sigma 105mm f/2.8 Macro Help

Sachphotography

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ok so I had a chance to play with this lens.... I have one on the way now... I noticed something and need some help....Can this lens not focusing on anything past like 15 feet? It seems that Focusing to infinity is only like 15-20feet...... Anybody else notice this or is this like that because it is designed for macro work.

My ignorance may be showing but oh well..
 
Well, this topic comes up periodically....as in this post from yesterday...

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/...s-news-reviews/218086-yes-no-you-tell-me.html

an excerpt of what I wrote: "Macro lenses are bad action lenses...they do not focus well beyond about 1.5 to 2 meters...the focus travel among all brands (except for the new Zeiss ZE and ZF models I've seen) is hair-trigger at normal "action" distances, which leads to lots of focusing misses and near-misses, which is the exact wrong thing for a lens used on sports, where "opportunities" are like fleeting, ephemeral chances, and the lens's focusing speed is the most-critical factor in being able to get a good shot, or ending up with an OOF,missed shot.

So....well...uh-huh...yeah....bummer man...
Yes, macro lenses OFTEN have very hair-trigger focusing throw beyond 1.5 to 2 meters...they often have micoscopic throws that go from 2 meters to 60 meters within three or four millimeters of focusing ring travel, and that means that at normal "field" or "portrait" distances, a macro lens can have difficulty focusing accurately and repeatably under what would be considered normal time constraints and normal percentages...and this holds true for the Tamron 90, Canon 100, Nikkor 60, Sigma 180, and a host of other excellent macro lenses...focusing with a macro lens at "normal" distances is a hit or miss affair...even with a good camera with a powerful AF module, getting a secure, accurate focusing lock-on with a macro lens can be a real PITA,many times, when something like a 50mm 1.8 lens will just go "Dzt!" and focus in 3/10 second, reliably, shot after shot...
 
I agree with Derral, macro lenses can be a bit tricky at longer ranges - that said the 100mm macros are often used as portrait lenses and I've seen some great work done with a 150mm macro and captive big cats. So yes they can and do work very well; they are just harder to focus.

That said your lens should be able to focus all the way to infinity - check that you've not got a focus limiter switch enabled which would restrict the focus to a select band of ranges. If you've not got the limiter switch on and the lens still cannot focus all the way to infinity it sounds like there might bea problem with the lens itself
 

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