Sigma 14mm F1.8 DG HSM Art pre-production sample gallery

All you rocket rangers going nuts over this lens for near field astrophotography need to cool your jets and wait until test shots come in re coma, which seems to be the major bugaboo for these lenses and this kind of photography.

Mar 9, 2017permalink

soundknight21

Basically a tasteful dowse of fish eye, don't know if it would work but could be good for close up lowlight portraits of rock bands screaming into mics and making rock poses.

Mar 9, 2017permalink

Jeremy Park

looks like a lot of messy lines if you need anything straight... otherwise looks like fun

Mar 9, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

That's called perspective

Mar 10, 2017permalink

DPPMetro

We're in yet another year of unfulfilled wideangle offerings for Pentax, along with Sigma support essentially ending for the K-mount, so it's time to jump ship and transition over to Nikon.

And for a savings, to boot. This will be one of my first two lenses.

Mar 9, 2017permalink

Marksphoto

all I gotta say is wow. Gotta try this lens on my Elan when I buy this.

Mar 7, 2017permalink

Suntan

With a vacation to Joshua Tree NP for star gazing coming this summer, this lens is appealing. That said, I've already got the Samyang 14 2.8. So this lens can't be justified.

Mar 6, 2017permalink

CardBoardBoxProcessor

Except double of speed and likely more sharp. Thoguh their XP 14 is impressively sharp.

Mar 31, 2017permalink

Suntan

I didn't say it wouldn't be better. I said it couldn't be justified.

Apr 3, 2017permalink

safford1977

You're wise to stick with what you have until the results come in. Even if they are better hard to justify since chroma, distortion, and vignette can all be adjusted with a little time and effort. I was waiting for the pricing but was anxious because of the 100% more light at f/1.8. When pricing was announced I said forget it and went with the Rokinon 14mm f/2.4 which almost no one talks about but scores very well for IQ, chroma, distortion and while it has some heavy vignette it is correctable. f2.4 is ~40% more light... I got one used on B&H. :)

Jun 27, 2017permalink

mermaidkiller

The ultimate starry sky timelapse lens ?
Would be very nice as it captures more than twice the light of the Samyang 14mm f/2.8.

Mar 6, 2017permalink

Caleido

Sigma did it again. Extreme aperture, extreme fov and still offering good to excellent corner sharpness - even full open. Complaining about distortion is childish. You can fix most distortion, but you can't fix soft corners or bad CA.

The fact most critics are complaining about the distortion, just shows how good the lens actually is.

Mar 5, 2017permalink

svliegen

Yes, you can fix distortion, but then you loose sharpness. I've used a sigma 10-20mm zoom. Zoom range is great for urban work, but there was always a lot of postprocessing to get reasonably sharp and undistorted results. I sold it.

Mar 5, 2017permalink

Caleido

But distortion is nowhere like the 10-20mm. It's not even significant or unsuspectingly bad for this type of extreme lens. Corner softness is 100x worse than the barely noticeable effects on sharpness by distortion correction. People correct perspective all the time. Are all those pictures soft? No.

So... no.

Mar 5, 2017permalink

Irakly Shanidze

With a 24mp file you don't lose sharpness if you fix distortion in a raw file. This lens is sharp, and you will be hard-pressed to see any loss of sharpness after correction, which is in this instance does not seem to need to be very significant.
That being said, unintentionally soft lenses are largely thing of the past with most manufacturers. Sharpness is not the only thing to look for when you judge image quality. This lens is very impressive in many ways, except it flares (images 18, 24), cannot hold highlights (image 37), generally prone to lose contrast and has an unpleasant looking bokeh.

Mar 6, 2017permalink

Caleido

Wait what? How can a lens "not hold highlights"?
What's a lens got to do with the tone curve rendering highlights? That image is a shot with the sun almost coming into the frame. Wide open at F1.8. You'd expect to see some harsh highlights at those settings during daytime. Even at smaller apertures.

Also, I see no problematic flare at image 18 nor 24.

Mar 26, 2017permalink

jforkner

Since this lens is being targeted toward astrophotography, why no night sky images?

Mar 4, 2017permalink

Barney Britton

Because we had barely more than a day to shoot with it, in a large Japanese city :)

Mar 6, 2017permalink

d810only

My 10 y old 14-24mm takes better pictures!

