Sigma 16mm F/14 Dc Dn Cont Lens for Sony E Review

Sigma's approach to mirrorless lenses (DN) has come in two distinct phases. Sigma get-go released a series of 3 budget primes with moderately wide apertures (19mm, 30mm, and 60mm f/2.8 DN lenses). I've tested all of these, and they are actually surprisingly good footling optics, with nice colour, quiet focus, extremely compact size, and a deal price. Though they wait aught like the other Fine art series lenses, they were, ironically, badged as Art lenses. In 2016 Sigma launched a new mirrorless lens, the Sigma 30mm f/ane.4 DN DC. Though information technology shared a lot of blueprint elements with the SLR Art serial primes (like body manner and materials), forth with the wide maximum aperture that Fine art primes are famous for, it was, ironically, badged a "Contemporary" lens. As a result, Sigma's arroyo to mirrorless branding is a little similar Alice'due south "Through the Looking Glass", where everything ends up somewhat upside down. The Sigma 16mm f/i.4 DN lens certainly looks very much like an Fine art lens!

Internal conversations with Sigma insiders reveals that the popularity of Sony's Eastward mount (and its evolution to the more premium a6xxx series) caught Sigma a little by surprise, and this second moving ridge of lenses (and their more than premium nature) makes for a better match with Sony'due south ain evolution. Having owned and used the 30mm f/1.4 DN lens, I was excited for the release of the new Sigma 16mm f/1.4 DC DN Gimmicky as a reasonably priced, premium wide angle option. If you ain Micro 4/3rds or Sony APS-C E-mountain, the 16mm DN should exist a serious interest to yous.

Thanks to my friends over at Sigma Canada for the loaner of the review copy of the lens.

The Contemporary designation obviously comes considering the lens relies on electronic correction (through the embedded profile) to correct for some things like distortion and vignette rather than the correction coming solely through the lens optics (which ART lenses are supposed to do). Fair enough, though I've seen very few perfectly corrected lenses in my mean solar day, and I don't recall whatever of them being Art lenses (Otus, perhaps!).

So don't exist put off by the Gimmicky designation; the 16mm DN is a serious performer!

Prefer to watch your reviews? I've got you covered! See my full video review here!

Sigma 16mm DN Build Quality

Equally previously noted, the physical blueprint of the 16mm DN is instantly familiar to those who have used either the 30mm f/1.4 DN Contemporary or a lens like the 35mm f/1.4 or 50mm f/one.4 Fine art lenses. If y'all were familiar with the 30mm DN lens, it will seem a footling big; if y'all were familiar with the 35/50mm lenses, information technology will seem quite pocket-sized. This is, by a skillful margin, the largest lens in the DN series, but it is nevertheless a relatively compact lens by normal standards. To be off-white, however, this is likewise the most extreme lens in the serial, as all previous lenses take been very "safety" focal ranges (from 28mm – 90mm full frame equivalent). The 30mm lens has a full frame equivalent focal range (on a Sony ane.5x ingather gene) of 45mm, and has a relatively elementary optical formula of nine elements in vii groups. The 16mm lens corresponds to a classic wide angle of 24mm, and with an extremely large maximum discontinuity to boot. That added engineering challenge is shown in the complexity of the optical formula, which is xvi elements in 13 groups (almost twice as complex)!

This video breaks down the build and handling of the 16mm DN.

The 16mm DN is 3.63" long (92.3mm) and a adequately narrow 2.84" (72.2mm) in diameter. This is most ¾" (19mm) longer than the 30mm, but just about 7mm larger in girth. Filter size in an extremely common 67mm. The lens weighs 14.29 oz (405g). The lens all the same balances fine on the Sony a6500 body that I used to test information technology on, though it is definitely up in weight from the 30mm, which weighed in at 265g.

