Sigma continues to be one of the most Daring companies out there when it comes To lens design and their newest lens is Maybe one of the most extreme yet the 15mm f1.4 DG DN art and this is a Diagonal fisheye is really kind of a Niche of an already niche Market it's The first autofocusing fisheye lens on Sony I believe on El Mount as well it's Also the world's first frame diagonal Fisheye lens with an f1.4 maximum Aperture as you can see that means that It's also beastly big weighs 32 lb and It cost a whopping $2,000 so is this extreme instrument a Kind of lens for you well we'll find out In today's review right after a word From our sponsor today's episode is Brought to you by the Phantom duffel a New unique convertible duffel bag that Starts as a compact packable case that Easily fits into your luggage or Carry-on bag but then converts into a 35 L duffel the exterior is made of 1680d Ballistic nylon which is tough and Weatherproof the interior has a high Visibility reflective finish that allows You to easily see what's inside even in A dim hotel room a large foam pouch on The side has a cable pass through to Allow for charging and the removable Straps use a fidlock system to easily And securely connect them I've been Using it for the gym and it has room for
My water bottle a change of clothes a Basketball my massive shoes a towel and A charger for my cell phone visit store. Fanom wallet.com to check it out and use Code dustin2 for 20% off when you're Ready to check out so the first thing to Know about this lens is that it has an Incredibly wide 180° angle of view I Wanted to take a shot of my feet I was Standing in the middle of a Bridge it's About 12T wide and you can see that just Aiming down towards my feet I not only Had my feet but I had all the width of The bridge and the rails on either side In the frame as well and so it is Incredibly wide it's nearly 50° wider Than what the laa af10 mm f2.8 that I Just reviewed because that lens is a Rect rectal linear lens and so it is Incredibly incredibly wi I think that we Can at least give some credit for this Lens existence to the fact that that Sigma already made the 14mm f1.4 art as You can see from this photo these lenses Are virtually twins when it comes to Their physical design and I suspect that There is some shared engineering not Just in the outer shell but probably Some of the inner working as well that Allowed Sigma to leverage their Engineering time and tooling to able to Produce two lenses and maybe you know Between those two being a little bit More Niche lenses earn enough to justify
The invest investment of of time and Energy into developing these lenses now The fisheye lens is very slightly larger And heavier but they are very very Similar in just about every outer detail Now this is a diagonal fishee and so Rather than being a circular fisheye Where you get a circular image with some Of the you know the rectangular frame Just blocked off this will fill the Frame and in fact you can really control The amount of distortion that you get by How you compose your subject and also How much you tilt the camera so for Example in this shot where I composed a Horizon in the middle of the frame Horizon's pretty straight all it takes Is just a little bit of a tilt up However moving the subject higher in the Frame more towards the edge and very Quickly you end up with that you know Very circular uh horizon line now as Noted this is a heavy lens it weighs in At400 G or 48 o means it's heavier than A lens like the 70 to 200 f2.8 sport That Sigma recently released and they Have attempted to try to keep the the Weight moderately down but I mean this Lens it's made up of a mix of some Metals and then what they call thermally Stable composite which is highend Engineered Plastics and so whether or Not they try to keep the weight down or Not this is still a heavy lens and you
Will notice it by the way out in the Field it it feels Hefty as you are Carrying it out and of course unlike a 70 to 200 which is a longer more slender Lens a lot of the weight is concentrated Right here and so as a result of that You do have a tripod collar so again That's a shared design philosophy with The 14mm f1.4 by the way this is a Removable tripod collar they do include A rubber sleeve that you can put over The top of the exposed uh kind of metal Screw points that are on there Underneath that tripod collar but you Can put that sleeve on if you don't want To use it the tripod collar itself Obviously you can rotate it there are Some detents at the Cardinal positions And uh it is is ARCA swis compatible in The foot I did find because of this Actual design that when I was just Carrying the lens on a strap out hiking It just tended to bump and rub in very Uncomfortable ways so I actually rotated The tripod foot out of the way uh you Can remove it all together if you're in A situation like that one other thing That I will say about this particular Tripod foot same as with the 14 mm f1.4 Is that it is really really close to the Barrel and so if you're accustomed to Kind of carrying a lens by the tripod Foot you can prettyy much forget that Here there just isn't really enough room
