The Focal Length

The 35mm focal length is by far my favourite one! I love using it for couple and family shoots, as well as weddings. If I could only have one prime, this would be the one. I have written previous blog posts of my favourite 35mm-ish lenses at the time, the Sony Zeiss 35mm f1.4, the tiny Samyang AF 35mm f1.8 and the APS-C Samyang 21mm f1.4.

Sigma 35mm f1.2 DG II @ f1.2 with an effect filter

Sigma 35mm f1.2 DG II Wedding Sample Photos

This is in general less of a review and more of an opportunity to showcase some sample photos to those who are unsure if they would like this lens. I live in Ireland where there aren’t really any camera and lens rentals, or big camera stores where we can try out unlimited amounts of gear. So I personally always appreciate having some sample photos to look at.

I have shot a number of weddings and family shoots with it now, and spoiler alert, I think this is a great lens.

Upgrading from the Sony Zeiss

I previously wrote a blog post about my previous lens, the Sony Zeiss 35mm 1.4. Although it wasn’t a very popular lens, I loved using it. But as time passed, there were two issues I was having with it:

The autofocus was very fast and accurate outdoors. Very reliable. But in any indoor environment, it was absolutely unusable as a professional photographer. It was both slow and inaccurate, telling me it had locked focus when it hadn’t.

2. It paired up really well with my Sony Zeiss 55mm 1.8, another characterful lens, but not with any of my other lenses.

3. I loved characterful lenses, but am now appreciating more neutral looking lenses.

I think the latter two points is more of an issue that I face specifically as a professional photographer. When I was an amateur photographer, my aim was to get a few great shots every couple of weeks. As a professional however, I need to be able to provide dozens of great shots every time I do a shoot. So I can’t have equipment letting me down by only working in specific scenarios, or complicating my shoot because I was only able to pair certain lenses together.

So along with getting this 35mm lens, I reduced my lens collection to the most important focal lengths for me. Choosing lenses where each lens can work in any environment (indoors/outdoors), any situation (fast/slow) and in any pairing.

Trying the Sony GM

So I began looking for a more suitable 35mm. Everyone seems to love the Sony 35mm 1.4 GM, so I bought that first. To me it honestly didn’t feel like a €1500 lens. The build quality was great but I felt like the lens should have been at most €1000. The look of the images was too boring for me as well, and even though it was also a f1.4, it rendered more like a f1.8 or even f2.0. I was definitely getting a shallower depth of field with my Sony Zeiss. So I sent it back and by pure coincidence, the new Sigma 35mm 1.2 DG II had just been put on sale.

I was also happy to upgrade to an f1.2 instead of sidestepping to another f1.4. I’d rather have more light and a shallower depth of field available to me and choose not to use it, than running out of light.

Choosing the Sigma 35mm f1.2 DG II

Immediately I loved the look of the photos from this lens. They are very neutral, not very characterful, but not boring like the GM. This is exactly what I was looking for. The Sony Zeiss was too characterful at times, and again, as stated before, when you’re a professional photographer and you have to capture dozens of great photos every time you shoot, this can become problematic.

Lens Pairing

This lens also pairs up really well with my Sigma 65mm f2 DG DN which I bought to replace the Sony Zeiss 55mm. I love the 65mm focal length, it really suits my way of shooting and I’m so grateful that Sigma made it. An 85mm or even 75mm always felt to close for me and I could never get used to it, no matter how hard I tried.

I was using the Samyang AF 35mm and 75mm together for a while. What I didn’t like about that combination was that the two focal lengths looked too different. The 75mm had so much compression, that when browsing through the photos of a photo shoot, I found it quite jarring going from one image to the next. I could, without fail, tell which image had been taken with which lens.

The Sony Zeiss combo of the 35mm and 55mm worked really well but here I had the opposite problem; the angle of view between the two was not quite big enough. So when I paired the Sigma 35mm with 65mm, I was in heaven, it was perfect for me! In the best way possible, the two lenses mesh into one and I can only tell half the time which lens is which while looking at the images. The shoot becomes way more cohesive and I love that!

The Positives

The autofocus is a huge improvement indoors and in less than ideal lighting conditions. That is the big one! I can now use a 35mm lens comfortably and reliably in any part of the wedding day. I have to say, it’s not as good as my Sigma 70-200mm 2.8 DG DN, but it’s 90% there. And I’m definitely getting more keepers even when the DOF is super shallow at f1.2!