The lens body is Sigma'due south attractive, mod blend of black on black just given grapheme through a variety of textures, including fine ribs at various points. While all Sigma lenses use a lot of the same materials (a mixture of metals and their "thermal composites", aka high end engineered plastics), some Sigma lenses accept a slightly more premium feel to them. This is such a lens, and nothing about the lens feels cheap.

There are no switches nor any distance markers on the lens due it it having a stepping motor with a "focus by wire" transmission focus ring (with such lenses there is no physical coupling to the elements, which renders a standard distance window impossible). Zeiss has created a solution to this on its high end Batis line past adding a minor OLED display that electronically simulates a altitude window (among other things.). The manual focus ring is dainty and broad on the lens, and moves much similar near "focus by wire" systems – smoothly but without a lot of tactile experience.

One nice touch that I've seen on some of the Art series lenses and that is included on the 16mm DN lens is a rubberized transition zone on the included lens hood right where you would grip the lens hood to loosen or tighten it. Information technology'south that kind of pocket-size attention to particular that impresses someone like me who sees a lot of lenses.

The lens has the now standard nine rounded aperture blades that I've seen on most all the Sigma lenses I've reviewed in the last 4-5 years. I'll comment more on the bokeh quality in a moment, but Sigma does a adept job of maintaining a round shape even with the aperture closed downwardly a number of stops.

If you were planning to do some macro piece of work with your wide bending lens, the 16mm DN is certainly not going to your first choice. It can focus downwardly to a relatively close ix.84" (25cm), but doesn't take much of a focal length to attain magnification with. The byproduct is a rather poor 0.10x magnification (one:nine.9 reproduction ratio). If you need magnification from your broad angle lens, something similar the Samyang/Rokinon 12mm f/2 lens might improve accommodate your purpose.

I've saved some of the best news until final. The 16mm DN is the start Sigma mirrorless lens to include some moisture resistance, which I recollect very of import on a lens that volition likely be used for landscape work. It has a very pocket-sized rubber gasket near the lens mount and Sigma calls information technology "dust and splash-proof", which suggests some further sealing internally.

All in all there is a lot to like and little to criticize here. Information technology's a nicely made lens that has a premium look and feel to it.

I inadvertently put this to the test, as I was shooting a wedding in Portland, Oregon, and had the lens in a harness system.  I had grabbed the wrong connector by accident, so I knew that I didn't have as snug a fit in the holster that I had my Sony a6500 and the 16mm DN in (I was carrying it as a wide angle option to supplement my full frame bodies that did the heavy lifting).  I was beingness careful initially, but while shooting a shot of the conjugal party from across the antechamber of the facility we were in, I was rushing down the stairs for some other angle when it happened.  Thud!  I watched in frozen horror as the camera and lens bounced downward the wooden rungs of the staircase…all the mode down.  When I rescued it at the bottom, nonetheless, while the lens hood was knocked beveled and had pushed the safety of the focus ring back a bit, I was able to quickly straighten everything up and ended upwardly with no more than than a small scuff on the lens hood.  The lens focused fine, and when I tested it later, continued to show good centering.  That'southward non the kind of testing I like to practise…just the lens passed, with flying colors.  Here'south the infamous staircase, shot with the lens…

Sigma 16mm DN Autofocus

I've previously reviewed the 19mm f/2.eight DN ART lens from Sigma, and, while the AF worked fine in a lot of situations, I discovered with utilise that I had some bug with the AF pulsing in and out some during video recording, particularly if in that location was whatever backlighting in the scene. This was in large role due to the fact that it was developed during the NEX days when Sony exclusively used a Contrast AF focus system in its mirrorless system. Later, however, Sony moved to a hybrid system that employs both Phase Detect and Contrast AF along with new features like Heart AF. Sony loves innovation, and my opinion is that they are much meliorate at developing new engineering science than they are at fully realizing (and servicing) existing tech. Sony is very much a forward looking company, and that has both practiced and bad points. This is, I imagine, 1 of the challenges of developing for a Sony system – the target keeps moving. The expert news is that the newer DN lenses (16 and 30mm) have been developed with Sony's newer AF technology in listen.

