Monday evening, Sigma announced it would be bringing its Art-series lenses to the Sony E-Mount. On the heels of the Sony a7 III announcement, this is great news for all the latest a7R III and a9 shooters, too.
Of course, the lenses could potentially have been smaller had they been completely re-engineered for the Sony mirrorless system. But using the existing, proven optics with what's essentially a built-in mount converter makes sense financially and will open up Sony's high-end lens selection quite a bit. These new Sigma Art lenses should give Sony users a great alternative should they be looking for something both high-quality and slightly more affordable.
Here's the full list of Sigma lenses coming to the Sony E-Mount:
- Sigma 14mm f/1.8 DG HSM Art
- Sigma 20mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art
- Sigma 24mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art
- Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art
- Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art
- Sigma 70mm f/2.8 DG MACRO Art (announced Monday)
- Sigma 85mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art
- Sigma 105mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art (announced Monday)
- Sigma 135mm f/1.8 DG HSM Art
Of course, these are Sigma's Art-series prime lenses. Any of the other zoom, Sports, or Contemporary lenses will not yet be available for the Sony E-Mount.
Specific pricing and availability is not yet announced.
As I understand Sigma have a licence to make the lenses and with licence also I would expect access to the technology. I don't think mc-11 is licenced, and for my part the 24-105 with MC-11 on a7r2 was a joke. Hopefully lenses will work just as good as Sony lenses. I got the Sony 24+105 but a Sigma 50 would be great, less if Sony reduce price on there best offers.
Anyway good news :)
I wonder if they’ll offer mount conversion to Sony
According to Sigma's press release under Key Features: "5. Available Mount Conversion Service
This service converts the mount of SIGMA lenses to that of a different camera body, allowing photographers to continue using their favorite lenses over the long term regardless of camera system."
Although this makes me wonder as to what other mount, exactly, could these be converted? Leica SL maybe?
They'll only support the mounts that they currently offer in their lenses, unfortunately. But one can always hope!
Reserved the 35mm 1.4 as soon it comes here to Finland. Really hope the pricing will be around 1000€ which would make it a no brainer buy for me.
...and boom goes the dynamite. Great news, even if the optics are just built-in-converted. If the Rokinon AF line pans out and expands, all of a sudden you have a very respectable ecosystem of lenses. Sony needs to replace that 24-70 and get a few long lenses out there, but things are on there way!
Replace the 24-70 G-Master? I thought people liked it?
So will this actually provide the better AF performance one would expect from a "native " mount camera with native firmware and electronics, or is this just a built-in MC-11 Adapter?
Just trying to see if it's worth sending my 135mm 1.8 for a mount conversion.
Hard to know for sure, but I don't "think" they would have done it if it didn't offer better performance. Time will tell.
If anything it will help with video performance. Continuous AF on the MC-11 with video is unusable.
This feels significant. I think one of the biggest road blocks of people choosing Sony is the lens selection, and Sigma might be helping them solve that problem.
I wonder if they will bring their 24-105mm F4 to the lineup? Wishful thinking?
I really wish they'd make a mirrorless version of a 5D Mk III type body, so I could go mirrorless with EVF without resorting to adding almost an inch of additional length to every single one of my lenses...
this brings up a point that maybe should be obvious to me but isn't....
i would think that the E-mount lens would have to be physically longer than a canon-mount lens, right? essentially the same size as the canon mount + adapter? to maintain constant distance between the lens elements and the sensor independent of system. they can't change that, right? that would mean designing a whole new lens, i would think.
Yeah, basically they're building in the adapter into each single lens, I guess.