I had the privilege in late February to be in Japan for Sigma’s announcement of a three new products along with some new branding initiatives. My favorite of those announcements was the 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT lens. Sigma had yet to release a true “super-telephoto” on FE and L mounts, and this one is exciting. It’s a big lens (167mm in diameter and 467.9mm in length) and weighs nearly 4 kilos (3985g), but it also delivers a constant F4 aperture all the way through 600mm, which puts it into very rare company. The Sony, Canon, and Nikon 600mm F4 lenses on their respective platforms all costs $13,000 USD or more ($14,000 for the Nikon), while the Sigma offers the versatility of being a zoom and also comes at a price tag of right under $6000 USD. But is the performance of this new 300-600 Sport make it worthy of inclusion with the best from the big brands? We’ll explore that question in either my video review below or in the text review that follows.

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Thanks to Sigma Canada (Gentec) for sending me a review loaner of this lens. As always, this is a completely independent review. *The tests and most of the photos that I share as a part of my review cycle have been done with the Sony a7RV along with the Sony Alpha 1 that serve as my benchmark cameras for Sony lenses. You can visit the product page for the Sigma 300-600mm F4 SPORT here.

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Don’t plan on being discrete with this one. People are going to KNOW when this big white is pointed at them.

This lens seems to have it all, including the premium HLA focus motor for sports work, an effective 5.5 stop OS2 stabilization system, and a huge amount of controls, including a drop in filter system including the ability to rotate circular polarizers. I noted and tested the ability to preset focus positions where a new unique control ring can be rocked and instantly return focus to the preset position – great for sports like baseball, for example.

As a Sports lens, it has Sigma’s premium build quality, including a magnesium alloy body and carbon fiber lens hood and completed with a thorough weather sealing. It’s also Sigma’s first white super telephoto lens, and it looks beautiful.

So does Sigma have a hit on their hands? We’ll dive in a little further to find out.

Build and Handling

Sigma’s build standards are continually evolving, but there really isn’t any precedent for this lens. Sigma launched a new logo, new primary font, new packaging, and of course a new finish for this lens. And, in my opinion, they nailed all of those ingredients.

What’s more, I had the opportunity to visit Sigma’s Aizu, Japan factory where they create almost every part of these lenses, and I’ve got a fresh appreciation for how much the “Made in Japan” label means to this company.

This is the most feature rich lens that I’ve ever used, and there are essentially multiple sections of features. Essentially the only thing that isn’t here is an aperture ring.

We’ll work out way forwards. The closest feature to the lens barrel is the drop-in filter holder (RFH-21). The basic (included) filter is a UV/protection filter.

“Protection from what?”, you might ask, since typically protection filters are screwed onto the front of the lens to protect the front element. In this case the opposite is true, as that filter seems to protect the rear element.

You can screw any 40.5mm filter onto that filter holder.

Perhaps more useful will be the optional circular polarizer or variable ND filter. That adapter comes with an external wheel that will allow you to rotate that filter to achieve optimal effect.

The bottom line is that the front of the lens is so large that using traditional screw-on filters wouldn’t really be an option (167mm filters aren’t really a thing!) so no front threads are included.

You’ll pay $193 for the CP-L drop-in filter and adapter and $265 for the 7-stop variable ND filter and adapter. Not cheap, but still probably a more elegant solution than trying to buy exceptionally large filters (I remember when Zeiss’ 95mm CP-L for the 15mm F2.8 Distagon was over $500!) and packing them along.

Next we come to one bank of switches on the left side and another on the right side of the next section. On the left side we have a fairly standard bank of switches including an AF | MF switch, a three position focus limiter, an OS mode switch (OFF | Mode 1 [Standard] | Mode 2 [Panning Mode]), and finally a three position Custom switch ( OFF | C1 | C2).

L-mount purchasers will get more out of this final switch, as there is a USB UD-11 dock available for L-mount that will allow you to customize the settings. No such dock exists for Sony E-mount, so that means for Sony users (like myself) the C1 and C2 are by default more options for the OS. C1 is Dynamic View (more stabilization of the viewfinder) and C2 is “Moderate View”, which gives you less viewfinder stabilization (allowing you to follow action more naturally) but gives you more stabilization assistance at capture.