Sigma says this, "The optical design and stepping motor deliver smooth autofocus during video shooting. The lens design fully accommodates the Fast Hybrid AF of Sony East-mountain cameras for super-fast autofocus functionality. Using confront recognition AF results in consistent autofocusing on faces, even as the subjects move." In other words, the 16mm DN supports all of Sony's new bells and whistles on their newer mirrorless bodies.

In practice, the Sigma 16mm f/1.4 DN has great autofocus. The AF is nearly instantaneous as I move from minimum focus to infinity targets, locking on silently and confidently. And it is silent. Even I put the lens side by side to my ear the merely thing I hear during focus is the focus confirmation beep. AF-C style produces no aural noise, either, and I got excellent face tracing during video segments (something I apply these Sigma lenses for quite a flake). Information technology's not always foolproof, but, then again, I've yet to run into anything on a Sony system that quite matches the magic of Catechism's DPAF for video servo AF face tracking. This lens does seem improve than average though.

I've used some other third party wide angle lenses for Sony (the aforementioned Sigma 19mm and the Zeiss Touit 12mm f/2.viii) and got a scrap of pulsing with those lenses in sure situations (this was too true of several lenses I adapted to the organisation), but I've not seen any of that behavior from the 16mm DN, which locks on very confidently.

I've got nothing simply good to say about the AF on this lens, which hasn't always been the instance with Sigma lenses in the past!

Sigma 16mm DN Epitome Quality

The best mode to go all the info is to watch this video:

One of my favorite things about Sony is that they are not restrictive with third political party lenses when information technology comes to in camera profiles. Third party lenses get the first party treatment for in camera corrections of things similar distortion, vignette, etc…. Unlike Canon, however, they also embed profile corrections into the RAW files. This is peachy in real earth use, but as a lens reviewer it can be a little difficult to divorce lens functioning from photographic camera corrections. I accept decided that what matters in my Sony reviews is to report on what you are going to see equally the finish user, which is going to be the images after correction.

Information technology is interesting to note, for example, that at the moment when I click the shutter I tin see the sides of the images existence "stretched" equally the lens contour is added. So, the 16mm DN is getting some in camera assist, but the good news is that the stop product is pretty splendid.

Earlier I break downwards the details of the lens performance, I do desire to raise one more than point. The Sony a6500 I'm testing the lens on has an excellent sensor. Skilful colour, great dynamic range, and a nicely detailed 24 MP sensor. In some situations I strongly prefer full frame image quality to APS-C, even from a expert sensor similar this one. I of those areas is when the ISO level goes upwardly, as I notice the "look" of the pixels to exist more obvious on APS-C. A lens like this 16mm f/1.four certainly helps that problem, though, every bit due to the wide maximum aperture, like shooting fish in a barrel to handhold focal length, and, in the case of the a6500, an excellent IBIS system (In Body Paradigm Stabiization), there are very few situations where a high ISO level volition be necessary. The lens' strong functioning at broad apertures merely seals that deal!

Resolution

The 16mm DN is a very strongly performing lens, with a lot of resolution available even at wide apertures. In existent world shooting I was very happy with the results, with a lot of good item showing upward at a pixel level. The sharpness is also nicely even across the frame, with fairly skilful edge performance (important for mural photographers). Wide open (f/ane.4) the center performance is stronger than the corners, simply neither are the corners mushy, either. There is a bit of veiling (lower contrast) wide open that I traced to a fairly mutual problem with wide aperture lenses – some axial (or longitudinal) chromatic aberrations. Different lateral chromatic aberrations, which oftentimes appear near the edges of the frame as green and purple fringing on both the top and bottom of things like, say, tree branches or other high contrast subjects, axial CA (LoCA) occurs when not all colors focus equally. It typically appears as regal fringing earlier the plane of focus and sometimes also with some green fringing after the aeroplane of focus. Lateral CA is generally unaffected past aperture, and will appear at almost aperture values. Axial CA is oft "fixed" past stopping the lens down to smaller apertures, every bit the depth of field increases and there is less variance between the focus of the colors.