To hang on and for that matter if you're In the kind of straight up and down Position kind of the default position There is hardly room to get at the Dclick uh switch for the aperture that Is there and so it the Tripod uh foot and collar it is useful Obviously for going onto a tripod helps The balance point to be better but at The same time it is inconvenient in some Other situations now you can see up Front that we have a a very large curved Front element here and so what that Means and there's also a fixed lens Hood So what that means is that number one The lens cap has to go over the top of This although it is a unique design with A pinch cap it also means that there is No room for traditional screw on filters Here now at the lens mount there is a Gel filter holder there and then also in That lens cap there is actually a place To store a couple of gel filters in There it's a little bit of a weird Arrangement but it is it is an option That is there the lens as sigma's better Lenses do does come with a nice padded Nylon case as well now when it comes to Some of the other features here this is A very featur rich lens and so we have Got an aperture ring and we've got a Variety of options with that we've got The ability to declick the apture if so Desired we also have the ability to use
An aperture lock if you you know for Example if you don't want to go into the Automatic mode you can lock yourself out Of that and lock into the apture mode or If you hate aperture Rings you can just Put it in automatic mode and you can Lock it in place there and once the Locks in place you will not be able to Come out of that without unlocking it And so it means you're not going to Inadvertently enter into a manual Aperture setting and so some nice Options there we also have an AF MF Switch we have a focus hold or custom Button there on the side and you can Program that function within the camera And then in a unique Sigma feature we Have got an manual focus lock and so That can be really useful for example For astrophotography allows you to pre Focus the correct distance for the Stars Lock that in place and that way when you Go outside you've already got Infinity L Focus ready to go and you can be sure That you're getting accurately focused Results for your shots at night other Applications as well obviously but that Is a useful feature to have we also have A thorough weather ceiling here starting With a gasket at the lens mount internal Seals at the switches and the Rings and Then a coating on the front element to Help to be both uh water and oil Resistant for fingerprints easier to
Clean all of those things the aperture Iris itself has 11 blades and so it Helps to maintain a circular shape but I Will note it also produces a really nice Looking Sunburst or Sunstar effect when You stop The Lens down so overall this Is a really nicely made lens it is you Know professional GR in terms of the Build quality in terms of the various Features that are here this has Everything that you would expect on like A equivalent Sony GM lens and so it is a It's a very nice lens but it is big and Heavy and of course it is expensive so Let's talk autofocus autofocus here is Utilizing sigma's newest and best High-end autofocus system they call it HLA which stands for high-speed linear Actuator it is a high-speed linear motor And in this case although sure there are Some large elements in a design like This an f1.4 Lens it's probably Overkill here because With a lens with a this wide of an angle Of view A lot's going to be in Focus all The time and so as a byproduct I found That Focus switches Focus changes are Basically instantaneous just snapping From one to another uh autofocus is Quiet it's confident zero problems there Uh had no problem locking on to eye Detect on either human or animal Subjects and was able to track that fine At this point I'd be shocked if a lens
Doesn't do that because that has become Such a well executed piece of technology Now on the video side of things the Video AF is really really reactive now That's probably great because I think One application for this lens could be In doing like extreme angles of sports You know skateboarding or things like That and so autof Focus even in video Mode is really fast now for doing just Basic Focus pools from one to another It's almost too fast now you can detune That a bit in the settings of your Camera if you so desire but there's Plenty of speed there for doing Focus Changes you you can see here with my Hand test you see that a bit that the The focus goes so quickly from my hand To my eye that it's almost a bit abrupt There was a little bit of focus Breathing too that draws attention to That but autofocus here is extremely Capable uh this is in this case I would Say almost an overpowered autofocus System which is much better than an Underpower powered autofocus system by The way but you're not going to have any Issues with that so it does mean that You know Sports Photography is part of The equation here I think this lens is Perfectly capable of Now on the image quality side of the Equation we have 21 elements in 15 Groups so that's obviously a lot of
Elements for a prime lens and that Includes four lld elements three sld Elements and two aspherical elements and So a lot of exotic elements in the Design as well now obviously a lens like This is so extreme that doing my normal Kind of chart testing is impossible if I Try to get close even close up to the Chart you can see that it looks Something like this in fact in testing For vignette and Distortion I used my Gar one of my garage doors and this is a 16t wide garage door I was about a foot Away from it and still it is has so much In the frame that I actually had a Little bit of of the the frame of the Door itself in there it's just it's Incredibly wide angle of view and so in Testing however I found that I had less Than two stops of vignette by the way I Will do a detailed Optical breakdown at The end of the episode if you want to Stay tuned for that but I'll give you a Quick overview here so under two stops Of vignette the uh correction obviously As far as correcting the Distortion You're not going to be able to do that And just using the slider it wasn't Capable of doing that with a but there Is a a profile that Sigma will provide For the lens it actually def fishes the Lens so as you can see you lose a lot of Image but you're able to get back to a Fairly much a rect linear angle of view
