Alrighty, with that piece of housekeeping done on to the main event! A friend of mine recently rented a Pentax DA 15mm f4 Limited for a trip to the 4 corners area of UT/AZ/CO/NM he had a couple of extra days after he got home before it needed to be returned to www.cameralensrentals.com (A great place to rent from if you need to!) and he offered me the chance to play with it. I was very eager to do so and jumped at the chance, even though I would have very limited amounts of time to do anything with it. I already have a lens that covers that focal length but it is much larger as you can see here.
With lens caps on you can see that the Sigma is twice the size (and weight) of the Pentax despite the Pentax being all metal, I guess aluminum has its merits!
With the hoods on, the size differential is similar. The Pentax has a built in slide out hood which is very handy, where the Sigma has a detachable and reversible hood which saves space but is really quite large.
With the hoods on, the size differential is similar. The Pentax has a built in slide out hood which is very handy, where the Sigma has a detachable and reversible hood which saves space but is really quite large.
Looking from the front the diameters of the lenses are readily apparent. Pentax 49mm as are ALL the Limiteds, which is great if you want to limit the number of filters you buy. Sigma 77mm which is a common professional filter size with professional cost too!
I did not include here any of the comparison photos, I try not to post anything here that is not processed a least a little to make them look better and in all honesty to the testing I did I simply posted the JPEG's straight out of the camera to my Zenfolio. As I said above you can download the original shots in the original sizes and look for resolution, CA and other things that excite you.Besides they are REALLY boring shots!
These are two shots that I processed from the few I shot that I liked. First one of my usual suspects.
Second a flag put at the end of the docks at our lake to show people where it ends when there is snow. Loved the colors.
In short I really loved this tiny little lens, it handles well, looks good and was a FAST focusing joy to use. One day when I am rich I could see myself with a set of the Limiteds to use. Using a prime, especially a small unobtrusive one, takes me back to a different time and type of photography. One without huge zooms that weigh a ton, and cameras that are light and reasonably sized. When I put one of these on I can take my vertical grip off and have a very compact camera with awesome IQ.
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