Mar 4, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

That's because you are using the D810, wait to see how this lens performs on the D810.

Mar 10, 2017permalink

pierre1

The older discontinued ( approx. 6 yrs ago ) Sigma 14mm f/2.8 EX Asph HSM lens was a pretty decent performer. ( $4 to 500 on craigslist)
https://www.flickr.com/photos/8450532@N04/30355903976/in/dateposted-public/

Mar 4, 2017*permalink

SMCTakumar

Very nice pic. This new 14/1.8 looks pretty good too, except for those geometric distortions which people seem to indicate can be corrected.

Mar 6, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

As long as the straight lines are straight it's perspective, this lens has very little distortion, I only see some in the corners and can be seen where people are as they look a bit stretched/wider. There will never be a lens like the human eye.

Mar 10, 2017permalink

mferencz

Distortion is controlled I guess, but photos look odd to me. I can't think of a reason I'd want this lens.

Mar 3, 2017permalink

thx1138

The choice of location, of which dpreview of course had no control really, is not one I'd in general choose for a lens of this width and doesn't really do the lens justice IMO. I'd be using it for grand landscapes, astrophotography (pending reviews) or tight interior shots. For walk about in a city I hate anything much wider than 28mm 90% of the time

Mar 27, 2017permalink

JonathanFV

I think those samples look good. Sharpness seems good, distortion minimal (seriously, it's really wide, there's some barrel distortion, but it seems very acceptable and easy to fix), CA isn't a big problem (I can see it zoomed in, but man, it looks like it's maybe 5px wide, and that's on a 50MP sensor)...

I don't think I can afford to buy it right now, and my Tamton 15-30 does an excellent job. But if I had the money, I'd get it. I'd just wait to see how stars look first.

But 14mm f/1.8 is an extreme design. It performs really really well.

Mar 3, 2017permalink

bfmcosta

Strange, the special aspect of this lens is really the combination of super-wide 14mm with super bright f/1.8 aperture, and more than 90% of the sample photos were taken at "quite ordinary" apertures higher than f/2.8...

Mar 2, 2017permalink

safford1977

Maybe because there was too much ambient light to open up? Really wish there had been a way to simulate a star in a dark room some where and maybe a portrait of a bar tender at f/1.8 - I mean the only reason to spend $1300 IMO is because this lens is fast and then maybe because it's sharper than the $300 option which is available used for even less.

Jun 27, 2017permalink

There seems to be quite a few new high quality, large aperture, wide angle lenses coming onto the market. Here is another with a couple of pictures.
https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/59208794

Mar 2, 2017permalink

safford1977

Haha, good one. I can't wait to see B&H suggest a hand cart as an accessory. ;)

Jun 27, 2017permalink

guywithyashica

Distortion not really apparent. Some resolution loss in the corners but not too bad considering, even at f1.8 (image 4, follow the screw holes left and right across the frame). Images should not be PP prior to posting as there is no way to know what the out-of-camera image is and we don't all use the same pp. I think DXO would help out the corners a bit but overall, really nice. I would like to see this compared to some of the better w/a zooms as most of us would go for those for cost-convenience
P.S. I have 4 Sigma lenses and 4 non-sigma so no preferential treatment fro me.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Searching

I know its a 14 but distortion seems high.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Khauen

Very high! Sigma 12-24mm F4 DG HSM Art are amazing at that part, also on the others, like vignetting, flare, ect.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

It's Perspective NOT distortion, you need to understand how lenses work before making comments on a very good lens. Read the post below with 35 likes, this may help.

Mar 10, 2017permalink

Khauen

@MacksCameraEye

Perspective? Hehe. So my 0.2% distortion are perspective. That is ALT of distortion, download the image and look for yourself. The image are like the earth, round 😂😂 much have you been paid for these ignorant comments?

You should do some research then, and test it yourself before calling it "perspective" and not distortion 😊 try Lr and see.