And it's it works a little bit better on A less extreme image like this landscape Shot here and so I mean there I think There's a little bit of cost for doing That but it it does quite a good job as You can see which does add to the value Of the lens fringing is extremely well Controlled you can see in this shot Within my Barrel sauna there's some real High contrast areas and even at f1.4 I Didn't see any kind of fringing around Those areas I also found that when I was Looking at the edges of the frame and There's going to be a lot of stuff in The edges of the frame with a lens like This that they're in bare branches and High contrast areas zero problem S no Lateral chromatic aberration there as Well in this case I used an outdoor test And I shot at 100% uh still 61 Megapixels lots of resolution but trying To go to 200% in real world scenarios it Doesn't work quite as well as with my Test chart but what I did find is that Even at f1.4 there is certainly Sufficient sharpness all across the Frame it improves a little bit at f2 Proves more noticeably by f2.8 and there You basically stay the same from f2.8 Through f8 and with just a little slight Degradation at f11 results stay really Strong after f11 defraction will soften The image a little bit now obviously a Lens like this is not good at drawing
Something close to it so for close-up Work it's not amazing you can only close Or Focus as closely as 382 cm and you Get a very very low 0.06 times magnification now up close Performance is a little bit softer Doesn't have as much uh it's not Optimized for that kind of focus Distance and so stopping down to f2.8 Very radically improves the amount of Contrast that's available however you Can get a decent amount of bouquet here And in this kind of unique shot of Nala You can see that the background is Reasonably creamy there and so if you Can get close to a subject you can get a Fairly blurred out background though Obviously that's not really why you buy A lens like that it's maybe a nice extra For some unique and creative type shots However more important is that this lens Has amazing flare resistance and that's Really key in a lens like this where It's going to be very hard to keep Bright lights out of the frame cuz so Much is in the frame but I found very Very minimal impact for having the sun In the frame even very bright very Directional Sun zero problems with that So I was very impressed with that and This lens is being marketed by Sigma Largely for astrophotography and so Importantly there I found that coma Performance was good and there is
Minimal kind of coma smear in the edges Of the frame and so that's very very Well-managed as well and so if that's a Reason why you would consider a lens Like this you can know that it actually Does perform well in that regard so in Conclusion obviously this is an extreme Lens and it's for a very Niche audience Who is that audience well according to Sigma it's ASAP photographers for one I Would say also good application is maybe Concert photographers uh those that are Working in lower light situations that Want kind of the extreme options and Unique look that can Pro be provided by A fisheye type lens and so it can be Very useful and professional Applications for that I would say that Sports is also a nice option the fact You have such quick autofocus does help In that regard and allows you to get Maybe more narrow depth of field shots Or shoot in lower light conditions and Still get a reasonable shutter speed for Stopping action so it could be another Useful application for that for most People however this is a curiosity it's An extreme instrument that is Technically impressive and it is Technically impressive what Sigma has Done here but it's probably too big and Too expensive to appeal to most people However for those that actually could Use it and can use it well I suspect
That this is a lens that they will have A lot of fun with and that that happens To be you there's nothing that I took Away away from besides the obvious that It's big and it's expensive everything Else about the lens is it's pretty Fantastic now if you want more Information you can either look into the Descrip description down below and get Linkage to my full text review there's Also linkage to an image gallery there Along with buying links and now stay Tuned if you want the detailed breakdown Into the optical Performance so let's start by taking a Look at that 180° wild angle of view so In this shot just out of curiosity I Just reached my arm back with the camera And I took the shot while driving and so You can see obviously I can't reach back Very far and yet everything inside of my The front of my truck is included Including the side windows likewise in This shot that I mentioned earlier I was Just pointing down towards my feet and In this case the bridge is about 12 ft Apart here it looks like it's quite Narrow but this is a very wide space and You can see that not only is the two Edges of the bridge included but all the Way up these rails is included and of Course quite a distance ahead of my F Feet included there as well so it is Really incredible how much gets in the
