Lenses

Field Review: Sigma 70-200mm F/2.8 EX APO DS HSM OS (Day 2)

Chris Gampat
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11/10/2010
2 Mins read
Lightroom 3 Sigma 70-200mm F/2.8 OS test

Last Updated on 07/30/2011 by Chris Gampat

Squirrels are awesome—so when I decided one day that I’d photograph them using the Canon 7D and the Sigma 70-200mm F/2.8 EX OS I wanted to see just how sharp some of the images this lens can take can be. Zoomed in at the full 200mm, the little guy in the picture was still pretty far away from my attic window. So what do the crops look like in this unofficial sharpness test?

Just a couple of words before I go on about how all these images were shot and post-processed. All images were shot at F/2.8 were shot at ISO 100 while all images at F/5.6 were at ISO 400. Attached to the Canon 7D, the Sigma 70-200mm F/2.8 EX OS is approximately 320mm—which as you can see is still too far away. I tried shooting images where the tree in my backyard wasn’t blocking the squirrel. Indeed, you can actually see some parts of it in the images. All images were shot handheld with OS 1 on.

After pulling the images into Lightroom, I did the crops that you see in the opening image for this story. After cropping the images, there was no need to resize them for the web because of how small they became. No sharpening, white balance changes or any other editing whatsoever was done to maintain the integrity of the images. For reference, the 7D was shot at full 18MP RAWs.

Why the 7D and not the 5D Mk II when this lens is optimized for full frame use? Because wildlife photographers and most people that read this site use APS-C sensor cameras.

Here are the images displaying how sharp the new Sigma lens is.

F/2.8

F/5.6

Share your thoughts down below with us and let us know your thoughts on this lens. Is the very center of this lens sharp enough for you?

The Sigma 70-200mm F/2.8 EX APO DS HSM OS is available for purchase at both B&H and Amazon.

At the time of writing this posting, the Canon 7D is available with a rebate at B&H.

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canon 7d review sharpness sigma 70-200mm Sigma 70-200mm F/2.8 EX APO DG HSM OS
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Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.