The lens does not really suffer with any green fringing later the plane of focus, but there is definitely some purple fringing that shows up before the aeroplane of focus. This axial CA does rob a niggling of the wide open contrast (which may or may non be a bad affair depending on your subject field and/or shooting style). Fortunately, in this instance, the solution is easy. Stopping down to f/ii or smaller substantially eliminates the issues, and, equally a consequence, there is a large difference betwixt f/1.4 and f/2 ( as you can see in the sample below).

If you want to eliminate some CA at f/ane.iv, you need to utilize something similar Adobe's eyedropper tool to select the colour so eliminate it.

The corner sharper increases slowly as you terminate the lens downwardly, and the optimal aperture for landscapes seems to be around f/5.six where the center and edge operation are most closely aligned.

Here's a breakdown of the resolution in a controlled test at fairly shut range:

F/1.four: Left, Center, Right

F/two: Left, Middle, Correct

F/2.8: Left, Center, Correct

F/4: Left, Center, Right

f/5.vi: Left, Center, Right

When I shot a like scene on the a6500/Sigma 16mm and and then the new a7RIII/Sony FE 24-105mm f/4 G OSS lens (at f/5.6) and so downsampled the a7RIII epitome to equivalent resolution with the a6500 (which favors the a7RIII result), I found that the Sigma 16mm DN all the same delivered the better paradigm. Less vignette along the edges, improve sharpness most the edges, and slightly more contrast.  This is a very sharp lens, with few competitors in the Sony system.

Speaking of the a7RIII, the 16mm DN can exist mounted on a Sony full frame Due east mount camera, where it volition automatically trigger Sony'south APS-C mode (on the a7RII/a7RIII this is even so a quite robust 18MP). You have the option of manually turning APS-C style off, only at that place is little to proceeds by doing so. The total frame image circle isn't even close to being covered, and you will need to essentially crop to the regular APS-C crop cistron to eliminate the black area where the epitome circle isn't covered by the lens.

Salvage yourself some trouble and merely shoot with the lens in APS-C style.  At that place aren't really any benefits from doing otherwise.

Nevertheless, I like the lens on the a7RIII as a reasonably sized, sharp prime in APS-C mode and also as a nifty video selection in Super 35 style.  You get to take advantage of that great sensor and still get a dainty 18 MP of resolution.

Color Rendition

My review of this lens coincided with 1 of the worse stretches of weather that I've faced.  Extreme common cold temperatures punctuated every now and then past blizzard-similar storms.  Not exactly the prime time of year to get smashing color.  I've done my best, merely delight realize that this lens is capable of delivering improve color than what my review photos might advise.

Information technology'south important for a landscape lens to deliver a good color operation. Nearly lenses deliver a fairly good color operation, with a few outliers. I've seen some mod lenses with a bit of a color bandage/bias to them or that deliver somewhat flat colors, and there are some other lenses (unremarkably with Zeiss attached to them) that accept a extraordinarily cute color rendition that is both vivid and accurate. The 16m DN seems to fall into mostly the normally good category. Images wait very good coming out of the lens, but neither was I wowed in any particular style. Color accurateness seemed to be quite good, and saturation seemed almost neutral (meaning you can punch in what you lot desire either via in camera profiles or in mail processing). In that location are certainly no odd color casts, nor do images look flat and unsaturated. I call back Sigma delivered what they needed to hither.

I should note hither that the lens is easy to add together filters to at a very common 67mm size, which certainly adds to the value as a landscape lens. I like to add ND filters for allowing for longer shutter speeds, and in some situations a circular polarizer tin reduce reflections, add contrast, and deepen colour saturation. The focal length is non and so wide that you should get too many weird "polarizing" effects in bluish skies. All of the focus takes place internally, and nothing rotates at the front, which makes using a polarizer more than simple.

