Sigma 35mm 1.4 Art or Sigma 50mm 1.4 Art?

cseawright · December 2018

I'm having a hard time deciding between which lens to buy. I love both the 35mm and the 50mm. They both produce great quality images.

I mainly do automotive photography. I mainly use a Nikon 50mm 1.8 and a Nikon 24-120mm. I have never had an issue with the 50 being too tight of a crop. I have a D750.

If anyone can provide me some insight that would be greatly appreciated.

spraynpray · December 2018

I haven't had the 50, only the 35 so I can't really advise you BUT, have you thought of the 24-35 f2? Tests say it is a 24, 28 and 35mm prime in one lens. I can confirm it is nice and sharp, as I have it.

Just thought I'd put that out there.

PB_PM · December 2018

I have the 50mm F1.4 Art, it's sharp as the reviews say, but nothing special otherwise. In hindsight I likely should have got 1.4G Nikkor or kept the 1.8G, cheaper, smaller, lighter weight. Unless you have the Sigma USB dock it's a bit of a pain since firmware updates for the camera can throw off focus performance over time, and if you have more than one camera body you need to tune it each time you switch bodies.

snakebunk · December 2018

I have the 50/1.4 Art, and it is super sharp and very special. I believe the 35/1.4 is equally awsome, so wich one you choose is depending on what focal length you need. Maybe a 50/1.4 now and a 24-35/2 later?

PB_PM · December 2018

When I first got the 50mm F1.4 Art I thought it was special as well, but as time went on that feeling left. Why? Just some thoughts from owning the lens for 4 years now.

What I like?
1. Build quality blows away all but the the pro glass from Nikon
2. Very sharp, when it focuses properly, compared to lenses that cost less than half as much anyway (1.4G 1.8G Nikkors) Question is, is it really worth $500-700 more than the Nikkors? Debatable. Looking back, I'd lean towards saying no.
3. Colour reproduction is neutral, which is kind of nice, but requires punching up the colour saturation if you shoot jpeg files (which I sometimes have to).

What I don't like
1. Far more frequent focus missing compared to Nikkor glass for one thing.
2. It just doesn't have the same pop that similarly priced high end Nikon glass has, hard to put it to paper, but images look kind of flat unless you use it at F1.4 all the time. Stopped down to F4 or more and the Nikon 50mm F1.8G produces nicer or equal looking images for way less money.
3. AF is so far off that buying the USB dock is 100% required for two camera bodies, because on one it front focuses beyond what can be adjusted in camera, and the opposite for another. No focus issue beyond what focus fine tune can fix with any Nikon lenses, just problems the two Sigma lenses have.
4. Having to buy an accessory (USB dock) to keep it compatible with future cameras. The Nikkors just work, same cannot be said of the Sigma. I have found it's AF performance has been reduced as I upgraded bodies over the years. It worked extremely well on my D700 and D800, but less than stellar on my D750 and D810 on which is has progressively got worse over time as bug fixing firmware updates came out.

spraynpray · December 2018

PB_PM said:
I have found it's AF performance has been reduced as I upgraded bodies over the years. It worked extremely well on my D700 and D800, but less than stellar on my D750 and D810 on which is has progressively got worse over time as bug fixing firmware updates came out.

The focus issues were the same with my 35mm in low light too. The last sentence is very worrying. Does that mean that new ones aren't as 'good' as the old ones were pre-updates?

cseawright · December 2018

PB_PM said:
When I first got the 50mm F1.4 Art I thought it was special as well, but as time went on that feeling left. Why? Just some thoughts from owning the lens for 4 years now.

What I like?
1. Build quality blows away all but the the pro glass from Nikon
2. Very sharp, when it focuses properly, compared to lenses that cost less than half as much anyway (1.4G 1.8G Nikkors) Question is, is it really worth $500-700 more than the Nikkors? Debatable. Looking back, I'd lean towards saying no.
3. Colour reproduction is neutral, which is kind of nice, but requires punching up the colour saturation if you shoot jpeg files (which I sometimes have to).

What I don't like
1. Far more frequent focus missing compared to Nikkor glass for one thing.
2. It just doesn't have the same pop that similarly priced high end Nikon glass has, hard to put it to paper, but images look kind of flat unless you use it at F1.4 all the time. Stopped down to F4 or more and the Nikon 50mm F1.8G produces nicer or equal looking images for way less money.
3. AF is so far off that buying the USB dock is 100% required for two camera bodies, because on one it front focuses beyond what can be adjusted in camera, and the opposite for another. No focus issue beyond what focus fine tune can fix with any Nikon lenses, just problems the two Sigma lenses have.
4. Having to buy an accessory (USB dock) to keep it compatible with future cameras. The Nikkors just work, same cannot be said of the Sigma. I have found it's AF performance has been reduced as I upgraded bodies over the years. It worked extremely well on my D700 and D800, but less than stellar on my D750 and D810 on which is has progressively got worse over time as bug fixing firmware updates came out.