Mar 10, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

@ Khauen. Still that is not distortion it’s called wide angle. Distortion is measured by Barrel distortion & Pincushion distortion and not by if you tilt the lens down and you get curved horizon, it’s measured straight on. Look at Carl Zeiss ZF Distagon T 15mm f/2.8 $2990 Lens, DxO has it measured at 0.5%. My Sigma 12-24mm f/4 is 0.3% and 0.0 is no distortion. Here is link on how this is measured. There isn't a UWA lens that doesn't bend the horzion when tilted up or down.
https://www.dxomark.com/About/In-depth-measurements/Measurements/Distortion

Mar 13, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

@Khauen
Before you call people "ignorant" maybe you should do your research and read this entire posts below. Also here is a quote from Sigma: "The 14mm F1.8 Art features the largest glass mold (80mm) in the industry, offering photographers an ultra-wide prime with virtually NO distortion, flare or ghosting." Maybe you think they are wrong also.

Mar 13, 2017*permalink

Kevin DiOssi

Very underwhelming performance in regards to fringe and cloudy corners by rendering details with ghosting.

Also, for all you "Anti Aliasing Filters aren't necessary" you couldn't be more wrong. Several of these shots are just ruined by aliasing. look at those patterns in the grate in Image 10. I would be very mad if I came home with images like that!!

Mar 1, 2017*permalink

Kevin DiOssi

LMAO, you're welcome to google me. But if you're unable to see the patterns in the drainage grate in image 10, then I think it's safe to say you don't know what you're looking for...or maybe you're not looking at the image in its full resolution. My observation on the image has nothing to do with the lens. I actually own the Art 50mm and the 85mm and will be buying the 135mm, so I'm a very big fan of Sigma, but this lens appears to not really look very good in the corners wide open.

I'm welcome to make an observation even if it offends you...or you find it suspicious. I'm on nobody's payroll, I just think AA filters serve a purpose.

Mar 2, 2017permalink

dtibi

agree, AA filter is a must have.

Mar 2, 2017permalink

Oh gosh. That aliasing/moire is something fierce. Or maybe they painted those things in rainbows for the gaiety? ;)

In all seriousness and back to the topic-at-hand (the Sigma 14mm Art), it's a good sign for its ability to resolve. Too bad they're not expending the same amount of effort for coma control.

Mar 2, 2017*permalink

rwdphotos

It actually has pretty damn good distortion control and resolution across the whole frame even at 1.8 it seems. I was actually quite impressed, and I use the 14-24 on the daily. With the D810 replacement coming out soon, all one would need to do is carry this around and crop in everywhere ;)

Jul 23, 2017permalink

There are several posts about "severe distortions" with this lens. As an old school photographer I find it quite disconcerting that these posters quite clearly do not understand the nature of rectilinear projection, but think that the edge/corner elongation is caused by a flaw in lens design or manufacture, while it is a mathematical fact which can not be avoided. The wider the picture angle, the worse it gets, and nothing can be done about it if we want straight lines to be represented by straight lines in the picture.

Still these "experts" have the audacity to post these uninformed opinions (alternative facts?) of theirs, highlighting their ignorance.

Mar 1, 2017*permalink

Agree 100% Asking for a distortion-free rectilinear 14mm UWA is like asking for a cheeseburger with no cheese.

Mar 2, 2017permalink

Dpreview should consider doing an educational piece about different kinds of projections and what the real life physical and mathematical (descriptive geometry) constraints are. Understanding the reason wide-angle lenses behave the way they do really requires only a pencil, ruler and a piece of paper.

Mar 2, 2017permalink

AbrasiveReducer

That's a very good idea. If you take a lens this wide, handheld, and aim it at anything vertical, the chances of rendering the verticals perfectly upright are close to zero because the camera has to be perfectly level. Even electronic levels may not be precise enough. But this has nothing to do with distortion.

OTOH, when a lens bends straight lines, that's distortion and some very expensive lenses have tons of it. Seems self-explanatory, but maybe an article on the subject is in order.

Mar 3, 2017*permalink

Tristan Jones

If these people took 5 mins to play any computer game that allows you to change FoV... they would get it. Since the days of Quake in the 90's - you could set FoV for your game play.... the projected game image obviously then suffers edge elongation.... FoV on 14mm (otoh) is 114 degrees? Play a game, set FoV to 114 ... see how real world physics works.... no need to even buy a camera/lens to learn this basic effect. So sad.