Flare Resistance, Chromatic Aberrations, Bokeh, and Distortion

One area of force for the lens is in the flare resistance (a fundamental metric for a wide bending lens!). I was delighted to observe that when I put fifty-fifty harsh sun in the frame the epitome quality held upwardly nearly perfectly, and that was true at a variety of aperture values. A nice bonus is that the ix bladed aperture produces very dainty lord's day bursts/sunstars with the lens stopped downward, which I actually appreciate in a broad angle lens. I love shooting backlit scenes and adding that sunburst outcome as a finishing detail.

I did detect some imperial fringing in sure loftier contrast scenes at wide apertures. The nature of this is covered in the resolution section to a higher place. Information technology is substantially only an issue at f/1.4.

While a broad bending lens like this is inappreciably going to make backgrounds disappear, a wide aperture on a lens like this does have the benefit of giving y'all a more 3 dimensional look to some of your images. If you compose with your subject having some distance to the background, it will definitely stand out. The quality of the bokeh in these situations is actually quite practiced, though I did notice in an image with Christmas lights in the background that at that place were some concentric rings (unremarkably chosen "onion bokeh") in the bokeh circles. These are well-nigh never going to be big enough with this kind focal length to be noticeable, however, so I wouldn't be too concerned. I only noticed them at a pixel level examination of the epitome. In virtually situations I constitute the quality of the bokeh to exist fairly nice, as this shot of pillars on a staircase shows.

Gauging distortion of the raw lens itself is a little difficult because of Sony's profile zipper (in camera correction), but I can encounter on the screen or in the viewfinder earlier the transformation takes place (in a split second) that there is some noticeable barrel distortion. But by the fourth dimension the image stretches out and is massaged into shape by the stop result is not bad, with merely a mild amount of barrel baloney remaining. You tin can purposefully encounter the distortion past turning off the profile correction, which shows that the lens definitely has some moderate barrel distortion. In this case, however, the automatic correction will be in that location in both your JPEG images and through the embedded profile in RAW files.

I run into no reason why this lens couldn't be a friend to, say, a realtor who needed to shoot interiors for a listing. Certainly for landscape type piece of work or general purpose shootings the lens volition work just fine after the profile corrections are applied.

The same is true of vignette, that, while it certainly exists if y'all go earthworks for it, arrives already corrected for in both RAW and JPEG images.  I had to go digging to find the vignette to demonstrate here.

I recommend that you accept a look at the image galleries here to run across more than images that I took during the review.

Coma Performance

Comatic aberrations are something I try to exam and look for with any wide bending options that might potentially exist used for astrophotograpy (stars) or similar purposes. The wide maximum aperture of this lens merely heightens a lot of people'south expectations for using this lens for astro piece of work.  Unfortunately this has never been a large Sigma strength in the many Sigma lenses that I've tested. They aren't the worse performers in this metric, simply neither are they virtually the top, either. The same truth applies hither. While I didn't get an amazing astro night during my review period (this time of yr brings either clouded conditions or bitter cold conditions, often with a brilliant moon), I did get one extremely common cold (-32 C) night were I was able to go out (briefly) and shoot stars (brrrrr….).

Commencement the bad – at that place'south definitely some coma. Star points are adequately well-baked in the centre of the frame, but most the edges they stretch a bit and grow wings. They look a fiddling similar mosquitoes. Stopping downward to f/2 does aid a fleck, but doesn't eliminate the issue.

A secondary issue is more well-nigh the nature of mirrorless. Mirrorless lenses (unless they are manual focus), rely on a focus by wire organisation. This means that when you lot turn the focus ring information technology sends input to the focus motor, which then moves the elements to focus. It isn't quite as precise as directly manual focus, though, as thus makes focusing on the stars a little more challenging. There is no standard distance window, and what I saw with the in camera feedback was that accurate focus for stars arrived nowhere close to "infinity".  Autofocus is rarely going to work in that kind of setting, either, so yous will have to practice focusing. I found it more than challenging than I'm accustomed to on DSLRs.