The OSS (Sigma calls this most recent version “OS2”) is very effective, being rated at 6 stops on the wide end and 5.5 stops on the telephoto end. I’m not sure how much the system will work in conjunction with your camera’s stabilization, but I certainly felt like I got more stabilization out of the combination than what I did with Sony’s own recent 400-800mm G lens. That’s great if you are trying to handhold this beast, as it isn’t exactly on the light side! I think that Sigma’s OS2 (on this and other lenses) is the most effective stabilization system that I’ve tested on E-mount to this point.

There’s a second bank of switches on the right side of the lens, and these are design to work with the unique power focus controls. There is a button that allows you to set a focus position (Preset). When this mode is activated, a quick twist of the function ring located up near the zoom ring will will instantly return focus to the preset position. This could be useful for sports (pitcher’s mound!) or if you are watching a preset position for wildlife.

In the power focus position, focus will smoothly move through the focus range. It is speed dependent (two speeds) depending on how quickly you rotate the ring. The idea is to be able to focus without moving your hand’s position (as it takes some effort to hold this thing up!)

I’m not sure that most users will be using these controls on a regular basis, but there are certain applications where they could be useful.

The “set” button in this section is not to be confused with the Custom/Focus Hold buttons) found nearer the front of the lens. There are four redundant buttons there at 90° intervals around the lens barrel so that one is always close to hand. These buttons will allow employ whatever function you’ve assigned in camera to the Focus Hold button.

Next comes the tripod collar section. Once again we have a very robust implementation. There is a tension knob that allows you to loosen the tripod collar section to rotate it. I’ll note that the balance point is excellent, making this easy to set up even on a lightweight tripod. There are strap attachment points on either side of the tripod.

The foot is awesome! It’s long, got Arca grooves, and, uniquely, it has a lovely padded section along the top that makes carrying the lens by the foot much more comfortable.

The foot also has another unique surprise. Along the back there is a dial that allows you to determine whether or not there will be clicks at the cardinal positions when you are rotating the lens on the tripod collar. I prefer clicks (easier alignment at these points), but others may prefer free rotation. This is the first lens I’ve tested that allows you to have both.

The tripod collar is not removable (not surprising in such a big lens), and removing/changing the foot will require Allan keys (included).

Next comes the manual focus ring. It looks relatively narrow in the picture below because the lens is so big, but in reality it is 3cm wide. It has a rubberized, ribbed finish and moves nicely with a good balance of freedom and resistance.

Next comes the large zoom ring. It is about 2.5x as wide as the focus ring and has a bevel in it to give it a tactile distinction from the focus ring. This is an internally zooming ring, so zooming is easier than most external zooming lenses. I would have liked the zoom ring throw to be even smaller than its roughly 80° arc to allow for even swifter zoom changes, but it isn’t bad. The action is a little heavier (and not quite as smooth) as my internally zooming Sony 200-600G, though that lens is moving much smaller elements.

It is worth noting that Sigma lenses zoom in the opposite direction of Sony lenses (and pretty much every other brand on E-mount). It’s a little annoying, actually.

There is a significant flare at the front of the lens to accommodate that huge front element.

The pearlescent finish of the “thermal insulation paint” is gorgeous. Sigma waited a long time to do a “great white”, but they did it well.

The lens hood is massive and relies on a tension knob to hold it in place.

Remove that hood and you’ll find an absolutely massive amount of glass up front.

I was able to get a look at the components of the lens before assembly, and you can see both the huge aluminum/magnesium housing components along with some of those massive glass elements that go into the design.

This includes some serious weather sealing. Sigma says, “The mount joints, manual focus ring, zoom ring, custom switches and other control switches, and exterior joints are all protected from dust and splash by a dust- and splash-resistant structure. Further, the frontmost surface of the lens is coated with a water- and oil-repellent coating to facilitate maintenance when water droplets or dust adhere to the lens.”

Bottom line is that this is a beautifully built lens both inside and out. It’s made to be tough, durable, and capable…but all of that comes at a price. This is a lens that dwarfs the largest lens in my kit, which is the Sony FE 200-600mm F5-6.3 G OSS. It looks rather tiny next the big Sigma despite covering an additional 100mm of zoom range.

It illustrates well a point that is lost on non-photographers. This lens obviously gets attention when you are out with it, as it looks like you are carrying a bazooka. People ask me, “Is that for taking pictures of the stars or something?” They assume it is akin to a telescope, because your average person has no sense of aperture, light gathering potential, or any of the actual reasons a lens like this has to be so large. They just think in terms of “reach”, as in, “the bigger the lens, the more telephoto it’s able to achieve.” It’s not even particularly easy to explain it to them, as most “civilians” have no context for trying to stop action with long telephoto lenses.

