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Reviewing the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens

Brian Hallett

It wasn’t love at first sight, but love at first shot. There was no romantic comedy cute-meet in this romance—not even Shakespearean drama between the Montagues and Capulets or between camera makers. No, this was a blind date of lens goodness. The coupling was set up ahead of time without expectations. From the first shot, I could feel the sparks of our chemistry. In time, I lost time and control, snapping so many prime-style lens shots on a zoom that touched my heart.Sigma 28-45mm DG DN | Art Lens

I couldn’t keep my hands off the SIGMA 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens. Like a newlywed, I clung to it as it was the only lens that allowed me to see what I saw in the way I saw it. All joking aside, the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens has something that the SIGMA 18-35mm F1.8 DC HSM | Art (for APS-C DSLR cameras) didn’t or really couldn’t give me.

Yes, on paper, the two match well. Both lenses have a constant F1.8 aperture throughout the entire zoom range, making both lenses great options for video shooters. Yet, the 18-35mm was designed for smaller APS-C DSLR cameras, and the SIGMA 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens was designed for full-frame mirrorless cameras. Sometimes, a larger image circle is actually better.

Love without compromises warms the heart and a lens like the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens was made with love. Love of the prime lens comes through in the optical performance in the 28-45mm. By arranging the 3 aspherical lens elements and 5 SLD glass elements, the 28-45mm suppresses aberrations and gives use prime lens performance in a zoom.mI saw this performance in my photography. Each shot felt like it was captured with a prime lens, which I absolutely love.

Fast Autofocus

Not only does the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens give images the appearance of being shot with a prime lens, but what also helps capture the love of shooters is Sigma’s HLA (High-response Linear Actuator) autofocus and optical design that minimizes focus breathing.

Make no mistake—the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art is well-suited for video work. Its weight and length also make it suitable for gimbal work.

A photo captured by my wife, Angela, shows the unique depth of field the 28-45mm offers. To me, this is a photo that wouldn’t be the same with a 24-70mm F2.8

Just as important as having a quick and accurate Autofocus is having a lens that doesn’t shift when the focus moves. That won’t fly for video shooters. Thankfully, the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art the focus breathing is well suppressed, allowing for smooth focus pulls between subjects.

What’s great about the Sigma 28-45mm is one can capture shallow depth of field detail shots just as easily as wide shots with a wider depth of field.

Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens Aperture Ring

Recently, Sigma has added a click/de-click switch and lockable aperture ring to its lenses. I love this for two reasons. First, it’s all about the nostalgia of having an aperture ring. I tend to prefer a lens with an aperture ring, and that is the second reason. I prefer an aperture ring, especially the de-clicked version because it allows one to nail the exposure exactly.

In many ways, the Sigma 28-45mm allows a photographer to bounce around and capture a lot of coverage without stopping to swap a prime lens on the camera for portraits.

Constant F1.8 Aperture

This Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens is the world’s first full-frame zoom lens with a maximum aperture of F1.8. Will we see other lens manufacturers make a constant F1.8 zoom lens? We might, but I doubt we’ll see one with the optical performance like the Sigma 28-45mm. This F1.8 on the Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens is a real-world F1.8, as there wasn’t any slight darkening of the image when zooming through the entire 28-45mm range. The F1.8, once reserved only for prime lenses, is proof in the pudding for Sigma’s design and optical performance they’ve created throughout the years. A lens like the Sigma 28-45mm only happens with years of experience and growth at a company that feels comfortable pushing to be better year after year.

In this portrait of my daughter, Avedon, you can see the Sigma can double not only as a video lens but a portrait lens with it’s shallow depth of field.

Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art Lens Performance

As I shot with the lens, I grew to love how it saw the world. The ghosting and flare are very much like Sigma’s other art lenses, and that is to say, they are very well controlled. The lens itself is not a big lens. Years ago, a lens like this would have been huge, but not the Sigma 28-45mm. There are two things that matter most to me. Is the lens easy to use, and does it help one take better pictures? The Sigma 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art was a yes for both, and we’d been happily ever after.

As you can see in this photo, there is practically zero ghosting or flare from the Sigma 28-45mm

SIGMA 28-45mm F1.8 DG DN | Art lens Features

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