It shouldn’t work. It’s basically a (beautifully constructed and finished) aluminium brick. The controls are minimal. There’s no viewfinder, no tilt screen, no IBIS, no shutter and a 60MP sensor that takes just under 1/10 second to read, so if your subject is moving at any significant speed you’ll get rolling shutter. And the battery life isn’t great: around 200 photos or 2 hours if you let the camera go to sleep between photos rather than turning it off.
And yet, it does work. It’s small, light and easy to use. The images it produces have the most beautiful colour I’ve ever seen, the dynamic range is excellent and high ISO noise levels are low. And because I’m generally photographing landscapes, architecture and the occasional portrait or candid, rolling shutter isn’t an issue: I’ve seen it 2 or 3 times in around 2,200 photos, and all of those were fast moving birds.
The smaller Sigma i-series primes are a great match to the camera. I have the 17/4, 24/3.5 and 45/2.8: they’re all capable of resolving 60MP, all perform very well with minimal or no optical issues such as flare or chromatic aberrations (lateral chromatic aberration, purple fringing, is a personal hate of mine), and they all render in a similar and very pleasant way. The 24/3.5 is my favourite since I’ve long had a preference for the 24mm focal length and like its 0.5x macro capability. I also have the 65/2: an extremely sharp lens with a slightly different character to the other three, more “modern” and with a bit less of the residual spherical aberration that gives the smaller lenses their very smooth bokeh.
Put it all together and you have a small, discreet, and silent camera that just about everybody ignores (well, apart from the occasional, curious, fellow photographer who will want to know what it is), that’s a pleasure to use, and that produces the best image quality of any camera I’ve ever owned.
So while it’s definitely not for everybody thanks to its very significant limitations, it’s turned out to be just about my perfect camera. I’m so happy with it that I’m actually giving serious thought to buying a second one as a backup, and handing in my Gear Acquisition Syndrome card…
Fountains Abbey by AlanC, on Flickr
Parcevall Hall by AlanC, on Flickr
All Saints Church, Kirk Deighton by AlanC, on Flickr
And yet, it does work. It’s small, light and easy to use. The images it produces have the most beautiful colour I’ve ever seen, the dynamic range is excellent and high ISO noise levels are low. And because I’m generally photographing landscapes, architecture and the occasional portrait or candid, rolling shutter isn’t an issue: I’ve seen it 2 or 3 times in around 2,200 photos, and all of those were fast moving birds.
The smaller Sigma i-series primes are a great match to the camera. I have the 17/4, 24/3.5 and 45/2.8: they’re all capable of resolving 60MP, all perform very well with minimal or no optical issues such as flare or chromatic aberrations (lateral chromatic aberration, purple fringing, is a personal hate of mine), and they all render in a similar and very pleasant way. The 24/3.5 is my favourite since I’ve long had a preference for the 24mm focal length and like its 0.5x macro capability. I also have the 65/2: an extremely sharp lens with a slightly different character to the other three, more “modern” and with a bit less of the residual spherical aberration that gives the smaller lenses their very smooth bokeh.
Put it all together and you have a small, discreet, and silent camera that just about everybody ignores (well, apart from the occasional, curious, fellow photographer who will want to know what it is), that’s a pleasure to use, and that produces the best image quality of any camera I’ve ever owned.
So while it’s definitely not for everybody thanks to its very significant limitations, it’s turned out to be just about my perfect camera. I’m so happy with it that I’m actually giving serious thought to buying a second one as a backup, and handing in my Gear Acquisition Syndrome card…
Fountains Abbey by AlanC, on Flickr Parcevall Hall by AlanC, on Flickr All Saints Church, Kirk Deighton by AlanC, on Flickr
