Just ordered a used Sigma 56 /1.4

DrMaemo wrote:

Congrats!

Share your impressions of the lens after you receive it and get to know what you like and dislike (if any) about it.

I don't have this lens, but it is on my list to get next. I am preferring this 56mm f/1.4 lens over the 32mm because the 32mm focal length is not that much different from the 28mm lenses (one is an f/1.4) that I own. For me, the 56mm fills a gap.

Have fun capturing images of our world.

Yes, I too am interesting in hearing the first impressions of the Sigma 56mm f1.4 EF-M lens.

I've had one for about a year and it's a fantastic lens, very sharp and the images have a special quality to them due to the portrait focal length, great sharpness, and clean rendering.

I find I take it out much more than the Canon 32mm since the 32 is closer to the wides I usually take along like the tiny EF-M 22, and I just don't shoot that much around the 32mm focal length. Although the 32 is definitely my sharpest lens, the Sigma 56 is probably the closest in sharpness to the 32 among all the lenses I have.

I have owned over the years nearly a dozen vintage 50mm lenses, including some classics like the Minolta MC Rokkor-X 50mm f1.4, and many 50mm f1.7s, 1.8s and f2s. When I got the Sigma I had 7 nifty fifties and was doing a comparison among them.... the Sigma 56 blew them all away wide open, they didn't even catch up in sharpness until around f4 - f5.6. Within months of getting the Sigma I sold all but 2 of my vintage 50's, realizing I wouldn't use them again...

I kept the two 50's I had used the most, which had the best, sharpest image quality. Interestingly, a Minolta MD 50mm f2.0 lens from the 1980s is the sharpest of any vintage 50 I've owned, at f2 or wider aperture. The other lens I kept is a Yashica ML 50mm f1.7 which is nearly as sharp at f2.0 as the Minolta, but at f4 is as sharp as any other vintage 50 is at f5.6 or f8, and at f5.6 the Yashica is razor, near-Zeiss-sharp with great micro-contrast and lovely colors that are slightly warmer than modern glass.

I also have the Sigma 16mm f1.4 lens. Fantastic lens as well, but it is larger and heavier and so comes with me only at night when I know I'm going to need it and no other lens will do.

I will say about the Sigmas, that they are really nice aesthetically --- sleek looking, very ergonomic, with great build quality. Really fun to use.