Mar 3, 2017permalink

fyngyrz

I would like to see a picture of a star field at max aperture, shot fast enough to make sure trailing is not an issue, for every lens evaluated. If you want to learn where a lens is weak, this is one of the best ways to do so. Coma and chromatic aberration levels are immediately obvious, and comparisons between lenses (and apertures of the same lens) are very informative and easily understood.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

rfdesigner

the 500/fl = exposure time in seconds rule is usually good enough.

whack it on a tripod, even if it's a bit hazy or patchy cloud, get a star in the top left and top right corners and one or two stars elsewhere, liveview focus on anything you can find in the centre.. even pre focus on something some distance away, in a wide lens the difference between a couple of hundred yards and infinity is negligable.

come on, this isn't hard.

Mar 3, 2017permalink

Suntan

I'll let you borrow a lens to evaluate it for a couple of hours, in the middle of the day, and then you can go ahead and run your "not hard" test.

Apr 3, 2017permalink

IMO Sigma would have done better to produce a smaller aperture version up to Art standards, but weighing in at no more than about 600 gm and costing half as much.

Unlike goactive, I sold off my D300 and bought a D610, keeping the full frame lenses I had bought while still using film. I also bought the AF-S Nikkor 20mm f/1.8G ED as I mostly like to shoot landscapes very wide. Had a suitable shorter focal length lens been available, I probably would have bough that instead. Perhaps the Irix 15mm would have done.

I will be keeping my Sigma 12-24mm F4.5-5.6 EX DG HSM Mk I. Testing it on the D610 last week I found that it was even across the frame and was already performing close to its optimum even at full aperture. Mine is quite sharp and has negligible distortion. On the D300 it was only so-so.

Mar 1, 2017*permalink

mick232

Manufacturer presents new lens X - someone says lens Y should have been presented instead. This is probably the billionth occurrence of that.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

So why does it happen then? Currently, there is a lunatic craze to produce large, heavy and expensive wide aperture lenses. Is the intent to turn photography into an exercise in weight lifting?

Mar 1, 2017*permalink

Mika Y.

Personally I'm fine with lenses the size/weight of this or somewhat more, including keeping several with me daily as long as they have a reason for it (large aperture, excellent image quality etc). However, obviously people have different ideas about what is comfortable and having both no-compromises lenses and somewhat more moderate alternatives is important.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

trilogy1000

I agree with the OP. I'm not sure I understand the desire to make large, expensive lenses which will rarely, if ever, be used at their maximum aperture. I'd be happy with a smaller, lighter, f2.8 which cost a lot less - and they'd probably sell a lot more of them. I know people will disagree and say it's 'necessary' to have a 14mm f1.8, but to each their own...

Mar 1, 2017permalink

IIRC the fastest FF lens available < 20mm was f/2.4 until now. This is a pioneering product: A good quality lens with specs in a league of its own that a whole lot of photographers will be excited to buy because it will allow them to do things that simply wasn't possible before. The motivation for producing this lens (and not another lower aperture version to join a crowd) shouldn't be hard to see.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

pkvman13

Haha, you know you want it to cost half as much even though they haven't announced the price of it yet!

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Eric Hensel

The "I don't need it, so nobody else should" crowd...

Mar 1, 2017permalink

trilogy1000

"It will allow people to do things which weren't possible before"?
Perhaps, but as a working photographer since 1979 I can't say there's been a single day in my working life I've thought to myself "Gee, if only there was an f1.8 14mm lens".
But I guess I'm not a member of the "I need it so they should build it" crowd. I'll just pass on this lens and happily keep working with my poor old proven lenses. Good luck to all you folks who think this is somehow necessary to make your photographic lives complete - Sigma will thank you for it ;)

Mar 27, 2017permalink

The results look good but the size, weight and high price are off-putting, considering you will also need to pay for a caddy or daily exercises in the gym.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Daniel L

R you like 90 and handicap? Get a cellphone!

and for the price... well, you are the only know seems to know what it cost to be so expensive.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Mika Y.

There's hardly need to be rude if someone has different preferences in lenses than you.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

pkvman13

Kind of like how it's rude to knock the "high price" of a lens that doesn't have a price yet?

