Sigma 80-400 OS vs Canon 70-300 IS

I have a the Canon 70-300 DO IS USM and was considering a 500mm for wildlife but at that length Canon is out of my price range.

I was thinking of selling the 70-300 DO privately and getting the Sigma because is has the OS or (IS) and with a converter it would help also.

Does anyone have this Sigma lense and any thoughts?

well if you want 500mm why not the Sigma 50-500 I think it might be a little better in IQ..plus it has HSM focus. the 80-400 doesnt. I dont know how well the OS is in that thing. I would opt to get the 50-500 over the 80-400 though

The OS in the Sigma is frankly superb, as is the optical quality.

Also (Nikon version at least) it has its own built-in AF drive motor which makes it very quick to focus for a non USM camera.

In truth, the one I used when I shot Nikon wants for nothing in any comparison with the Canon 100-400mm I use now - except that the Canon is quieter.

I'd have one again in a heartbeat if I wasn't happy with the Canon, and would certainly choose it over the Bigma.

All I shoot is birds incidentally, always handheld.

05Xrunner wrote in post #2107310
well if you want 500mm why not the Sigma 50-500 I think it might be a little better in IQ..plus it has HSM focus. the 80-400 doesnt. I dont know how well the OS is in that thing. I would opt to get the 50-500 over the 80-400 though

I second this motion, however, I have heard fantastic things about the 80-400. There was a thread about it vs. some other lenses last week, but I don't remember the title.

may want to check out photozone.de and Popular photography for reviews on this lens
Personally, if I'm going big and long, bigma works for me.

from Photozone
The Sigma AF 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6 EX OS is an impressive piece of equipment. In terms of build quality Sigma seems to have catched up with the genuine brand offerings. Nonetheless the lens didn't convince completely. In the lab the sheer quality figures are surely good enough with slightly better MTF results than the Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 USM L IS but in the field the OS didn't really feel as reassuring or mature (or I had too much coffee at the time ...). The rather odd shutter delay issue when shooting several images in a row didn't help either to lift the impression. It's interesting that Sigma managed to implement FTM (full-time manual focusing) combined with a conventional AF motor - this is certainly something that we'd like to see in other lenses as well. On the downside the AF is a little on the slow and noisy side. All-in-all the lens should go though a little extra fine-tuning.

Well that's the opinion of someone who had the lens long enough to test it.

As someone who owns both the Sigma and the Canon, I'll say it again: the Sigma is a superb lens, and if anything I think the stabilisation in the Sigma is probably better than that in the Canon - though both are excellent.