The 300-600 Sport has no more reach than my 200-600 G, but a look in the front of the lens shows just how much light gathering potential there is in this constant F4 aperture than what exists in the variable aperture Sony.

All of that glass shows just how much extra light can get to the sensor vs the Sony, which means that I have a much better chance of stopping action with the Sigma.

But yes, that means that it is huge and heavy. The lens in E-mount form is 167mm in diameter (6.6″) by a whopping 469.9mm (18.5’mm”) in length. The lens hood adds another 165mm to the length (longer than a Tamron 35-150mm!), meaning that when mounted on my camera the lens extends out a full 60cm (2 feet). Wow! You’ve got to bust out a wide angle lens just to take a picture of it!

The lens weighs in at a whopping 3970g or 140oz, meaning that for most people a nearly 4 kilo lens is going to be more of a monopod or tripod lens rather than a handheld option. I did use it mostly handheld, but it definitely gets tiring fast. Let’s just say it will be a handful for most people!

Sony has limited the use of teleconverters on all third party lenses. I can confirm that my Sony 1.4x does physically fit, but there is no flow of communication through it. The camera will power on, and you can see the image in the viewfinder or LCD, but you can’t focus. And no, you can’t just manually focus, either, because on mirrorless even manual focus relies on the focus motors to actually move the focus group.

On L-mount, however, both Sigma’s TC-1411 (1.4x) and TC-2011 (2.0x) teleconverters will work, allowing you to achieve up to 840mm at F5.6 with the 1.4x and 1200mm at F8 with the 2.0x. It is such a shame that the lens won’t work with TC’s on Sony, as that would add so much value to the lens. On L-mount the Sigma is a first party lens (L-mount is a consortium of brands) and thus gets first party support.

The aperture iris has 13 blades, which helps maintain a nice circular shape when the lens is stopped down.

It will be easy to get lots of “sparkle” from this lens if you’re shooting with bright areas in the frame.

Like many modern zooms, the minimum focus distance will vary from the wide end (2.8m) to the telephoto end (4.5m), or 110.3″ x 177.2″. Magnification is slightly higher at the telephoto end than on the wide end.

Performance is fairly close on both extremes.

If you look at the fine print, however, you’ll find that the maximum magnification figure of 1:6 (right under 0.17x) actually comes at a very specific 470mm. There’s one significant problem with that – there is no marking at 470mm, leaving you having to guess where exactly that is. I took a shot and got 462mm, but you can see that it definitely produced a higher level of magnification.

The minimum focus distance didn’t feel much longer (if any) than the 2.8m of 300mm at 470mm(ish).

Obviously you can obliterate a background when shooting at close focus distances. Depth of field is less than one centimeter.

The lens ships with a nylon hood, a very large (and very nice) padded and zippered case, a shoulder strap, and the basic drop-in filter holder.

There’s a lot to love here in every sense of the word. The Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT is one of those rare lenses that is simultaneously both very expensive (at $6000 USD) and also a great bargain relative to the competition.

Autofocus and Video

This is another area where Sigma has made some key strides. Their initial offerings on Sony (and L-mount) featured STM focus motors, but Sigma has since released their more powerful, smoother HLA focus motor (High speed Linear Actuator). The HLA motor has much more torque/thrust than lenses equipped with the stepping motor, which is very important when you are talking about a lens with larger, heavier optical glass like this one. The increased thrust of the focus motor means that it is capable of moving much faster and is thus much more reactive. Real world focus changes at 300mm are essentially instantaneous, while focus pulls at 600mm from a close to distance subject took just a bit longer. Focus speed was fast enough that I could pick up birds from essentially the first shot.

This will allow you to nail the critical moments and get the shots you want.

Focus sound is basically nonexistent. The HLA motor is essentially silent even if I put my ear next to the lens. It is quiet enough that I literally looked up at the screen to make sure the lens was actually focusing.

Focus accuracy during bursts was largely extremely good (though perhaps not Sony GM good). I did have one particularly distracting burst with a lot of very bright highlights on the water that results in some focus confusion and misses, but that’s understandable when the subject stops being the highest contrast object in frame.

In general I found that where a high quality Sony lens might give very near 100% perfectly focused shots, the 300-600 Sport would give around 90%, with a few shots here and there that were close…but very slightly front or back focused.

Slower moving subjects weren’t a problem…particularly when they aren’t moving at all!

