Sigma SD14

[BoblyBill]

I just a read about the new Sigma SD14 the three layered light sensor. I was amazed but I know that advertisments are designed to make it look better than others so that you will buy them, but it did look impressive... I was wondering what you guys thought about it... Any experience with them?

 

[Don Simon]

I've always had mixed views on Sigma. On the one hand they do make some very good lenses, often for a lot less than the big names, and they do make some lenses that you probably wouldn't otherwise find anywhere near the same price range (for example a 30mm f/1.4). On the other hand their quality control doesn't seem to be great, and there are many stories of lenses not autofocusing properly. Also, when I looked at their film SLRs, I was very impressed indeed by what functions they put in the cameras - like mirror lock-up - which again would not be found on any of the big names' cameras at the same price... but again the build quality did not overly impress me.

One issue I have with Sigma is that they use their own proprietary lens mount. That may sound fairly silly; all the big names have their own lens mount too. But my point is, with Sigma you are limited to Sigma lenses, whereas with Canon, Nikon, Minolta/Sony or Pentax you have not only their own lenses but also Sigma's, Tamron's and Tokina's. This may or may not be a problem for you.

As for their digital sensors... I honestly don't know if they're any good. I have never used one. Hopefully someone else knows more about that.

 

[bla]

I own a Sigma SA9 with a crappy kit lens. But I've generally felt that the SA9 was pretty solid in my hands, and I loved the feel of it.

Then the tripod screw insert broke, and now I'm left with a slow lens without a tripod connection at the bottom of my camera.

Digitally, I can't really help you there. All I can say is that they do know how to put some very nice functions in their cameras, and they know what 'ergonomics' means, unlike some other manufacturers and their low-end dSLRs (*cough canon XT *cough).

 

[bla]

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/sigmasd10/

This explains it fairly straight-forwardly, seems to be the next big thing. And I doubt dpreview is very biased. They also have a bunch of X3 sensor hands-ons and etc.