Mar 1, 2017permalink

mikeyL

A lot of folks (like myself) are very interested in lenses like these for nightscape photography. Sure would be nice if you could include one or 2 tripod mounted star field shots of short enough exposure to not trail the stars so we could evaluate the coma of the lens in the corners.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Tapani Tarvainen

Yes. Coma is definitely critical for me, too. If it isn't at least as good as Samyang 14/2.4, it's a no-go, regardless of anything else. So, can we have a star shot - pretty please?

Mar 1, 2017permalink

They had a pre-production sample for less than an hour in an afternoon. So no star photos this time. How about reading the article and some comments from the tester first?

Mar 1, 2017permalink

goactive

So on a DX camera it is a no so wide 21mm. I sold off all my FF cameras.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

21mm is just about as wide as one could want for every day photography.

I used to have the 14-24mm Nikkor (for FF Nikons) but exchanged it for the new 20mm f/1.8 because I practically never used it wider than 20mm and it was so big, heavy and had to be extra careful with the bulging front element

Of course this 14mm f/1,8 Sigma would also be huge on a DX, but IQ would be stellar.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

This is why Fuji is so successful : they have an excellent 10-24 mm which is a zoom lens that adds flexibility to the performance....

Mar 1, 2017permalink

cosmicnode

Nikon also has excellent 10-24 and 12-24 Dx lenses

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Triplet Perar

Uh, too many distortions. And that is the problem with 3rd party lenses; nothing inside camera will react to the lens, and try to fix something that should have been sorted out in lens design.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

hatem95

too many distortions simply because its a 14 mm lens, the images are perfect IF you like this focal length. I cant stop to imagine the wonderful opportunities I wont miss with a 1.8 lens at this focal length

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Hatem95,
It is far better to have a well corrected f2.8 UWA than a f1.8 full of distorsions.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Eric Hensel

Point out these horrible distortions, please.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

P Hartung

Not much optical distortion (amazingly) that I can detect. What is visible in some shots is the natural distortion from the perspective of a naturally wide angle lens. This lens rocks...

Mar 1, 2017permalink

A 14mm with no distortion? Are you people high??

Mar 2, 2017permalink

Eric Hensel

Wrong thread? No one claimed "no distortion".

Mar 2, 2017permalink

Juck

Definitely an interesting lens,,, some of the samples look to be front-focused a bit,, maybe it's just me, maybe it's a copy-specific thing. I'll probably still buy this.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Daniel L

How do you judge an image front/back focused without actually know the focus point? Just curious...

Mar 1, 2017permalink

dooglestar

Probably best you look up what front/back focusing is before commenting. It won't matter though as you'll be buying it anyway 🙄

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Juck

You're kidding right? Are you new at this?

Mar 12, 2017permalink

rwdphotos

Such as the image with the seagulls, you can tell that the camera focused behind the group of people - the ship is in focus, wheras if the group was the focal point the ship would have fallen off enough that the finer details wouldn't be as visible. Most of the images were shot at 5.6, so there are still regions where imperfect focus could cause loss of acuity. What interested me most about that image though is that while the ship is in good focus, and the content behind it, acuity falls off rapidly along the boardwalk to the right. This suggests a pretty extreme field curvature, but it's not equally noticeable across all the samples.

Jul 23, 2017*permalink

Honestly, sometimes Sigma does these "stunt" lenses just to do something unprecedented and tickle the imagination of the photography gearhead-set.

Sometimes they shine, sometimes they have minor caveats, and sometimes major ones.

It seems that with the amount of coma they can't seem to keep out of their ultra-fast UWAs, these lenses are actually more niche than the already-niche wide-field astro application that people keep hoping Sigma can work some magic with.

Do these seem to be reasonable UWA primes? Sure. Are they ultra-fast, faster than anything before? Sure. Can you run them wide-open? Sure, there's probably enough DoF at this short FL for reasonable usage. Can you run them wide-open at night at point light sources like everyone wants to? Well...

Honestly, I think people would have been more pleased had this just been a coma-free 14mm f/2-something at Sigma's Global Vision build quality.

