Sigma 120-300 - Not Happy :(

I can't seem to get a decent picture.

Canon 1D MKII , Overcast day but been using this combo for a month or more with same results. Usual shoot manual but went AV today to try and cut a bit of me out.. however same results either way. I am using a monopod

Two full shots here. straight from camera in JPG.. Any help appreciated.

1st pic girl is hardly moving and should be pin sharp IMHO but isn't
http://www.kipax.com/m​bgfx/testgirl1.jpg

2nd pic girl player is trotting towards me and this is what I tend to get for most action shots
http://www.kipax.com/m​bgfx/testgirl2.jpg

are these wide open...maybe they moved out of the DOF and thats why its a little soft

really the first pic doesn't look that bad, the second is a little blurry. What is your film speed set at? I believe that if you set the filmspeed higher then you will get clearer pics.
Jacob

KIPAX wrote in post #2000223
I can't seem to get a decent picture.

Canon 1D MKII , Overcast day but been using this combo for a month or more with same results. Usual shoot manual but went AV today to try and cut a bit of me out.. however same results either way. I am using a monopod

Two full shots here. straight from camera in JPG.. Any help appreciated.

1st pic girl is hardly moving and should be pin sharp IMHO but isn't
http://www.kipax.com/m​bgfx/testgirl1.jpg

2nd pic girl player is trotting towards me and this is what I tend to get for most action shots
http://www.kipax.com/m​bgfx/testgirl2.jpg

id love to help you but i just got the sigma 120-300 two days ago and im trying to decide why my own arent razor sharp. I use a 20D and thought the cam you have is what I needed.... apparently not.

im gonna follow your thread with a
lot of interest.


troy

Straight from the cam so exif intact but both f2.8 and the first 1/1300 and second 1/1600 both iso 200 and should be sharper than they are IMHO..

I definitely get a lot better with the sigma 70-200 just not as much DOF and less of the field to shoot at hence the need for 120-300.. just havent got anyhting as good as the 70-200 yet

Is this single shot AF or servo?

servo

Yeah, the second one looks really bad, especially for a $2,000 lens (no offence)! Maybe send it back to Sigma?

There are better sport and action shooters around here than I am, but my experience with my 70-200 L and 300 L is that I regularly get somewhat softer images with servo, especially when lateral as opposed to movement toward or away is involved. I also get soft results sometimes whn using servo to af on a still subject. Why? I have no idea...

I would suggest a tripod test on objects or targets at known distances and compared against a lens you believe is tack sharp.

I am anxious to see results.

Also...I downloaded the first image and applied some USM in PS and thought it looked pretty good. Is your camera applying any/enough sharpening to its jpgs, since that is what you are looking at?

I can get printable results in photoshop. I am doing no in camera sharpening.. Going to take a day off work and do lots of daylight testing tommorow (Monday). Meanwhile I ahve emailed Sigma UK and outlined the problem and url to samples.. I await there reply..

3.30am here so off to bed now... I will post anyhting sigma reply

Thanks

Well...you pretty much have to do some sharpening somewhere to overcome Canon's AA filter or whatever it is. Go into your settings and crank in some sharpening, like 4 or 5, shoot a bunch of jpgs and see what happens.

subtle_spectre wrote in post #2000373
Well...you pretty much have to do some sharpening somewhere to overcome Canon's AA filter or whatever it is. Go into your settings and crank in some sharpening, like 4 or 5, shoot a bunch of jpgs and see what happens.

But he's getting better shots using a Sigma 70-200 with the same settings.

Seems we have a pandemic of members disatisfied with therre new 300mm f/2.8s

This is three in two days at least.