I shot a kayaker shooting the spring rapids and had no problem tracking the subject throughout the sequence.

The HLA focus system is definitely fast enough to do birding, with quick acquisitions and accurate tracking.

Bottom line is that this autofocus system is capable of unleashing the optics of the lens.

Autofocus for Stills

I also saw mostly good results for video work. Autofocus pulls were very fast and confident. No hunting or settling. Focus pulls at 30mm were smooth and confident. At 600mm pulls were a little slower as momentum built and then moved quickly.

I shot sequences of the seabirds and found that focus was nicely “sticky” on the subjects but was sometimes a bit reluctant to move to the next subject if one bird walked out of frame, for example.

Here’s a freeze frame from one of my video clips.

Overall I found video focus worked fine. I had a limited time with the lens and didn’t have as much time to give to the video side of things.

Sigma’s HLA focus motors are great, though they are slightly limited on Sony by the fact that Sony limits bursts to 15FPS with third party lenses. It’s not “fair”, but it’s reality. This lens is awesome, but it would be even more awesome with TC support and full burst speeds.

Image Quality Breakdown

As you would expect, this is a fairly complex lens optically. There are 28 elements in 21 groups, and, as you can see from the optical design cutout below, a lot of space between some of those groups. There are 6 FLD elements and 1 SLD element as a part of the design. The MTF chart shows an excellent center and a very linear fade to the corners, which remain excellent. The 600mm looks similar but just slightly weaker (and lower contrast).

At it’s best, the 300-600 Sport is able to produce images with a lot of detail, contrast, and pop even at 600mm, F4.

If you aren’t experienced with long telephoto lenses its important to know that sharpness results are much more dependent on environmental conditions than with shorter focal lengths. You are often shooting at much great distances, and there are many more variables like thermal pockets that cause heat shimmers and other optical disturbances. Shooting with long lenses requires skill and developing a sense of what works and what doesn’t…often some trial and error.

I got fairly lucky on the day I shot the visual comparison of focal length, as the water temperature and the air temperature were fairly close, which eliminated some of the heat waves which can mar sharpness.

Here’s 300mm:

And here’s 600mm:

Obviously that is going to be extremely useful…particularly with an F4 aperture.

A bit of a caveat before my formal tests. It is very hard to chart test long lenses unless you have very specific equipment and environments (which I don’t have). I worked very hard to make my tests as scientific and accurate as possible, but when I have to take things outside there are more environmental factors that can cause minor inconsistencies. I used a ten second delay on all tests, for example, but a lens this big is like a sail, and so there’s a possibility that vibrations can be introduced even if nothing is touching the tripod. That being said, my results look fairly consistent with what I expect.

Testing for longitudinal chromatic aberrations (LoCA) show a bit of fringing at 300mm:

…but essentially none at 600mm:

I also saw zero issues with LaCA (lateral chromatic aberrations), which shows up along the edges of the frame. All of the transitions here are very neutral.

This is a lens with near perfect OPTICAL correction of vignette and distortion. These “before and after” results are not going to look very different as there was very little to correct.

I used a -2 to correct a tiny bit of pincushion distortion and added about a +12 of vignette correction mostly because it felt weird to not add any.

At 600mm things are largely the same. I changed to a -3 of correction for the distortion and if anything there was less vignette.

There’s nothing here that would need correcting in real world shots, though correction profiles obviously do exist.

This is a high end optical instrument, and they’ve corrected the issues in the optics rather than through software. What a novel idea!

So how about resolution and contrast? My formal tests are done on the 61MP Sony a7RV.

The MTF suggests that this is a very sharp lens in the center and mid-frame areas, with a typical corner drop-off at wide apertures. Is that what we see? Here’s a look at the test chart from which the crops come.

Here are crops from across the frame at F4 and shown at a 200% magnification.

In many ways I’m more impressed by the mid-frame and corners than the center, which looks very good but the corners more unusually so.

What’s so weird to me is that you can get shots like this on the WIDE end of a zoom lens!

That tiny, shallow depth of field of 300mm, F4, is actually incredibly rare. None of the variable aperture zooms achieve F4 at 300mm, much less 600mm!

Stopping down will provide a slight contrast boost.

Sharpness consistency seems to peak at F8 in some areas of the frame, though you’ll probably get the best center performance at F5.6.

Diffraction will start to take a bite out of contrast by F11, but more noticeably by the minimum aperture of F22.

Moving on to 400mm shows an uptick in contrast and detail as compared to 300mm.