Mar 1, 2017*permalink

Run wide open ? I doubt, it will,probably have a lot of vignetting, I guess between 2.5 and 3 EV

Mar 1, 2017permalink

People with your priorities would have been more pleased, but you already have numerous choices for wide, high quality f/2-something lenses. I think most would disagree with your statement that it is "more niche than niche". There are plenty of good reasons for Sigma to produce this lens, including significant demand.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Poul Jenson: "but you already have numerous choices for wide, high quality f/2-something lenses". You forgot about the most important factor: an absence of coma. Help name me those "numerous choices" you insist are there.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Personally I wish lens reviews would include coma tests, but apparently coma isn't quite so important to others. Coma-free UWA f/2.x lenses do not exist, nor could Sigma produce one, but current UWA f/2.x lenses were already designed according to your priorities (IQ over speed). This lens was made to differ. Frankly, your post is like complaining that spoons were brought to market because you don't eat soup and think people would prefer a better fork.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Poul Jenson: "Coma-free UWA f/2.x lenses do not exist..." You are asserting easily-disprovable things again. The Samyang UWA offerings (specifically the 14mm and 20mm) are well-known among wide-field astrophotographers for their absence of comatic aberration. Of course, the trade-off is 1) hit-or-miss quality control, and 2) prior-generation resolving power. The Tamron SP 15-30mm f/2.8 and the new Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L III USM are nearly coma-free. The latter was (blatantly) introduced with a full-resolution Milky Way shot as part of its marketing to hammer this fact home. But that's it as to the known choices. Samyang and Irix both have f/2.4 versions of 14-15mm lenses on the horizon. The former is too early for reviews, and the latter looks to be a dud for comatic aberration.

I mean, I could also point out where lens reviews *do* include coma tests, but I grow tired of this full education I'm forced to impart to you. I don't think you have many well-founded points.

Mar 2, 2017*permalink

So by "coma-free" you mean well-controlled coma. Yes, then you have options, and it turns out you already know some. How many options do you know for FF < 20mm < f/2.4? Would it be okay with you if a manufacturer finally met the demand for such lenses?

Mar 2, 2017permalink

NarrBL

Well, Dan, that eye...

Fresh venue in this lens brings it well...

There's one subject we miss, maybe later.

These are very fine, many of them.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Wanchese

I dunno'..... These pics look pretty good to me. Nothing to make me re-jigger the glass battery, but nice photos.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

SmilerGrogan

Beautiful images, very crisp and nice color, but once you tilt the camera everything gets so distorted, it's annoying.
Maybe when you buy this lens buy a stepladder at the same time so you can photograph taller things without having to deal with so much ga-boing!!!! from the wide angle.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Clyde Thomas

Nice to see at least two images (19 & 34) with no tilt up or down.

#19 tells me a lot. At f8, the image looks slightly front focused upon very sharp backpack sitting atop bridge. The house is sharp-ish, but focus was missed, and background fell to blur. Wondering if all these images are suffering a little front focus.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

PhotoUniverse

I am not impressed at all. Lots of visible distortions and softness. And yes, I know it's a very wide angle lens.

I was hoping better than this. I would've got it for Astrophotography.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

s1oth1ovechunk

You mean night sky photography? :)

Mar 1, 2017permalink

PhotoUniverse

@s1oth1ovechunk

yeah, night sky astrophotography. Not Deep Space astrophotography ;-)

Mar 1, 2017permalink

It's called "widefield astrophotography"

Mar 2, 2017permalink

jonny1976

unimpressed and totally useless lens. at 1,8 corner are really soft...in addiction the distortion of faces and element at 14 is already heavy. apart some creative effect with shallow depth of field a perfect 14 2,8 with zero distortion, kind of laowa 12, would have been much interesting. luckily they not do in k1 mount but after watch the gallery is the less interesting lens sigma did.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

andrewD2

Is this sarcasm? I can't tell.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

jonny1976

no i'm not impressed

Mar 1, 2017permalink

andrewD2

This is on a 5Ds and the corners look amazing when in focus. Don't confuse lens softness with areas that are simply out of focus. I'd much rather have a smaller f2.8 personally but I'd not expect it to be this sharp at f2.8.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

maxnimo

I wish this pro-wide angle bias would end. I'd sell my soul to see a review of at least one super-telephoto lens for a change. Just who started this irrational super-wide-angle fad anyway?