The build quality is amazing, like all Sigmas, and I love their lens hood design with the button and I love that all their lenses have an aperture ring. I love using aperture rings! Especially compared to the Sony Zeiss that had a flimsy lens hood that often fell off and a loose aperture ring who’s clicks weren’t very confident.

I’m delighted that Sigma was able to reduce the weight by such a big amount. There was no way that I was going to carry a 35mm lens that weighed over a kilogram with me. The mkII is a bit bigger and heavier than the Sony Zeiss but it balances really well on camera.

And finally, the image quality is just out of this world! It’s such an upgrade in every way that even my non-photographer friends and family have remarked about how much better the images look, not knowing that I got a new lens. They asked me what I did differently because the photos looked noticeably better. And I totally agree.

Neutral Remarks

I know that everyone mentions that the lens has no CA. But what I have noticed is that sometimes when I see the images in the Lightroom library, it does show some photos to have purple fringing but when I open it in ‘Develop’, it disappears. So I wonder if it’s just digitally removed. I don’t really mind, as it’s removed so well that it’s never been an issue but I’m just curious what’s going on there.

Something else that I noticed and that I’ve never seen with any other lens before is that very rarely, when slightly stopped down, you can get these square bokeh balls in the corners of the image. Again, I don’t mind it, but it’s just odd, I’ve never seen that before. I’m assuming that when stopped down, the swirly bokeh makes the balls square.

The below example photo of this phenomenon is an extreme crop of the top left corner taken at f2.0. It was a Christmas tree in the background.

Square Bokeh

“…you can get these square bokeh balls in the corners of the image.”

This is a sharp lens. A very sharp lens. Just like with my 70-200mm when I do headshots for companies, I end up having to spend more time in post softening skin. I suppose this is one of those cases of ‘at least I can always soften an image, but I can’t make it sharper’.

A minor non-issue, but I do prefer Sigma’s previous sans-serif font. I think it looked more timeless.

And lastly, this lens does wash out more significantly in backlit situations than any of the lenses I have owned in the last 8 or so years. I’m not sure why they didn’t or couldn’t match this to their usual great flare resistance. However, I must say it’s not terrible, I actually think it makes the images look a bit more natural, which is why I didn’t put it down in the negatives but it’s something to be aware of.

Flaring

“…this lens does wash out more significantly in backlit situations…”

The Negatives

What I have noticed is that the AF does sometimes struggle on objects that are closer up, like about 70cm or less to the camera. It can just refuse to see the object. For the types of shots I use this for, this isn’t a deal breaker as I don’t miss any critical shots, it’s just a little bit annoying sometimes. I wonder if there might be a firmware update in the future to fix this issue?

And the only other negative I have, is that it makes my Sigma 24-70 2.8 DG DN mkI look like dogsh*t. Haha! I thought this was a high contrast and sharp lens when I got it initially. Turns out I was wrong.

Verdict

Sony has a weird 35mm line up. With so many lenses in their catalogue, from Sony themselves to numerous third party manufacturers, I am still a little surprised how packed yet empty the 35mm line up is. There are many entry level options and some great expensive options. But nothing in between for around €800 that is reliable and versatile. I think if the Sigma 35mm 1.4 would have been a newer lens with more reliable autofocus, that logically would have been the lens for me. Having said that, I am really happy I went with the more expensive lens with the most advanced autofocus. Yes, it’s not double as good for double the price but for someone like me who is using this lens regularly for paid gigs, it’s clearly made the difference.

Buying this lens was also a part of a greater project of simplifying my lens collection and making the lenses more compatible with each other. So I now have:

• Sigma 24-70mm f2.8 DG DN I

• Sigma 70-200mm f2.8 DG DN

• Sigma 35mm f1.2 DG II

• Sigma 65mm f2.0 DG DN

• Zeiss Batis 40mm f2.0

The Batis is the only outlier and I use that either on it’s own or with one of the two zooms. Otherwise I can pair any of the Sigma lenses together perfectly. They look well together and all have great autofocus so that I can use them in any situation. This has made my work life so much easier.

All the Sigmas also have much more similar colours to each other as well, simplifying the white balance settings in Lightroom as well. Mixing brands before was a bit of a mess, as some lenses were warmer than others or had more magenta that needed to toned down.

Hopefully this has helped you make a decision if this is the lens for you or see more of my gear reviews here.