100-400 Mk2 vs Tammy zoom vs Siggy zoom (1 Viewer)

They are pretty close. the 400 5.6 has been a stellar lens for years. the reasons one would choose the the 400 5.6 over the original 100-400 were:

Tack Sharp
Super Fast AF
Lightweight
Built in Hood

The 100-400 II pretty much matches it except for the lightweight, but.....it has a 4 stop image stabilizer. so that is a trade off i am willing to live off. oh yeah, it zooms, now has a min. focus distance of 1 meter, and the hood has a cool notch in it, so that if you are using a circular PL, you can rotate it w/o taking the hood off...

stuck in the same circle ,and having tried the sigma sport for a hour i decided yesterday that it was the one to go for ,frustratingly all the u.k sites that list it seem to be doing so on a "it will be in stock mid feb " basis there does not seem to be any available in the u.k .
so for now i will stick with my 1d3 400 5.6 and 1.4 tc combo as i have lost the moment and back on the indecision bandwagon ,further testing up in snowdonia today will decide me ,nearly went for the tamron yesterday out of pure frustration but will most likely now sit it out till the C sigma comes out

Having looked at the digital picture lens comparison it looks like the 100-400 mkII is about the same sharpness as the 400/5.6 both at 400mm and 560mm which is incredible for a zoom lens.

100-400 mark II hunts with distant birds against skye

hi all,
what i found is, that the af on my canon 100-400 mark II hunts more on distant birds against skye on my 7D mark I than on my former 100-400 mark I. I think the reason for this is, that the focus limiter on the mark II lens is from 3m on insteead of 6 m on the mark I. I´m using center point af in servo mode. this is a strange thing I`m not so happy with. how are the sigmas in this respect ? or will a 7DII body hunt less in this situation ?

best wishes,
andreas

For my typical usage (at the long end using a crop sensor 7DII, subject usually in the center) the image quality differences shown on the Digital Picture between the Canon 100-400II and the Tammy 150-600 can shrink drastically depending on the aperture and focal length. At first glance long and wide (600/6.3 vs 560/8) the Canon kills. Try the Tammy at f7.1 or f8 and the performance gap shrinks. Now look at the Tammy at 500mm, it gets even better. And on a crop sensor that ugly Tammy corner performance should not be as big a problem. I do wish they had images for the Tammy on a 7DII for a direct comparison with the Canon 100-400II.

On a recent birding trip to Ecuador I used the Tammy/7DII in dismal conditions (ISO6400!) and was often pleasantly surprised at the results. I think the trick was using f7.1-f8 and backing off full zoom just a tad.

Anyway I have a feeling that for my usage these lenses are about equal in optical performance. I imagine the Canon is of better build quality and might have better IS performance. Plus the smaller size would be nice for carry-on packing. Those folks looking at weight comparisons between these lenses should remember that the 1.4x is a chunk.

I'm not a Tammy fanboy, and frankly was looking at the dig-pic site to justify purchasing the Canon and selling the Tammy, but after doing the comparisons discussed above I just can't justify spending over $2,500 for the Canon lens/1.4x combo.

Does anyone have any practical experience with the image stabilization systems of all the three said lenses?