Frame now with a diagonal fishee you do Have a lot of control over how much Distortion is going to be there so you Can see here just by changing the Composition by uh in the center if I put My subject in the center of the frame And hold the camera basically straight You can see that I've got a almost Straight horizon line but by tilting the Camera up just a little bit here by that Moves the subject up and introduces a Little bit of tilt to the camera you can See that already we get an pretty Extreme curvature going on to the Horizon line and of course if I moved it Up even higher that would be even more Extreme now the nature of this lens Means that I can't use test charts so Much and so I'm going to be relying on Real world shots to try to create the Various situations that I can test these Things so in this case I'm looking for Fringing specifically looking for Longitudinal chromatic aberration before And after the plane of focus so we can See in this very high contast crash Transition zone no fringing there also Very interestingly along here and then Also around the edges of this window These are all areas where I would Anticipate seeing fringing and you can See that they are extremely well Controlled so a great job there and in a A lens like this you're going to get a
Lot obviously a lot of stuff in the Frame all the time and so obviously There's going to be a lot of edges and So including these bare branches so I'm Very very impressed by how little Lateral chromatic aberration is here It's it's basically perfectly controlled No issue with fringing near the edge of The frame in these transition zones at All so really really high marks on both Of those areas so as mentioned earlier Trying to get a a subject where you can Test a subject that is big enough and Flat enough to be able to test for Something like vignette is difficult so I used my garage door here which is I Measured it's just right under 16 ft Across you can see that even though Setting up right in front of it I still Got other things in the frame you know a Little bit of concrete beforehand a Little bit of the the frame at the top Of the door here but it's about as good As I could find for getting a flat Surface for this so obviously when it Comes to Distortion Distortion is part Of the equation here and in fact if I Try to use the Lightroom slider to Correct for the Distortion you can see That even maxing it out it is reduced But there's still a massive amount of Distortion that is left but it's as far As correcting for the vignette I was Able to do that by just introducing a
Plus 45 and so less than two stops so That's not bad at all now I was Surprised when I used the profile that Sigma sent me which will be freely Available that it actually defish the Lens though it there's a little bit of Complications that come with that we'll Get to in just a moment so uh what you Can see here is that now we have a Rectilinear design without any kind of Vignette and fairly straight lines now Obviously you've lost a lot of image but I think you're probably still pretty Close to what a normal 15 mm lens its Angle of view would produce and in fact The amount of image that's lost was a Little more exaggerated there because of The extreme amount of distortion from Being so close if you're a little bit More of a distant subject as we've got Here you can see that sure we have lost A significant portion here at the edges Of the image but it's not nearly as Severe as what we saw there on the Garage door so what you can see here is That you're not going to Eliminate like this is not a distortion Here this is more kind of a keystoning Effect just because the lens is tilted Up somewhat and so as a byproduct the Lean is not going to go away but what we Can see is that the curvature of Everything has gone away so that fisheye Type Distortion is gone now what's
Interesting here is that if I cycle Through my information here in light Room you can see that the fulls sizee Image this was shot on the alpha 1 is 8640 by 5760 now on the right it says It's still 8640 by 5760 even though Obviously we have cropped off a Significant portion of the image due to Correcting that so that intrigued me and So I dived in here and what I find and What my theory is here is that after the Profile is applied the image seems to be Scaled back up because what you can see Is at a pixel level it's not really as Sharp and as high contrast as what it Was before so there is a little bit that Is lost through that process now I think It's more exaggerated on the edges as we Move back towards the center of the Frame I don't see that anymore but you Can also see that the scale is not Nearly as severe and so that effect is Taking place here and here those this is You know it's it's about the same size If we move over here this is obviously Much larger and so there's a portion of The image that has been you know Stretched and corrected and then I think Scaled back up and so anyway it's a Little bit of a weird bit of trickery Going on however it is a nice option Because you are obviously getting the Ability to have a defish version of your Images as well now in this case I'm
Actually going to examine images at 100% I couldn't use a chart so I'm going out Into the real world and trying to look At real world images at 200% and the Less in controlled environment it just Doesn't work as well so I've got f1.4 on The left I've got F2 on the right so Let's take a look starting in the center Of the frame to see what we see so first Of all you can see that the lens is very Sharp even at f1.4 in the center of the Frame we can see that as we stop it down The contrast does pick up a little bit At f2 and you can see in areas like this Uh Old Wagon Wheel here you can see that It's a little crisper and better to find Now if we pop over to the edge of the Frame we see basically a similar story Looking at the vehicles here you can see Already I mean there's lots of detail And contrast there the image is Obviously a little bit brighter we've Removed some vignette and I think that Some of the textur are just a little bit Crisper as a result not a whole lot of Additional resolution I wouldn't say but A little bit better contrast and I would Say a little bit better definition in Some of these areas both due to some of The Shadows lifting somewhat from the Vignette but then also I think that the Textures are just a little clearer there Now there's actually a more significant Jump from F2 now on the left to
