profmbo's reviews

  • Sigma 50-500mm f/4.5-6.3 DG OS HSM APO

    9 out of 10 points and recommended
    Great (& unique) range, efficient optical stabilization, fast focus, price
    Good (but not very) quality picture

    I use this lens as a complement of my (14-24, 24-70, 80-200 f2.8) Nikon lenses with a Nikon D700 (full frame) camera.
    The long focal Nikon lenses f4 are not affordable for my budget.
    The range is very large, this is comfortable allowing not too frequent lens change. I made some comparison switching on & off the OS with a low light inside house during night,a small light and witout support, various f (up to 500) the difference is great ! the test objects were small labels, you are unable to read the text without OS. It is easy with OS. Sometime, it does not work properly (< 5% of cases) and a picture that would be ok witout OS is not usable with it !
    The focus is fast but I recommend (for small objects or birds tracking to start with 100 and zoom to 500)
    It is more or less heavy but only boring after 3 or more hours walk.
    With 500 mm and 22 opening using 95 mm filter), the angles are cut !
    When comparison is made with the (best ?) of Nikon f2.8 you clearly see a difference, the reason of my quality 7.
    Sumarizing, very interesting for low light but a bit disappointing for outdoor suny days.
    Bigma is a robust construction !
    I wrote "I am wondering to change to a NIKON 80-400 f4.5-5.6 D" on June 16th, finally I will go to a Nikkor 400 f/3.5, an old reference with manual focus (updated 11/11/11) & will comment it asap.
    P.S. DXO optics pro (soft) does not recognize this lens.
    After "playing" with the very wide range of the lens, it is clearly amazing, I come to the conclusion that the pictures taken are not in the 1% I love. I generally prefer to uses my Nikkor and...zoom to "increase the focal length !"

    reviewed June 16th, 2011 (purchased for $2,000)