Sigma 30mm f/1.4 for M43!

peppermonkey wrote:

Austrailshooter wrote:

Well I'm looking for a fast standard prime that doesn't have the issues of my Panasonic 20mm F/1.7 on an olympus body, if they bring out a 19mm F/1.4 I'd be sorely tempted given how attractively these lenses are normally priced.

Can't think of any other Olympus related problems with the 20mm.

BTW, has that been fixed for newer Oly's?

No, apart from high ISO banding, slow focus speeds are still issues on Olympus bodies. It's a good lens, it just tests your patience sometimes.

OrdinarilyInordinate wrote:

I don't get this thing with lenses that must be exactly 50mm effective FoV, etc. People get so obsessed about small differences in field of view between different primes. If that were the case, we'd never have zooms and we'd never have lenses that are not 17mm or 25mm on m43. Maybe a telephoto option and one wide prime. And better ban those pesky fish eye lenses, they are an abomination in the eyes of a proper self-respecting rectilinear photographer. So say you have a zoom (12-40mm f/2.8), would it mean you should always only photograph at 12mm, 17mm, or 25mm? Don't go to 30mm! It's danger zone! By the way, different lenses of the same focal length designation (or effective focal length) might still have noticeably different field of view because of software correction or other factors. Can be a few mm difference between nominal focal length and effective focal length based on the final field of view.

The problem isnt that the problem is 60mm is quite a narrow field of view. If it were my only lens and I was using it for normal shooting I'd feel claustrophobic.

Austrailshooter wrote:

The problem isnt that the problem is 60mm is quite a narrow field of view. If it were my only lens and I was using it for normal shooting I'd feel claustrophobic.

Who exactly, is forcing you to use just this one lens?

People are talking about this as if its a normal lens, I was just saying if this were my normal lens I'd feel very claustrophobic. It might just be my bias to pick up a normal lens where I just want to walk out the door with a lens that fits somewhere between 35 and 50 and feels comfortable to me. 60mm might be comfortable for some people I'd feel very claustrophobic.

We've all had that experience where we feel we're in a wrestling match with our camera lens, that's what it feels like to me at 60mm, like I can't back up far enough to get everything I want in the frame, it feels like "hey, back up a little here, I can't breath." I tend to see the world a little wider though so it might just be me.

Astrotripper wrote:

73x64mm and 265g. Pretty sure it's for APS-C. So on MFT, it should be very sharp corner to corner, with minimal to non-existent vignetting. Only slightly larger and heavier than PanaLeica 25/1.4. Not a bad proposition, if someone doesn't already have one of them standard primes.

Interestingly, it's a Contemporary, not Art. That would be a first prime in Sigma's contemporary line, right? Does that mark a start of a new line of lenses?

Yes, being offered in E mount too suggests it's an APS-C design, which has pros and cons. As you say, it will be using the sweetest part of the glass so optical performance should be excellent. But it also means it's a little bigger, heavier and uses more power than is strictly needed for m43.

I'm confused about the 'Contemporary' classification too.

When the new classifications were first announced, they were described as:

"The lens categories are Contemporary, Art and Sports,

• with the basic emphasis being compact and multifunctional for the Contemporary line;
• large-aperture, quality prime lenses for the Art line;
• and high-performance, durable telephoto and zoom lenses for the Sports line."

So the reading here could be that they are designating it being compact over being a large aperture quality prime. I hope that doesn't have implications for the quality and performance.

From the headline specs, it should be a very nice lens, and is priced as such, so i'm feeling positive that the quality will be there.

-Andy

Righto. I couldn't use a 25 mm as a "normal" lens either though. If I had to choose just 1, it would be either my 14 or 20 mm. Perhaps just a psychological thing, I don't really know. But anyway, I bought an interchangeable lens camera, so I don't see any issues with putting that interchangeable part of it to good use

No, but sometimes its refreshing just to walk out the door with the 20 1/.7 attached to your camera and to not have to think about things or worry about what lens you should be using for which shot. Given I already own the 12, 20 and 45, a 60mm F/1.4 would be far enough apart to be doable as a lens choice but I really hope Sigma has another go at their 19mm lens again I'd like a 19mm F/1.4

I can't understand why you're bothered by the size of the lens, and its not like its a full frame lens, it's an APS-C lens that has been adapted. It won't be that big.

OrdinarilyInordinate wrote:

Well, you don't have to be limited to just that lens though, do you? I mean people photograph with a 75mm f/1.8 lens too, and it's far narrower field of view. The very popular 45mm f/1.8 lens... Well, you see the trend.

I think what he's saying is that it's too narrow for "normal" and doesn't really fit. Same for me. It's not for me, I guess.

Since you also shoot 1.5 crop do you see any sense in 50-100 1.8 Art for APS-C, does not appeal to me. If you want 85 or 105 (eq) for porttrait why not just buy prime instead of $1000 zoom.

I see they remembered that manual focusing works better when the focus ring isn't smooth

Now how about some more focal lengths, Sigma?

enossified wrote:

I see they remembered that manual focusing works better when the focus ring isn't smooth

Now how about some more focal lengths, Sigma?

I'm afraid if they do produce more lenses for m4/3, they'll just be cobbled APS-C focal lengths, not lenses designed specifically for m4/3. That's the bad news. The good news is that we already have a pretty nice selection of lenses for m4/3, so no problem.