This summer had the fortune to purchase a brand new Nikon D700 the day it came out. Preparing for this purchase, I sold my D200 and all of my DX format lenses so that I could finance the new purchase. This sale included my prized Nikon 70-200/2.8 lens. This is clearly not a DX format lens. However, after reading Bjorn Rorslett's review, I decided to sell it in preparation for the D700 and replace it with a not-too-well-known lens, a Sigma 100-300/4 lens.

I have had shitty experiences with third party lenses before, and with the purchase of Nikon's best camera to date, what was I thinking?? A number of thoughts went through my mind. First, I was thinking that I respected highly Bjorn's opinion regarding lenses. I also realized that I could now still command a decent price for the 70-200 -- though I was taken for a ride regardless because of a bad decision on my part. I was also thinking that the utility of the 70-200 was not something of which I was taking full advantage. The weight combined with the relatively short distance meant that I frequently left it at home when traveling. The 2.8 maximum aperture was also something I was not usually taking full advantage of, and I would be perfectly fine with an f4 lens, especially given the extended range of the new D700 sensor. Especially, though, was the solid construction and the relatively light weight in the extended range, plus the fixed aperture. This is a lens I can really take around in my kit without too much notice!

In fact, before I dropped the paltry $1100 for this lens, I read review after review to see if I was about to waste a ton of money. 99% of the reviews were positive, and that was encouraging. However, they weren't irrationally exuberant, which still scared me. What if I got a bad sample? What if I had higher demands on quality than other people? To give away the farm at the beginning of this short "review", I'll say that this lens is perfectly adequate for my usage, and definitely better than what Nikon has to offer in the same range.

To show this claim, I contacted the person to whom I had sold the old 70-200 -- a friend of mine -- and asked to borrow it, as well as his Nikon 80-400/4.5-5.6 lens and do some comparison shots with them at various apertures. Below, I've posted the test shots of these, but before we get to those, I'll just write up the quick conclusions.

Note: these conclusions are based entirely on a series of test shots on a sunny day and then compared to each other on my computer. No further analysis has been done, other than using my own eyeball. I think that the test shots shown below will illustrate every point I make adequately.

First, the hugely noticeable first impression of all three lenses is that, wide open, the Sigma 100-300 was tied with Nikon's 80-400 for the best lens of the three when comparing light fall-off in the corners. There is noticeable, yet minimal and extremely well controlled corners with hardly any light loss in both lenses when shot wide open at all focal lengths. In fact, the Nikon 70-200 was far and away the worst for fall off in the corners, showing significantly dark corners at f2.8 at all focal lengths. Only by stopping down to f4 does the Nikon lens begin to approach the quality of the Sigma lens for light fall-off. These features were particularly exacerbated as one approached 200mm, as shown below.
Nikon 70-200/2.8 wide open at 100mm


Nikon 80-400/4.5-5.6 wide open at 100mm


Sigma 100-300/4 wide open at 100mm


Nikon 70-200/2.8 wide open at 200mm


Nikon 80-400/4.5-5.6 wide open at 200mm


Sigma 100-300/4 wide open at 200mm

The other question that people will probably want to know the answer to is sharpness, at the center and at corners. From the look at the photos in Adobe Photoshop's Camera Raw tool, it appears that sharpness on the Sigma lens at 100mm wide open is excellent at the center. Additionally, at the edges, while the sharpness is excellent, it's still good at 100mm, wide open. Stopped down to f5.6, sharpness at the edges goes to better. At 300mm, sharpness at the center is good wide open and better when stopped down to 5.6. This is disappointing at the wide end, but it's still reasonable.

Before you take what I just said regarding sharpness at the edges to heart and decide to never purchase this lens, please take a look at the source photos for my determination and see for yourself.

f4 photo at 100mm
f5.6 photo at 100mm
f4 photo at 300mm
f5.6 photo at 300mm

That's my short review of this lens. I think it's clear that I am not a writer, but I wanted to get across the idea that this lens is a quality addition to most people who don't want to pay the 2.8 aperture tax, but don't want to settle for 5.6, and also need a lens that will do more than just one focal length. Do check it out!

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Any instructions provided in this essay are provided as-is with no warranty whatsoever and the author bears no liability resulting from any and all uses of this work. Use at your own risk.

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