hackmann's reviews

  • Sigma 24-70mm f/2.8 EX DG Macro

    8 out of 10 points and recommended
    Cheap, high performance with correct exposure, aperture and ammount of light
    Bad performance at night

    I bought a used copy of this piece to use in my nikon D90. The lens is 3 years old and it is perfect, no problems due age, except to the rubber focus ring that is a little "dry". No front or back focus.

    English is not my mother language, I will try to be "understandable" Smile.

    Well, first of all is a big, heavy and bulky leans and it uses a big filter. People get intimidated by that lens, its nice!

    About IQ I can tell you I like when used at day, despite being a f 2.8. Its a little soft at wide open and you need to step down a little bit. Center shows a very high quality image and borders are a little soft. I found some distortion CA and purple fringe wich is 100% correctable (at least with the lens profile in Lightroom 3). So, if you are shooting landscape, or buildings at wide open, I can tell you, with the correct exposure, you have a very high picture quality. I can tell also, in this scenario, it perform better than D90 18-105mm lens kit. It produces a warmer tone than 18-105mm lens, I love it, and 90% of shots I do only need to apply lens profile, because image is very well balanced (colors and the exposure) already. This is the kind of lens that dont give work to you on the post processing. AF works great and it is not as noisy like people complain. To be honest it produce less noise than my nikkor 50mm 1.8D.

    But, here comes the bad part.

    I am disapointed by lens performance at night. When you shoot, the darken part of the image get blurry, like a out of focus blurry noisy image. In this case, the darken area of the image have a very poor quality and it is not sharp. I know you are thinking "that´s is normal, it is the dark problem", but it is not. I can tell that because the 18-105 kit lens, in same scenario, perform 200% better, and even with the noise, the image is focused in dark area, not blurry or out of focus..... I found this problem in every aperture range. In other hand, noise in dark area is better than the 18-105mm, because somehow does not show purple dots, only black ones.

    The bottom of line is, it is a very good lens for the price charged and the performance to shoot landscapes or portraits with the correct exposure, aperture and with the right ammount of light, do a high quality sharp image. It captures a very good skin tone also.

    The zoom ring is not smooth in all range, maybe because the front element is heavy.

    If you have a nikon and want to have a lens that suit FX and DX sensor and you want to save some cash this is the lens for you.

    Here you can see some samples about its image quality:

    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Arquitechure/14214600_pNesQ#1058366042_84Boe
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Arquitechure/14214600_pNesQ#1058366803_2KmZS
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Arquitechure/14214600_pNesQ#1058365287_X9YfT
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Arquitechure/14214600_pNesQ#1058364258_DgMni
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Arquitechure/14214600_pNesQ#1058362720_8Qc8s
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Arquitechure/14214600_pNesQ#1058363477_iHANk

    reviewed September 25th, 2010 (purchased for $400)

  • Nikon 50mm f/1.8D AF Nikkor

    9 out of 10 points and recommended
    HQ, Cheap
    Flare

    Well, I am a D90 owner.
    You should not forget to have this piece in your bag.
    Its far the best lens I have. IQ its awsome, fast and light lens.

    Only problem its having a tendency to flare easly.

    You can check some samples here:
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Other/GearTest/50mm/23746304_wBX5xf#!i=1923151392&k=qhDHZ76
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Plants/14217129_wh8vj#1058448835_UMetH
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Inanimate-objects-1/14230830_8udAW#1058452246_2ZkBR
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Inanimate-objects-1/14230830_8udAW#1058453208_WwvyZ
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Inanimate-objects-1/14230830_8udAW#1060152544_P6yNp

    reviewed September 25th, 2010 (purchased for $150)

  • Sigma 150mm f/2.8 EX DG HSM APO Macro

    10 out of 10 points and recommended
    Image Quality, sharpness, color, contrast
    no OS

    This lens make you think sigma is the best lens manufacture in the world. Its very affordable due its quality.

    In aps-c sensor you can use as short telephoto also. Macro shots its awsome, but i found a very good use to portrait and long distance shots.

    Check some cool shots at my webpage:

    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1049989532_3tAjs
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1049996631_6qbDK
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1050000030_3pP7Y
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1050000854_fbGJu
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1050001585_wmTMD
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1050002391_qUJ4M
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1050003191_dtM62
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Flowers/14214321_Nk7s4#1050003893_tMake

    reviewed October 18th, 2010 (purchased for $700)

  • Nikon 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR DX AF-S Nikkor

    9 out of 10 points and recommended
    Impressive Image Quality at 70mm f5.6, vr effective and silent, walkaround lens,
    Some chromatic aberration at wide agle, focus hunt at dark (need flash led to focus), too much vignete at 105mm

    This is the best affordable walk around lens.

    Only problem I found it tends to give too much cool temperature shots, some chromatic aberration at wide agle and too much vignete at 105mm.

    Despite that is a impressive lens, 80% of my shots i use this lens, even having some expensive ones. Very good for portraits.

    Check some awsome shots i had with this at my webpage:

    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050422248_WCZ6v
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050421209_Zz5MR
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050401443_MQ7yN
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050399814_VU2Dy
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1060039475_dpCRB

    reviewed October 18th, 2010 (purchased for $300)

  • Nikon 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G IF-ED VR AF-S Nikkor

    9 out of 10 points and recommended
    Affordable, VR, great IQ until 200mm f5.6
    300mm image quality

    This is a very affordable lens due its quality.
    Until 200mm, its a monster. Very good IQ.
    Impressive image at 70mm.
    VR is very good.
    I found a very good use to photograph birds, animals and guess... portrait shots.
    Check some nice shots i have with this at my webpage:

    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050023593_Sg5go
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050547374_z7CkB
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Landscapes/14214801_Xvmfw#1050424923_VS7a9
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/animals/14226282_xkiuv#1051062043_bkyi5
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/animals/14226282_xkiuv#1051066413_kQKB8
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/animals/14226282_xkiuv#1051064290_EoKoq
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/animals/14226282_xkiuv#1051066943_o2gCz
    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/animals/14226282_xkiuv#1051057439_jBk7Q

    The last one is a 100% crop of a moon shot at 300mm. You can see a lot of detail, including the lunar craters on the darker side of the moon:

    http://www.carloshackmannphotography.com/Galleries/Skyscape/14219754_WHE86#1073548130_hHWxk

    reviewed October 18th, 2010 (purchased for $600)