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Thursday, October 23, 2008

Sigma 17-70mm f/2.8-4.5 DC IF Macro Lens for Canon Digital SLR Cameras

This lens has a minimum focusing distance of 7.9 inch (20cm) throughout the entire zoom range. Maximum magnification of 1:2.3 enables close-up photography like a macro lens. The new lens design and multi layer lens coating reduce flare and ghosting, which is a common problem with digital cameras. A Special Low Dispersion (SLD) lens and two aspherical lens elements provide excellent correction for all types of aberrations and produce a high level of optical performance throughout the entire zoom range. This lens offers a large aperture of F2.8 at 17mm wide angle and yet it is compact, with an overall length of 82.5mm (3.2 inch) and diameter 79mm (3.1 inch). It performs superbly even in relatively low light conditions indoors or at dusk. The lens design incorporates an inner focusing system, which ensures fast AF speed as well as prevents the front of the lens rotating, making it particularly suitable for use with circular polarizing filters and petal shaped lens hoods. This lens is also equipped with a Zoom Lock Switch. Maximum Magnification - 1 - 2.3 Filter Size - Diameter 72mm Dimensions - Diameter 79mm x Length 82.5mm, 3.1 x 3.2 inch Weight - 455 grams (16.0 ounces)
Customer Review: Great all around lens
I have found this to be a great all around lens. The pros of this lens are that it does a really great job focusing and has very sharp pictures in most situations. It is very fast. I have captured bees in flight and have been amazed with the clarity. The color is spot on. I am used to having to adjust the color/saturation in photoshop after uploading photos. I rarely have to do so with this lens. I also love that you can get very close to the subject and still focus. Makes macro type work very enjoyable. This isn't a true macro lens but it does a very nice job as "almost macro". The cons are: this is a heavy lens. I would not want to carry this around my neck all day long. That is a pretty minor con..definitely wouldn't deter from buying. It also does poor in low light. I had to shoot a wedding after sunset and this lens was very soft (focus) in such conditions. It can be soft (focus) at the end (70mm) also. I would highly recommend this lens if you want to replace the kit and have a great lens that rarely leaves the camera.
Customer Review: Great "Walkaround" Lens at a great price!
I was looking for a good every day lens that I could take with me on a trip to San Francisco this past summer but being just a light hobbyist, I didn't want to spend the money for the high cost of some of the canon lenses like the 17-40L or the 17-55IS. So after reading alot of the helpful reviews here, I decided I would give this lens a shot and I'm very happy that I did. The image quality on this lens is far better than the kit lens that came with my Canon XTI 400D. It actually feels like a whole different camera now. Pictures are sharp and the contrast and color the lens produces are head and shoulders above the kit lens. Also the extra reach this lens has over the kit lens comes in handy too. At 17mm, the f/2.8 really works well indoors in lowlight situations, but it does stop down quickly...at 20mm, it already jumps to f3.5 and quickly goes up from there. The lens focuses fast and not as loud as I'd expected(going off of some other reviews) and the build quality is good also. Some extra bonuses that I was happy about... The Macro feature is a definite bonus, I can zoom into an object that's right up against the lens and it'll still focus well. The lens even came with a hood as opposed to having to buy a separate lens hood($45)for a canon lens. A few things that were on the negative side... The lens does tend to hunt in very low-light situations and there is some barrel distortion when shooting wide. Also it's much larger than the kit lens but you do get ALOT more lens so the trade off in weight is well worth it. Plus, I have a battery grip on my XTI which nicely balances it out. Overall, the pros for this lens far outweigh any cons that this lens might have. It's nearly half the cost of the 17-40L f/4, and almost a third of the cost of the 17-55IS f/2.8. For someone that mainly shoots as a fun hobby on weekends, this was the perfect lens to fit my needs.


Photography has become a fine art and photographers increasingly rely on devices like the digital camcorders to bring out a life like quality to pictures. There are so many minute specifications and adjustments embedded into these cameras that the end result is simply astonishing. If digital cameras are an improvement on the old cameras, then the digital camcorders are a neat combination of digital camera and a camcorder. They are special because they can capture both still images and videos.

Thanks to the digital camcorder even amateur photographers can produce photographs of a professional quality. Before capturing a picture the viewfinder will help us to view the picture in all the glory of a colour print. Adjustment therefore becomes very simple. An LCD display a little more than 2.5 inches offers us high quality results.

There is also a compact recording device that is supported by the HDD format. The memory stick duo is a flash memory card that helps us to store data. Images can be zoomed optically or digitally using the zoom lens. A mini DV cassette is used as storage media in some brands. The storage media can be maintained with the help of a head cleaner. More images and video clips can saved using the multi media card and secure digital card.

There are features like the touch screen control, built in speakers, auto power save, progressive shutter system etc in a digital camcorder. There is also a digital noise reduction feature to filter the unwanted disturbance in the audio recording. There are advanced shooting modes like beach and snow, frame movie, spotlight, digital photo and manual. The special effects are art, auto fade, mirror, mosaics, slim stretch and tracer. Images can be effectively faded as black, overlap and window wipe. The pictures are vivid and true to life. The effect is therefore quite stunning.

If one is looking for more compact sized cameras with all the required features then the pocket digital camcorder is the best option. The LCD monitor is replaced by the viewfinder and the image can be zoomed up to 8x. It has an integrated memory and video input too. There is a rotating display form and CMOS sensor. It has a sensor resolution of 5 pixels. The multi media card and secure digital card can be supported. The special effects also include black and white, sepia and negative. All these features are found in a device that is as light as 160 grams.

Read unbiased reviews on best-selling brands including Panasonic digital camcorders and Samsung digital camcorder reviews at digital camcorder reviews site.

Cannon Cameras

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