The Sigma came to me today, rather than next week. We are anticipating another very hot weekend in Sydney, over 40 degrees C, so I wanted to take photos of the flying foxes at Parramatta or Penrith one afternoon. That way I can compare the results to my EF 500/4L IS USM. Flying fox pics are on my Facebook photo page, pinned to the top at present, getting some great traction according to my better half.
In any case, I ran out after work to a local pond today while there was good light and did some more testing. I copy the text from my FB photo page to save me typing...
Well, did this lens perform? I am absolutely blown away by the image quality I was able to get even of "boring" common, old waterbirds.
I tried it with the matching 1.4x and 2x converters and I must say some of the pictures with the 2x were mind blowingly sharp! Albeit, that also came at a cost with the AF acquisition speed. However, even the manufacturers' own lenses slow right down with a 2x!
The flight photos were not all sharp, though I only got to shoot three brief sequences. The Little Pied Cormorant had five images in total with the first two soft, but the last three pin sharp! The Australasian Swamphen was more difficult, as it had some mixed backgrounds and it was getting too big for my frame as it approached. I got 8 sharp shots out of a burst of 32.
And the one thing I still had to do was to customise the lens with Sigma's USB dock, which I did once I arrived home from this quick late session. I adjusted the AF speed, which was at an average setting and I would bet, that this was the culprit causing the AF being hit and miss with the flying swamphen.
Needless to say, I have an extremely busy testing weekend (or two or three) coming up.
In one word so far (ok two). VERY IMPRESSED!!!! A little fine tuning and I think it should kick butt!
I started a gallery on my website for the test shots. A couple of 100% crops are included. Boy, the 2x rocks big time!!!
http://www.amatteroflight.com/Sigma-500mm-f4-DG-OS-HSM-test-images/