is my canon making my sigma look bad

stumac

stumac

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Just recieved today a canon 85 mm 1.8 and a sigma 50mm 1.4 so first off I must state I've only used them in the house only tonight,
I found the canon amazingly sharp and the sigma ..... Well .....sharp
So what I'm wondering is the sigma faulty or is the canon so good it's making the sigma look bad( bad probably being too strong of a word but you know what I mean)anyone out there owned or used these lenses? Your findings would be of much Interest to me
 
I have the Siggy 50mm f1.4 and I find that it doesn't blow my socks off at f1.4. After sharpening I'm happy with it and it does get very sharp when stopped down a bit but it's not “oh my gosh” sharp at f1.4 straight out of the camera IMVHO. However all things are relative and from what I've read the Siggy is the one of the sharpest 50's wide open.

All that's assuming that you've got one that's working within tolerance.
 
I've not used the Siggy, but I'll echo the comment above; IME the 85mm f/1.8 is a crackingly sharp lens.
 
Thanks for replys all I suppose something I overlooked was the fact the sigma was wide open. With regards to the canon though it's the best lens I own for sharpness and is by far the cheapest out of my collection, wish I had bought it along time ago
 
If the 50mm was wide open and the 85mm was stopped down to anything from f/2.0, I'm not surprised you can see a difference in sharpness.
 
I doubt there is anything to choose between them, they're both very fine lenses. If there is anything to be seen, it will only be around the edges at low f/numbers.

Make sure you're comparing apples with apples, and be especially careful with focusing as depth of field is really tiny at close range. Beware of that focus test chart - it is far from ideal and very prone to user error. You will probably find problems that aren't there, or even create a few if you're not careful. There are better ways, and easier too. Quite a few threads on here about that.
 
Thanks again all, I tested them both at 1.8.
Mat be a bad way of testing but I lined up 4 of my sons toy figures in a line and took shots at a 45 deg angle using selective focusing eg put camera on tripod focused on action man 1 to blur the other 3 then sane with 2,3 and 4
 
i have used canon 50mm f1.4 and did compare to the Sigma 50 1.4 , i think that for me , the sigma is sharper even at 1.4

But to compare to the canon 85mm , the 85 works even better than these last 2 50mm lens -one limit is the 85mm stay only at 1.8 and doesn't make some light effect as wide open at 1/4.

But still, i hate the 50mm f1.4 of Sigma, the one i have had fell in back focus so easy so i had to sale it out.
 
stumac said:
Thanks again all, I tested them both at 1.8.
Mat be a bad way of testing but I lined up 4 of my sons toy figures in a line and took shots at a 45 deg angle using selective focusing eg put camera on tripod focused on action man 1 to blur the other 3 then sane with 2,3 and 4
Click to expand...

Sorry, but that is indeed a poor way to test.

You're very close, DoF is a couple of mms, and the subject isn't flat. The AF sensors are bigger than the viewfinder point, you can never be certain what they've locked on to, and it might be slightly different each time. Then you're only looking at central sharpness, and it's the edges that sorts the men from the boys.

If you want to test for that, you need a distant subject because DoF and potential focus issues make things extremely hard and misleading to compare at close range.
 
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