Sigma 50mm 1:1.4 DG HSM A (Art) Lens (f/1.4)

Overall Rating:

This made-in-Japan lens is 11 years old. It is a retrofocus design with three low dispersion elements and one aspherical element making this a modern design. It features no type of image stabilization.

Performance

There is no color fringing save for a little LoCA. There is some vignetting to be found wide open but it disappears when stopped down.

Stopped down some, this lens is razor sharp until diffraction sets in around f/8. Emphasis here on RAZOR sharp! It is no where near as sharp wide open...

The autofocus is silent and not fast but not slow.

There is 0.1% pinchusion distortion.

It's a very nice performing lens and performs better than the Nikkor AF-S 50mm/1.8G lens with a huge weight and size penalty. Its focal length is slightly shorter than a true 50mm.

Infrared

This lens just does not work for infrared photography. There is very strong reflections of the infrared light on the diaphragm creating a hotspot in the center of the image.

Bokeh

The bokeh is pretty decent not being too distracting. It does have a little LoCA which affects the color fringing and bokeh scores negatively.

Construction

This lens is not compact at all for what it is. It is very large and very heavy.

This is a plastic lens with a metal base and focus collar. The focus collar is not loose but could have a nicer feel perhaps because it is a autofocus lens Sigma decided that it did not need a really nice feel to it.

This lens has a focus scale and depth of field scale. The focus scale is useful as it is not too small. It goes down to 1.3 ft. or 0.4 m.

The 77mm filter threads do not rotate.

Specifications

Images

Related links:

• Sigma Lens Reviews
• All Lens Reviews