Now for the proficient. Considering the star points occupy so little space in a wide angle frame like this, this isn't overly obvious unless you are looking at a pixel level. The even better news is that the lens sucks in a LOT of calorie-free, making information technology very piece of cake to shoot stars at lower ISO levels and faster shutter speeds, which ways a cleaner result and too less risk of movement in the stars.

I don't consider this lens a top choice for astro, merely I fabricated a few images with it that night that I like a lot, so won't hesitate to use it in that manner in the future.

A Proficient Video Choice

If you are a videographer or vlogger, this lens should definitely be of interest to y'all. This is a great focal length, in either Super 35 (total APS-C frame – 24mm full frame equivalent) or 30P ingather fashion (where it frames a little tighter – probably closer to a 30mm full frame equivalent via a roughly 1.8x crop factor), and will requite you quality footage with smashing detail and quality autofocus. The footage is noticeably sharper than average, and I fully await this lens to be a favorite with videographers.

The lens focuses smoothly and quietly during AF-C style, and I constitute face tracking to be amend than typical for the Sigma DN serial, with no noticeable "glitches" where my face was lost. The upside of a focal length this wide when used from a gimbal or something like is that the depth of field is going to be quite deep at almost apertures, meaning that the focus shifts are going to be minimal anyway. Information technology'southward wide enough to exist a great vlogging lens without being likewise broad.

I like having the two framing options from this lens, as both perspectives are highly useful from a storytelling perspective.

Conclusion

The Sigma 16mm f/1.4 DC DN Contemporary provides something unique to the Sony E Mount lineup and is an bonny lineup even on the M43 side of things. It has a build quality that puts information technology up almost the luxury end of the class of lenses available for Sony E Mount (particularly the APS-C lenses), and a cost that is just moderate at $449 USD. The premium competitors (Zeiss Touit or Sony Zeiss options) are generally double in cost, and the similarly priced or less expensive options lack the feature set of the 16mm. I suspect this volition exist a fairly popular lens, as it seems similar a great option for videographers with smooth, quiet focus that takes reward of the a6500 or similar photographic camera's strengths as a video platform. That's a great focal length, and is very useful in either Super 35 or crop for the classic framing options information technology gives. For stills, the autofocus is quick and accurate, and the prototype quality is definitely at the pinnacle of the heap. It's larger than any of Sigma'south other DN series lenses, but still a very manageable size on my Sony a6500. All in all, I'm pleased enough with the lens that I purchased my own copy at the stop of my review, and that is really the highest praise I could give it. Information technology's hard to contend with the value of the lens, which checks most of the boxes that a landscape lens should.  If this were an Fine art series lens designed for DLSRs, information technology would be a thousand dollar lens, so at less than half that information technology definitely earns an piece of cake recommendation.

Pros:

• Quality build with some conditions sealing
• Quick, repose, and authentic autofocus
• Supports all Sony focus technologies, including Center AF
• Good sharpness at f/1.4, exceptional sharpness and contrast from f/2 and beyond
• Very strong flare resistance
• No lateral CA, and little to no axial CA after f/2
• Adept price to performance ratio
• Largest in form maximum discontinuity adds to versatility

Cons:

• Some axial CA at f/1.4 reduces contrast
• Coma performance non exceptional
• Minor amounts of distortion remain afterwards correction

Gear Used:

Sigma 16mm f/i.4 DN Gimmicky | B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK
Sony a6500: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon UK | Ebay
Sony a7R III Camera: B&H Photo | Amazon | Amazon.ca | Amazon United kingdom  | Ebay
Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud one-Year Subscription
Alien Skin Exposure X2 (Use Code "dustinabbott" to get x% anything and everything)

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