F2.8 on the right and if we come back Down here we can see on the right that Uh textures are you know crisper still Contrast is better defined you can see Even in this snow area here that it's Just better resolved here along the edge Of the frame uh moving into the vehicles And these plants better resolved and Then as we come back towards the center Of the frame we can see again like this Area is definitely crisper still and I'll go to the other side just so you Can look there look at the mailbox you Can see it's better defined and as we Move off towards the edges here just a Little bit more detail in everything now More Traditional landscape apture of f4 And f5.6 frankly I don't see a lot of Difference after f2.8 things stay pretty Consistently uh the same from f2.8 all The way through f8 you can see that f8 Continues to look fantastic f11 is still Very good but you can see it is very Slightly softer due to the effects of Defraction and so we're starting that Cycle now towards losing some detail and Contrast due to defraction effects that Difference is actually more pronounced In that final stop from f11 to F-16 Where defraction is really starting to Play Havoc there and the image is still Usable as you can see but it is Considerably softer than what we see Over here at f11 all of these textures
You can just see that there's less Detail in them you know look even in the Amount of contrast on the car from left To the right side and over here you can Just see that we are starting to lose Information though I would say this lens Is usable throughout its Zoom range Though I personally would keep it at f11 As a top now as noted previously our Maximum magnification is really low on This lens but also if you're going to Shoot up close it is nice to use a Little bit smaller aperture than f1.4 The lens as we saw is really sharp at Infinity to f1.4 it is softer when You're up close and you can see that There's a pretty radical difference Between f1.4 and f2.8 in terms of the Contrast on the image and and so I would Definitely if you want detail when You're up close I would stop down a Little bit you can however create some Really uniquely either wacky images uh Using that Distortion creatively as I've Tried to do here but you can also see The quality of the Boker is actually Pretty decent for a lens like this you Would never expect a fishe lens to be One producing bokeh but you know this is An extreme unprecedented instrument here In this shot here there's less kind of Extreme exaggeration there you can also See however that at f1.4 it's it's Usable but the contrast is reduced here
At that closer Focus distance here's Another shot to look at the bouqu Quality and so once again up close this Is only at f1.4 and so you can see that You know the the contrast isn't amazing But the quality of the blur is pretty Good flare resistance was very Impressive and again it's very important In a lens like this because such a wide Angle of view 180° means that you're Going to have bright lights in the frame And so I could move the Sun the kind of Reframe with the sun in different Position this is at f1.4 no issues at All and then if I begin to stop The Lens Down you can see that even at smaller Apertures there was no issue there I Composed here again this is f11 there's A little bit of a ghosting artifact here Not bad at all however in this shot here You can see that we've got a nice uh Sunburst effect going on and also the Flare resistance is quite good here's a Shot at F1.4 and you can see the sun's right There in the frame a different kind kind Of image you can see the contrast is Held up perfectly and because we're a Little bit further away that detail There is fantastic now perhaps most Importantly for this lens is a look at Coma now this lens has a lot of really Important strengths for shooting Astrophotography number one coma is
Extremely well controlled look how crisp Those star points they're in the center But then if I pan off towards the edge They're almost as sharp right in the Corners of the frame that's really Really impressive another advantage to This particular lens is the fact that Vignette is quite low even at f1.4 that Means you're not introducing a lot of Noise and correcting for that vignette And then also the fact looking at this Image now obviously this is not a peak Astro night the moon was still quite Bright but it was the only clear night I Had during my test uh period and it was Cloudy before the morning came but Anyway uh I shot this image f1.4 this is Only ISO 800 and a shutter speed of of 2 Seconds so that means I'm completely Eliminating the possibility of any kind Of stretching of the Stars light Trails Forming I'm able to freeze that quickly And also I'm keeping the iso down and so There is little noise in the image which Produces a better end result here's Another shot here and I just wanted to Quickly demonstrate the different ways You can approach so obviously here once Again you know star points look Fantastic that's all good I also have The option of doing that defish option And recomposing to get a rectilinear Image obviously there's in the frame That could be a good thing however
Depending on you know whether how much You want to be in the frame but you can See that while there is a little bit of Stretching at the corners from that Defishing uh it still is very very Usable and so as a byproduct that's a Nice secondary option for doing Astrophotography overall however this is A really really impressive instrument if You're serious about Astro hey you've Made it to the end thanks for watching Have a great day and let the light In For
