Sigma 50-500mm f/4-6.3 EX HSM

The Sony – mount version of the Sigma 50-500 “Bigma”. The Bigma is probably the widest range telephoto zoom available in a high quality lens. A favorite among nature shooters and everything shooters for its great range and good image quality. Nothing else does quite what this lens does.

There are trade-offs, of course. This is a large lens that for most photographers needs a tripod for really sharp images unless the light is excellent.

Roger’s take: To paraphrase James Earl Jones in Field of Dreams, “The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been the Bigma. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. Sigma has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But the Bigma has marked the time. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh… people will use it, Ray. People will most definitely use it.”

There’s a couple of reasons we don’t stock the ‘newer’ Sigma telephoto zooms that have Vibration reduction: quality control isn’t good, they’re even heavier than the Bigma, and they aren’t EX lenses, meaning they just aren’t quite as sharp as the Bigma is. Other lenses have come and gone, but the Bigma has been a consistently popular lens for a very long time. There’s no other lens that does what it does.

The Bigma gives a range not matched by ANY other telephoto zoom, it’s reasonably sharp throughout its range, and has a very reasonable price. And it’s been around for years, so the quality control seems superior to the other Sigma telephoto zooms. Yes, I wish it had IS (but not if that means a $500 higher price and increased failure rate), and I wish it weighed a bit less (but not if that meant giving up some of the range). At the end of the day, it just does the job you want it to do. And it has some very nice touches: the ‘handle tripod mount’ is something I wish other manufacturers would copy.

High Risk Lens: The Sigma 50-500 lens has a higher failure rate than most lenses in our lineup.

• How high? The 50-500 has a problem rate of 1% of rentals, despite being checked out thoroughly before it leaves us.
• Why? We can’t be sure. Sigma lenses as a rule have more problems than other brands. The larger Sigma zooms seem to have more issues than other Sigma lenses, possibly because of the weight of the glass elements and shock damage in shipping.
• What’s the point? We’re letting you know on the front end make sure you order this lens in time to check it out before you leave for vacation or schedule your big shoot. We can send a replacement if it has a problem, but we can’t send a replacement Friday night to get to you on Saturday morning.
• Type of problem: front and back focus, loss of calibration, zoom lockup.
  Note: The Sigma 50-500 is a sharp lens. Almost every complaint of ‘soft copy’ we hear are actually from people trying to shoot this very heavy, very long lens in poor light handheld. Unless you’re really strong and skilled, you’re going to get motion blur handholding this lens at 500mm in anything other than bright sunlight.

Try and Buy Program: Lensrentals is pleased that our friends at SuperdigitalCity have made a special offer for our customers renting this item and considering purchase. Simply email your Lensrentals Invoice number to SuperdigitalCity and they will email you back a coupon code good for $43 (75% of a week’s rental) off of the purchase of the Sigma 50-500 lens.