Feb 28, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

That's what it is, a fad. Created because a very wide lens allows the average mediocre photographer to create images with some drama (thanks to distortion) in them. It'll pass at some point.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

AbrasiveReducer

It would be nice to see a gallery or a contest of subjects where an ultra wide lens was needed. By needed, I mean photos where your first thought about the image is about the subject and not about the lens that was used.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

SmilerGrogan

You are correct, but real telephotos are updated so infrequently that whole civilizations rise and then fall before a new one comes out.
And if you think the commenters get angry about a $2000 or $3000 camera body, they'll be at the gates of DPR headquarters with pitchforks and torches if these guys dared to write about the $12,000 Nikon 600mm f/4. Maybe it's a stone better left un-turned.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

(unknown member)

It's irrational, people don't get angry because they can't afford an expensive car on a car site, but they still like reading about them.
Truth is, long, fixed teles are about as good as they're ever going to get, their designs are much less complex than wide angle lenses. So updating a long telephoto won't gain you anything much.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

imsabbel

@Pmaxnimo:

Easy. Image resolutions have exploded. Crop the center 5 Megapixels from a modern camera shot at 200mm and you get the same image you needed a supertele a decade ago. (and yes, for most image applications, a couple megapixels of subject are perfectly fine....)

While on the other hand, you cannot uncrop images. Sure, you can so panoramas, but those sucks in comparion.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Mister Joseph

A little Barrel D, but still looks OK!

Feb 28, 2017permalink

CantThinkOfAName

My nikon 14-24 F2.8 is very curious about this one .. it felt threatened by the 20mm 1.4 ART I tried but that didn't last as it was sent back.

Waiting for starfield shots ....

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Boeing skipper

Why was your 20 Art sent back?

Feb 28, 2017permalink

CantThinkOfAName

For the cost of it, I wasn't happy with the coma in the star field images @ 1.4, stopped down a bit they were ok but that's not the point of me having a f1.4 lens. Besides, I felt I was compromising on the 14mm wide angle which I use a lot on night sky shots which would have been ok if the 20mm had performed better ...

Feb 28, 2017permalink

The Tamron 15-30 is better than the nikon...

Mar 1, 2017permalink

geekyrocketguy

A gallery of f/5.6 images isn't very helpful. Any non-crap lens should be able to produce sharp photos at f/5.6. We need lots of images at f/2.8 and faster, ESPECIALLY with detail in the corners. The images in this gallery with objects in the corner tend to have them very close to the camera, so it's difficult to tell whether the massive softness is due to lens aberrations or just focus limitations.

Come on, DPR, you can produce a more helpful sample gallery than this.

The single most important test for this lens, a field of stars at various apertures, wasn't included. That single scene tells you everything you need to know about a lens: corner sharpness, vignetting, astigmatism/coma, and field curvature!

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Dan Bracaglia

As soon as we get a production copy of the lens into the office, we'll get some star shots and build out a new sample gallery. In the case of these samples, we only had the lens for an afternoon.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

geekyrocketguy

Thank you for the response, Dan. I don't mean to be overly critical, but even working with the limitation of only having the lens for an afternoon, this gallery could be a lot more helpful. For example, this scene would have been perfect to shoot at a variety of apertures: https://www.dpreview.com/sample-galleries/1628118141/pre-production-samples-sigma-14mm-f1-8-dg-hsm-art/0945630077

Shoot it at f/1.8, 2.8, 4, 5.6, and 8, and then we can see how the corners improve with aperture. Instead, we're left searching for any detail in the corner of a wide-aperture shot, and as a result we have to guess whether blur is caused by mis-focus or actual lens aberrations. Due to this, you get comments like Matthew's, below mine, assuming the worst about the lens. Is he right? Does the lens have terrible coma? I dunno, but if DPR had done a better job of this gallery, we would be a lot closer to being able to answer that question.

Feb 28, 2017*permalink

All the reviews of lenses here and almost elsewhere else are totally haphazard and next to useless. When they go into such detail about many cameras, it is utterly ludicrous that they bother so little.

If I am interested in a new lens, I have to spend hours on the web trying to find useful pictures to judge by, but in the end I always have to resort to guesswork and a large serving of hope.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

The 1.8 shot that shows a corner even remotely in focus has *huge* coma. At first I hoped to god that it was just because it was the 5DsR's resolution making the "coma wings" larger, but even after cropping to 16:9 and scaling down to 4K, it is still BAD COMA.

