Lens Debate - My Next Purchase

[cpasley]

After talking with a few people and seeing the results from our Goldwater trip I have decided to work on getting a new lens, I am going to keep my body for now, since cant afford both, I was really impressed with Kennedy's 100-400, but as I was window shopping I had noticed sigma's 150-500 for just under a grand, that like $600 less then the canon but I am unfamiliar with sigma, are they good lenses and what would be the pro's/con's for each lens?

[Joe Copalman]

I've been shooting with a Sigma 150-500 for three years now, and I have very few complaints about it.  The most annoying thing about the lens is that it's 150mm on the wide-end - that was particularly annoying to get used to early on, but by now, I've learned how to manage it in most cases. 

The one actual problem I did have with it was with the image stabilization system.  It started to crap out on me about a year ago.  While it was at CRIS in Chandler for repair, Kaspar was kind enough to loan me his Sigma 150-500, which he told me was crap and he hated it.  Sigma DOES have a reputation for quality control issues, and I got a taste of this while using Kaspar's lens.  With mine, the autofocus was impressively fast.  If there was a difference in how quickly and accurately my 150-500 acquired and held focus compared to a 100-400, I never noticed it.  But with Kaspar's, the autofocus was slower.  It was still much faster than my ancient Canon 75-300, but it was definitely slower than my copy of the 150-500.  The other thing I noticed was that the stabilization on Kaspar's lens worked much better than mine, even before mine crapped out.  It was also much quieter, leading me to conclude that the stabilization system on my lens was defective from the get-go. 

Now that my lens has a new OS motor in it, I've had no problems with it. 

Both are great good lenses, but if you're on a budget, you really need to look at what you'll be getting out of the 100-400 for that extra $600 bucks that you wouldn't be getting out of the 150-500.