Best BANG for the Buck Telephoto Zoom? (Lens Review)

**Orgnoi1** · #1 09-30-2006, 11:44 AM

Well having used a few teles and zoom teles, I figured I would give this lens a try. Trish has been using one for a while and can never really place if she truelly likes it or not. Which lens is that? The Sigma Bigma (IE: the Sigma 50-500mm f/4-6.3 HSM DG) is that lens. The reasons I have for calling it the possible best bang are numerous. First off the price... this lens was purchased for sub-$800 in used condition (but extremely good shape). Next would be the overall range of the lens, its a true 10x lens being from 50-500mm. Another reason would be weight, as this lens at 500mm is tiny in comparison to the highly reputable Canon 500L.

The test was a fairly easy one. I shot 6 shots using ISO800 on Av f/14 at 50mm, 100mm, 200mm, 300mm, 400mm, and 500mm of downtown Albany, NY from on the hill in East Greenbush. All of the following shots are completely unprocessed with the exception of resize. The last shot was a lucky one... a redtail hawk from the drive home in flight @500mm from the drivers window of my truck while stopped on Rte 7. This shot was processed only using PSP8 (no levels or highlights/shadows), resized and set for posting.

Is this a decent lens for a sub-$1000? I will let you decide!

50mm

100mm

200mm

300mm

400mm

500mm

**Orgnoi1** · #2 09-30-2006, 11:45 AM

And last but not least... the hawk shot...

**convergent** · #3 09-30-2006, 01:12 PM

Its hard to get a feel for sharpness on these. Maybe you could do a 100% crop of a small square of each image, and apply appropriate sharpening to them for a comparison. I know that most of my images appear a little soft if there is no sharpening applied.

There is no question this lens gives you some serious range for the price.

**zacker** · #4 09-30-2006, 05:41 PM

i think i like it ross.... which body? id love to see it on a cropped sensor..also id love to see some "processed" shots..been thinking of the bigma for a "someday-maybe" purchase.

**Orgnoi1** · #5 09-30-2006, 06:58 PM

These were all taken on the 5D...I wanted to get a feel for exactly what the lens would do... on a cropped body I think the results may be even better honestly... I didnt want to process the shots at all for this post since without processing you can see what you can expect... but I will be posting some train pics from today using it..

**zacker** · #6 09-30-2006, 07:11 PM

cool... when did you get the lens?

**Orgnoi1** · #7 09-30-2006, 07:15 PM

I got it in yesterday... today was really the first day using it... I am running through my train shots right now... and I have to say that the shots I am getting with this lens easily rival my 100-400L

**Orgnoi1** · #8 09-30-2006, 09:16 PM

Here is the link to the train shots with the Bigma....

http://www.northeastfoto.com/forums/...ead.php?t=5366