 55-210? I'd assume I'd be shooting anywhere from 55mm to 100, 150mm with it most of the time.

Mcb345 said:

If you're building out a 'full kit', the 55-210 isn't a bad choice by any measure. But if most of your shooting is in the sub-100mm range, you may want to consider other options (like the 18105 or the 1670Z, which gets an honorable mention here since Hasselblad variants are selling for 700$ right now, putting it from way overpriced to reasonably overpriced.)

Click to expand...

I am aiming for that "full kit" but I haven't really figured out what my needs are but likely won't know what my needs are until I've already bought one of the zooms lenses and used it for a while. I know 70mm wouldn't quite be enough for what I would want long term and I'd prefer not to spend anymore money on lenses after this one. I guess the benefit of the 55-210 is I can comfortably afford that now and it gives me the long zoom, plus, my wife might kill me if I bought the 18-105, even used, since it will be well over $400.

Mcb345 said:

That said, while I haven't payed close attention to the newest firmware, I found that shooting with the 18-105 on the a6000 benefited greatly from shooting RAW and correcting in Post, rather than letting the camera do so for photos; the distortion difference between In-Camera correction and out-of-camera correction at some focal lengths is noticable at full-size viewing. Doesn't change my assessment of the lens one bit.

Mcb345 said:

Also, since I'm not so well versed with shutter speeds vs motion blur quite yet, shooting the 55-210mm about halfway through it's zoom range (I'd assume I'd be forced to shoot somewhere in the mid f/5 range give or take) would this give me some pretty slow or unusable shots of semi-static people indoors under "medium/normal" lighting with no flash? I'm pretty sure shooting a moving child would be nearly impossible unless at it's most wide open 55m zoom but would the lens around 100-150mm give me some terrible results?

Click to expand...

Depends on the sort of indoors; If you're talking plays/school events, you'd probably be OK. If you're talking indoor sports, I'd not be as optimistic. If you're talking household, I'm not sure what you'd be shooting at those focal lengths, unless your house is big enough you could afford to just buy both lenses.

Click to expand...

I wouldnt be shooting indoors sports but just your typical infant/toddler doing whatever it is they like to do hah. I'd imagine most of my use for this zoom though would be when they're sitting down reading a book or being held by someone or something of that nature. As for outdoor shots, playgrounds, scenery, city shots, long distance portrait, basically anything I can shoot. I know for fast moving shots of kids I'll have to throw on my Sigma 30mm but I just don't want to buy the 55-210 if it's going to be so slow at 100mm that even moving your arm to itch your nose or something of that nature results in a huge blur.

Mcb345 said:

Mcb345 said:

Thank you all for your opinions and help here by the way!

Click to expand...

I'll try to find some samples from both lenses to toss on here.

Click to expand...

Would love to see examples of the 55-210 without the teleconverter and perhaps with your shutter speed/f stop listed on there?? Would be a HUGE HUGE help.

Click to expand...

Not the best -Example Shot-, but these are decent comparison shots.

These are AFTER PP, but only with the following corrections enabled in DXO:

-RAW White Balance

-Noise Reduction - RAW

-Vignetting

-DXO Lens Softness

-Chromatic Abberation

-Crop

-Distortion









Note: The 55-210 pictures look a bit smudgier and it's possible my focus was off, but on the other hand I've never liked the output of my copy outside of the long range.

Thanks for the examples. Were all of these images cropped significantly? The reason I ask is because like you mentioned, the 55-210 images seemed pretty blurry. I would definitely hope the focus was off a bit or that these crops weren't in the center of your original image before cropping. The 18-105 both look pretty sharp, you can actually see the detail on the ribbon that you can't see with the 55-210.

Basically, if I buy the 55-210 I should make sure I can return it after doing some indoor shooting is what I'm gathering from these images if they were in fact in focus...

Hi mate I will add a few samples from the 55/210 for you. Not taken inside but will give you an idea of the results possible.













For the money it's a easy buy. I have not used it inside for portratits so that might be a tougher test, as it is for most slow Telezooms. However outdoors in sunny Oz it's a good performer.

I have built my kit up slowly over the years to include all the lens that you are looking at. The 18/105 the newest addition is very nice but not a lot of images yet. It looks to be sharper as expected and 105 is enough reach for portratits, when you are indoors.

I tend to use the 50 f1.8 if talking planed portraits, but my subjects are older than yours and are well use to dad moving around to frame the image. It is a solid performer and it was saw a lot of use at my brother and sister in laws wedding I photographed recently. They were very pleased with the results. A few 50 f1.8 images in low light.

I









if I get some time over the next few days I will try the 55/210 indoors for you. I use an NEX 6 so the focus speed might not be as quick as your 6.

Regards.

Stephen.

Mcb345 said:

Question, if I'm trying to get a feel for what the Sony 18-105 lens zoom capabilities would be, is it safe to say going to 2x digital zoom with the 16-50mm lens gives me roughly a 100mm zoom or is there some hidden math going on there that I'm unaware of?

Click to expand...

If you choose the "Clear Image" option, that will restrict the zoom to a maximum of 2x, and I've found that it's accurate. BTW, CI will still give you an interpolated 6000x4000 image; you might find that confusing if you are expecting "cropped" dimensions.

I've found that even with CI, zooming is a waste of effort in general use, but it will give you an good indication for your test purposes.

Mcb345 said:

Thanks for the examples. Were all of these images cropped significantly? The reason I ask is because like you mentioned, the 55-210 images seemed pretty blurry. I would definitely hope the focus was off a bit or that these crops weren't in the center of your original image before cropping. The 18-105 both look pretty sharp, you can actually see the detail on the ribbon that you can't see with the 55-210.

Basically, if I buy the 55-210 I should make sure I can return it after doing some indoor shooting is what I'm gathering from these images if they were in fact in focus...

Click to expand...

Those were 100%, no crop. The item in question is a gift-card holder (about the size of two credit cards, one on top of the other.) It was sitting pretty, plus the finish/texture of the box seems to be a nice thing for pixel-peepers to look at.



That said, I gave it another go since I don't think the 55-210 should look THAT off.

Same for these; 100%, same PP settings.











Better...ish? Not that much tho.



I think a lot of it is lighting and a presence/lack thereof. I've had pretty good luck with the thing and a TC... But at the same time there's always plenty of light for that shooting.




There was actually a 1.7x teleconverter involved here; call it ~305mm

As you can see, even with a teleconverter it performs well under good lighting conditions.

So... I think a lot of it boils down to how much light you have available to play with in your shooting scenarios.

Some really nice looking photos from the 55-210 outdoors! Those pictures pretty much sealed the deal for me and I've placed an order for the lens. As for the indoor photos I've now

I did snap a few images with my 30mm sigma lens indoors using the 2x Clear Image zoom that was discussed and liked how they turned out so that definitely will help going forward trying to capture better indoor portraits from across the room (assuming the 55-210 will leave me with some not so great results indoors). I've typically left all clear image and digital zooming off with my 16-50mm kit lens but now that I know the Clear Image lends pretty decent results I'll give it a whirl going forward if I need a little more zoom with my Sigma. I now have a Sigma 30-60mm f/2.8!