That’s particularly noticeable in the corners, which are notably sharper and higher contrast.

That’s an absolutely brilliant performance for F4 at 400mm.

Ferrari’s head will give us a real world sense of F4 performance in this range.

Contrast will tick up even higher at F5.6. It’s fantastically sharp in the 400mm range.

If we move on to 500mm, contrast is a bit lower, but sharpens up nicely at F5.6:

Even at F4, however, there’s a nice amount of detail in real world shots.

At 600mm we see a similar pattern, with good sharpness and contrast that improves when stopped down to F5.6:

Corners also improve a bit by F5.6:

I find that F8 performed the best at 600mm in my tests, though the gains from F4 to F5.6 to F8 are very incremental.

Even “on the wing” the 300-600 Sport is capable of giving crisp results.

On a random side note: have you every considered how weird seagulls “red eyeliner” is?

It wasn’t hard to nail great looking shots in the fast, reactive situations where this lens will the most valuable.

One of the things you have to get used to when using an extreme instrument like this is just how shallow the depth of field is at 600mm, F4. Even at a considerable distance of 15 meters (around 50 feet), the the depth of field is still just 15cm (6 inches). In this shot, for example, shot at roughly that distance, the foreground seagull is in focus while the landing (and squawking) seagull just a couple of feet away is completely out of focus.

A shot of this chain at a closer distance shows just how tiny the depth of field is.

The big advantage of a lens like this is no much the close focus shots where you can completely obliterate a background (though that looks great!)

Lessor lenses can do something similar if you get very close to the subject.

But the advantage of a lens like this is going to be in the quality of the background blur when you have the unfavorable ratios where your subject is further away from the camera and perhaps the background is closer to the subject. With variable aperture zooms at F6.3 or F8 there won’t be much subject separation, but that’s no problem with this lens.

In this shot of Nala I was around 10 meters (33 feet) away from her, but she was only perhaps 2 meters from the background objects, yet the 300-600 Sport allows for nice separation.

Even a dove in a complicated network of budding branches is still rendered pretty nicely.

I didn’t shoot right into the sun with the lens, but I did plenty of shooting in very bright and backlit scenes without any sign of flare issues. That’s a more typical case use anyway.

Overall, the optics are pretty fantastic. No, it might not quite match a dedicated prime at any of those main focal lengths, but it’s about as close as you are likely to get in a zoom. And, if you consider that you are getting a 300mm, 400mm, 500mm, and 600mm F4 near-prime performance for just $6000, that’s pretty amazing. That collection of lenses mentioned above would probably cost nearer $40,000! If you want to see more images, check out the image gallery for the lens here.

Conclusion

The Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT is a very appropriate flagship lens. It’s big, it’s expensive, it’s high performing, and it’s beautiful. Carrying this thing around is liking having a supermodel on your arm…you get a LOT of attention.

It also is a very capable lens, delivering high optical performance along with generally excellent autofocus performance (though not quite at a premium Sony level). Like most long telephoto lenses, however, the more you use it the more refined your technique with the lens would become and thus the quality of your photos will only improve.

You’re going to need to have (or build) some serious muscle if you’re going to use this lens handheld for any length of time, but most people can solve that with a monopod. I love this addition to either Sony E or Leica L, however, as it provides a more flexible yet still high performing alternative to long telephoto primes. I’ve always noted that there was a huge gap between the $2000 telephoto zooms and then the $10,000 telephoto primes, and Sigma has done a beautiful job of filling that void with this lens. I just wish that Sony would release the artificial limitations on third parties, and the 300-600 Sport was MADE for teleconverters and fast burst speeds. Or perhaps the solution is a Sony Alpha 1 level camera for L-mount. Right now neither solution seems close, but fortunately even with the limitations the Sigma 300-600mm F4 DG OS | SPORT is a pretty killer lens.

Pros:

• The kind of lens many birders have been looking for
• Beautifully made
• Oozes premium quality
• Feature rich
• Thorough weather sealing
• Function ring brings an interesting control point
• HLA focus motor is extremely quiet and has a lot of thrust
• Extremely sharp lens over most of the frame and zoom range
• Excellent flare resistance
• Near perfect control of aberrations
• Beautiful colors
• Constant F4 aperture
• Great value for what it offers

Cons:

• Very big and very heavy
• Focus accuracy during bursts not quite at Sony level
• No teleconverter support
• Burst rate will be limited

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GEAR USED:

Purchase the Sigma 300-600mm F4 OS SPORT @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

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