I do always try to shoot between f/1.8 - f/2.8 to try to keep my images super sharp (I also shoot RAW). Are you saying that I go with a Nikkor 1.4 for now then maybe purchase a Sigma lens sometime down the road?

PB_PM · December 2018

spraynpray said:

PB_PM said:
I have found it's AF performance has been reduced as I upgraded bodies over the years. It worked extremely well on my D700 and D800, but less than stellar on my D750 and D810 on which is has progressively got worse over time as bug fixing firmware updates came out.
The focus issues were the same with my 35mm in low light too. The last sentence is very worrying. Does that mean that new ones aren't as 'good' as the old ones were pre-updates?

The last firmware updates for the D700 and D800 came out before the Sigma lens shipped, so Nikon wasn’t messing with them anymore. Loved the Sigma 50 on them, it focused as fast and accurately as my 24-70mm 2.8G did on those cameras. Haven’t seen the same focus performance on the newer cameras, I suspect that they just are not as well made, with looser talerences for AF. Unfortunately that seems to hit the third party glass the hardest. The D750 is more reliable than the D810, but the latter is less suited for moving subjects anyway.

cseawright said:

I do always try to shoot between f/1.8 - f/2.8 to try to keep my images super sharp (I also shoot RAW). Are you saying that I go with a Nikkor 1.4 for now then maybe purchase a Sigma lens sometime down the road?

Kind of suprised you shoot such a narrow depth of field for vehicles, but if it works for you why not. Since you’ve already got a 50mm 1.8, which is more than sharp enough already unless you are using the old D model, I’d skip that and look at a 35mm if you want to try something new.

Sports · December 2018

cseawright said:
I do always try to shoot between f/1.8 - f/2.8 to try to keep my images super sharp.

With the inexpensive Nikon lenses you had to do that, but the point of the Sigmas is that they're sharp at 1.4, I guess.

snakebunk · December 2018

I have never had any AF issues with the Sigma Art 50/1.4. It is actually the most reliable lens I have. Image quality is always very good, super sharp and neutral. It may not have any pop effect, but I don't think I would like that. I have used it mostly with the D800 and I have the latest firmware. The usb dock is a great and inexpensive accessory that I recommend to anyone who buys his/her first Sigma global series lens.

I am not much of a landscape shooter but here are some shots with the Sigma 50/1.4 Art (from Dettifoss and below) : http://www.snakebunk.com/trips/iceland_2017/#dettifoss

Sorry PB_PM that it doesn't work very well for you. Maybe there is an issue with the D750. I would write to Sigma.

WestEndFoto · December 2018

snakebunk said:
I have never had any AF issues with the Sigma Art 50/1.4. It is actually the most reliable lens I have. Image quality is always very good, super sharp and neutral. It may not have any pop effect, but I don't think I would like that. I have used it mostly with the D800 and I have the latest firmware. The usb dock is a great and inexpensive accessory that I recommend to anyone who buys his/her first Sigma global series lens.

I am not much of a landscape shooter but here are some shots with the Sigma 50/1.4 Art (from Dettifoss and below) : http://www.snakebunk.com/trips/iceland_2017/#dettifoss

Sorry PB_PM that it doesn't work very well for you. Maybe there is an issue with the D750. I would write to Sigma.

Nice images Snakebunk.

PB_PM · December 2018

snakebunk said:

Sorry PB_PM that it doesn't work very well for you. Maybe there is an issue with the D750. I would write to Sigma.

If it was just one camera I wouldn’t say much, but it’s several cameras (D750 and D810). Like you I never had issues with the lens on the D800, or my older D700 (neither of which I still have).

Since Sigma cannot calibrated Nikon cameras, only the lens, they cannot help. They just told me to buy the dock, which doesn’t solve the problem, since it needs different calibration on each. At least with Nikkor lenses, Nikon can adjust the lens and the bodies to work together.

Where the lenses flaws show the most are wide open, low contrast or low light situations. Like locking onto people’s eyeballs, or other similarly sized objects. I photograph children a lot (not creeping in public parks), sanctioned stuff, and it just cannot keep up like the Nikon 24-70 F2.8 or other Nikon glass can, let’s put it that way. Guess it wouldn’t matter to the OP, shooting still vehicles as much.

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Sigma 35mm 1.4 Art or Sigma 50mm 1.4 Art?

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