Sigma 50-100mm F/18 Dc Hsm Art Lens Review

The Sigma fifty-100mm F1.8 DC HSM Art ($1,099) is a premium telezoom lens, aimed at photographers working with APS-C SLRs. Information technology's designed around the aforementioned principle as the standard 18-35mm F1.8 DC HSM Art ($598.00 at Amazon) zoom, and is probable to appeal to the same demographic. Information technology's a bright lens, maintaining an f/1.8 aperture throughout its range, that makes no compromises on image quality compared with shooting prime number lenses. That requires quite a bit of glass, and when coupled with a tough build you lot've got a big, hefty lens. It omits image stabilization and is on the pricey side, but optical operation is superb. It's an first-class pick if you're in the market for a broad-aperture telezoom for your APS-C SLR.

Design

The 50-100mm F1.8 ($963.46 at Amazon) is a large lens. It measures 6.7 by 3.7 inches (HD), weighs 3.iii pounds, and supports 82mm front end filters. The barrel is a mix of metal and polycarbonate, with a metal tripod collar that rotates and locks into position every xc degrees. A reversible lens hood is included, along with front and rear caps and a conveying pouch.

The overall package feels pro-grade, and the heft means information technology's best paired with a college terminate APS-C SLR. Entry-level bodies like the Nikon D3400 ($300.00 at Amazon) are typically small and low-cal, and won't pair well with a large, heavy lens like the 50-100mm. But the 50-100mm is a fine lucifer for larger bodies similar the Canon 80D ($899.00 at Amazon) and Nikon D500 ($1,496.95 at Amazon) . Sigma sells the 50-100mm for Canon, Nikon, and Sigma SLRs. Pentax and Sony versions are non available at this time.

When paired with an APS-C photographic camera the lens covers a field of view roughly equivalent to a 75-150mm zoom on a full-frame organization. That'due south not a lens you usually see—pro-grade full-frame zooms are typically lxx-200mm designs, like the Canon EF lxx-200mm f/2.8L IS II USM ($998.95 at Amazon) .

I didn't find myself missing the additional telephoto reach, but I wish that Sigma had somehow been able to add together some broad-angle coverage to the zoom. For the correct photographer, the fifty-100mm could pair with the Sigma xviii-35mm equally a solid two lens kit, and if the wide stop of the 50-100mm was closer to the 35mm marking, you could cutting downward on lens changes in the field. That said, if you're an issue photographer working with a two camera kit and oasis't moved to a full-frame system, the l-100mm is a fine option for portraits.

The lens has two control rings, ane to adjust the zoom and some other to focus manually. Its zoom is internal, and so there's no extension when adjusting the focal length. The zoom band is covered in textured rubber, sits at the centre of the barrel, and is marked at 50, 60, seventy, 85, and 100mm.

The manual focus ring is finished in the aforementioned texture, and located just behind the front chemical element. It focuses to iii.1 anxiety (0.95-meter), which captures images at upwards to 1:vi.7 magnification. It's definitely not a macro pattern; if that's what you're later, you may want to consider pairing it with the Sigma 17-70mm F2.8-4 DC Macro Os HSM ($322.18 at Amazon) , equally there aren't a lot of telezooms out there with strong macro capabilities.

Image Quality

I tested the 50-100mm with the 20MP Canon EOS 7D Mark II ($1,199.00 at Amazon) . Focus is very quick—the 50-100mm takes advantage of the 7D's loftier-speed shooting capabilities. Our test copy of the 50-100mm was slightly off in focus when working at the 100mm end of the range, but a quick adjustment with the Sigma USB Dock ($42.00 at Amazon) resolved the upshot. The USB Dock is an inexpensive accompaniment that lets you fine-melody performance of select Sigma lenses.

At 50mm f/1.eight the lens scores 2,236 lines per flick height on Imatest's center-weighted sharpness test, meliorate than the ane,800 lines we wait for in an prototype. Image quality is fairly consistent from border to edge, with the periphery of the frame lagging behind the average score by about 200 lines.

There'southward a modest improvement at f/2 (ii,412 lines), and more palpable increases at f/2.viii (2,512 lines), f/iv (2,539 lines), and f/5.six (2,519 lines). Diffraction cuts into sharpness at narrower settings, starting at f/eight (2,414 lines). Merely it's only an issue of notation at f/11 (2,177 lines) and f/xvi (1,780 lines).

The lens isn't quite every bit crisp at 75mm f/1.eight—it shows two,062 lines there, with edges that are simply to a higher place our sharpness cutoff (one,861 lines). There's modest improvement at f/2 (2,139), just both the average (2,473 lines) and edge (ii,112 lines) scores show more than significant gains at f/ii.8. The lens continues to ameliorate at f/4 (ii,579 lines) and f/five.vi (2,594 lines), earlier dropping in fidelity at f/8 (2,480 lines), f/eleven (2,219 lines), and f/16 (1,833 lines).

At 100mm f/i.8 the zoom scores 2,214 lines on the center-weighted evaluation, with strong performance right up to the edges of the frame (2,062 lines). As with wider focal lengths, there's improvement every bit you stop downwards—2,254 lines at f/2, 2,464 lines at f/two.8, 2,580 lines at f/4, and 2,595 lines at f/5.6. We see the aforementioned drop-off equally you narrow the aperture further to f/8 (2,505 lines), f/11 (2,240 lines), and f/xvi (i,860 lines).

Distortion is well controlled. There'due south less than 1 pct visible at 50mm and 75mm. Yous do get about 1.4 per centum pincushion baloney at 100mm, which will give directly lines a slight inwardly curved appearance. It's non enough to exist consequential for near images, but architectural photographers should brand certain to apply a profile correction to images in Lightroom ($9.99/Calendar month at Adobe) in guild to eliminate the small-scale distrotion.

Corners are dim, about 2.2 stops (-two.2EV) backside the center of the paradigm, at f/1.eight, throughout the zoom range. The arrears is cut to almost -1.5EV at f/two and is non at all relevant in field atmospheric condition at narrower apertures. The slight vignette effect can also exist corrected in Lightroom, either via a lens profile or via the vignette control.

Conclusions

The Sigma fifty-100mm F1.eight DC HSM Art is a lens that is without a lot of contest. About APS-C telezooms are narrow discontinuity designs, like the mutual 55-300mm f/3.5-5.6 multifariousness bundled with entry-level SLR kits. Zooms that step upwardly the quality from kit options are typically wide or standard angle designs, every bit the size and weight reward is more than pregnant at that stop of the spectrum.

So the 50-100mm stands lonely in the market place. Its broad discontinuity design gives y'all just about every bit much control over depth of field when shooting with an APS-C camera as you lot would get with a comparable f/2.eight zoom on a full-frame system. It's a excellent performer, although one that comes without image stabilization and doesn't offer quite as much coverage range as we'd like to run across. Only if you lot're dedicated to an APS-C SLR system, and are looking for a curt telezoom to embrace events and give you some liberty in framing portraits, the fixed f/1.8 design and excellent sharpness delivered by the the Sigma l-100mm are very appealing.

Cheers to Lensrentals for supplying the lens for this review.

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Source: https://uk.pcmag.com/lenses/86466/sigma-50-100mm-f18-dc-hsm-art

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