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Author Topic: Sigma 120-300/2.8 on Canon - experiences & thoughts?  (Read 1273 times)

nemophoto

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Sigma 120-300/2.8 on Canon - experiences & thoughts?
« on: July 13, 2017, 06:26:34 pm »

My quite ancient 300/2.8 finally bit the dust a few months back I had had it for 25 years and it served me faithfully. My mistake was sending it to Canon to be cleaned for the first time in years. There was guarantee or anything because of the age. In the end, it just stopped focusing on a shoot when I was using servo. As excellent a lens as it was, my 70-200/2.8 II wasn't terribly far off qualitatively (which is what I used to finish the shoot).

I have shoot in about a week and the client informed me that they really want long lens on some of the stuff to really blow away the background as only a 300 can do (though I usually shoot around f4-4.5 anyway).

I was going to get a 300 from Canon CPS to use, but then started thinking: What about the Sigma 120-300/2.8. It's supposed quite a good lens (especially if I'm generally shooting at f4 or so). I would have to calibrate the focusing with FoCal, since I find all my Sigma lenses (my 50 and 85) are off and needed micro adjustments on my 1Dx and 5Ds.

What have any of your experiences been with the lens? The shots that I'll be using it for, primarily, are becoming 8' tall in-store posters (the native 5Ds file doesn't have to be res'd up at all since at 400ppi, it is almost exactly what the printer needs at a final 100dpi output). Is this lens sharp? Is the focus too sluggish, or not bad?

Thanks for the thoughts.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2017, 12:47:57 pm by nemophoto »
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NancyP

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Re: Sigma 120-300/2.8 on Canon - experiences & thoughts?
« Reply #1 on: July 17, 2017, 02:36:15 pm »

Try a sports photography site. They must be the main users of such lenses.
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nemophoto

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Re: Sigma 120-300/2.8 on Canon - experiences & thoughts?
« Reply #2 on: July 17, 2017, 05:12:40 pm »

Thanks. I ended up renting the beast from lensrentals.com. From what I've read, plus the DxO score (for what it's worth), it should be fine, plus is a bit better optically (again, if you trust DxO), than the 100-400 II I borrowed from CPS a couple months ago. I liked the latter lens, but a bit slow for fashion at times (f-stop, not speed of focus). My only real concern is having to calibrate the focus -- I haven't had good luck with Sigma and focus unless I use the micro adjustment, after which they are very sharp.
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