Wedding photographers..Which prime?

[42zx]

Except for squeaking focus rings on the Sigma, I've seen more than the odd report of that including on this forum 8)

 

[King Damager]

I don't think there is any argument, it's a considerably better lens. It's much sharper and bokeh is much better. It's well built. Focuses pretty fast.

The Sigma 50 is 'arguably' better than the L but at the expense of 0.3 stops of Aperture.

The Sigma 85 I think is sharper than the L, it focuses MUCH faster and is much lighter, has nice bokeh, but again misses out on the 0.3 stops aperture advantage.

The aperture advantage is mainly going to affect DOF rather than light gathering so much (Silicon not good at absorbing light from angles).

I haven't had extensive amounts of time trying out all of them, but have tried most of the lenses here in the shop.

I think the Sigma 50 is slightly worse than the L, and slightly better than the Canon 1.4. There's really not much in it, but I do think the L is slightly better if I'm honest.

The Sigma 85 isn't better than the L. IQ wise the L is better, I've had sample shots with both in similar situations, and whilst there's obviously variation in the lenses, I found the 85L to be absolutely stunning. Money no question, I'd get it over the Sigma 85. Whether the quality increase over the sigma (which is still obviously great) is worth the price however is another question. The other issue is, as you pointed out focussing speed. The Sigma 85 is great from that perspective, and for many I suspect that would nudge them in the direction of the Sigma, purely because the L is unbelievably slow.

kd

 

[mr tommo]

Just to update on this thread.

Used both lenses extensively at this weekends Weddings. I tried to stick with the 35mm and 85mm, took a while to get the hang of not using a 24-70mm zoom but got there in the end.

35L really is a stunning lens. Absolutely perfect and it's definitely convinced me to get one. Every shot just pops and it really did allow me to get shots that previously at f2.8 I was unable to get. (will probably opt for the cheaper Sigma though to save some pennies)

Onto the 85L, again IQ amazing. Found myself taking shots and being a little gobsmacked every time I looked at the back of the camera. I've not shot lower than f/2.8 before. Only criticism of this lens was the very slow focusing speeds. For the first dance I used the 35mm and the 85mm on two bodies. I found that the 85mm was pretty much useless for this job. Low light, slow focusing and a dancing B&G meant that the majority of my shots we unsuccessful. So I gave up and went over the the 35mm which was much better.

Overall, very impressed. Despite people seeing the rental as a waste of money, its certainly convinced me that going for fixed primes is the way forward.