Who the heck is this lens aimed at, if not astro shooters, Sigma? Cinema is really all there is left, and if Sigma was that dedicated to serving cinema shooters, then they would have started designing cine style lenses back when they decided that the 24 1.4 Art and 20 1.4 Art ought to have plenty of coma, too.

Bah-humbug. Rokinon 14 2.4 it is, I bet.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

stevo23

It's sharp enough to excite some moire!

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Boeing skipper

Very impressive.
Would love to see a night sky shot at f1.8 to check the coma.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Dan_168

Exactly, I never worry about sharpness of any Art lens, but Sigma up until these day don't have a good track record on COMA performance and this will be mainly a candidate for my new Astro lens so COMA performance will be one main deciding factor if I want to buy one or not. Don't care for filter, size, wight, AF performance at all.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Dan_168

Any info on price yet?

Feb 28, 2017*permalink

I guess you do not shoot skies handheld. So on a tripod, you set f5,6 or f8 and that's it, nomore coma...

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Tapani Tarvainen

For night photography there's never enough light, even though it is indeed done with tripod. Stopping down means exposure times grow, stars become trails, auroras become blur... The only point of this lens is speed, and if you need to stop down to get rid of the coma I'll rather go with Samyang/Rokinon 14/2.4.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Dan_168

@dansclic: For milky way and stuffs like that F5.6 and F8 is useless, even F2.8 is slow and I always searching for a faster lens. Like Tappani Tarvainen above said, the only point of this lens is the F1.8, if it's not good at F1.8, there is no point buying this, I already have the Samyang 14 F2.8 which has almost no coma and I shoot it wide open every time, as well as the 14-24 2.8, pretty well control in COMA.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

photo_rb

Gosh, the corners look pretty sharp!

Feb 28, 2017permalink

RPJG

I just came here for the comments.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

bereninga

Shut up and take my money! Never thought that I'd like something this wide, but with 1.8 and AF, this looks exciting. There's no way this is below $1k.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Scottelly

I was hoping to see a night shot, made at f1.8, which would have shown how much coma the lens has.

Too bad.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Nicolas Alexander Otto

I bet as soon as Chris gets his hands on it you will see those. ;)

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Check image 36/38. Lower right.

So. Much. Facepalm.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Yake

Amazing and freaky at the same time.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Kaso

Samples <3 Dan Bracaglia <3 <3 Sigma 14/1.8 Art <3 <3 <3

Budget for Sigma lenses augmented.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

LDunn1

Please shoot a (clear) night sky wide open for approx 30 seconds with this lens on a full frame sensor. I'd like to see how it renders point light sources (aka stars) towards the edges/corners of the frame.

I was excited with the announcement of the Sigma 24 f1.4, but then I saw a review which included a point light source in the corners & edges shot wide open & I was a bit disappointed. I'm hoping this 14mm performs better with such things than the 24 appears to.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Scottelly

30 seconds would make star trails. It would be much better for them to do it for 5 seconds at ISO 800 or ISO 1600 on a Nikon D810 or Canon 5Dsr.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

tkbslc

500 rule says you could go to about 36 seconds without trails.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

t_wade

For "near" pinpoint stars, the 200 rule is better. You will get quite a bit of trailing using the 500 rule.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

Check Image 36/38, in the lower right.

It's not looking good. My money is on the Irix 15 f/2, or the Rokinon 14 2.4. Sigh.

Feb 28, 2017permalink

LDunn1

for me, 30 seconds with a 14mm would be an acceptable test, it would be 'real world'. I wouldn't shoot the night sky for just 5 second - it is usual for me to shoot at 1600iso & 30 seconds.

The star trails would be minimal & you would easily see the star quality (or lack of) in the corners. You can also 'tweak' minor star trailing in post process, which gives a bit more leeway.

Mar 1, 2017permalink

Tapani Tarvainen

For me the primary use for this lens would be aurora borealis, and with them 5 seconds is more typical - and that's where the wide aperture would really help as it'd allow using lower ISO sensitivity.

But nonetheless a 30 second exposure sample of stars would be useful for assessing coma.

Mar 1, 2017permalink