KEH's recent 20% off sale had me *almost* push the button on a SWC a number of times. Having the 40mm on the Bronicas was what kept me from doing it. For about the same cost I ended up with a digital version with essentially the same FOV, about 1.5 degrees difference and it gets me a backup body for my main kit.
Hard to get a sense of scale in these but it is small. Without the optical viewfinder, I had this on my belt using a capture clip. The grip doesn't really make it appreciably larger but makes it much easier to hold, gives a place for the OVF to mount and adds to the thumb grip on the back. That puts my thumb in just the right place to use the AEL button to activate auto focus. (AF On)
The mask on the viewfinder is almost perfect for the 17mm shooting in 1x1 mode. I'm going to print another mask for the same lens in 21:9. Might try moving the VF to be centered on the lens. If I do about a 1/4 of the bottom of the viewfinder is blocked by the lens in 1x1 mode. At its current position the lens is barely in the finder though it does make getting to the shutter button a little trickier.
In 1x1 mode this has 40 megapixels and a hair under 39 megapixels in 21:9. So plenty of resolution and it has more DR than my S1R.
Will see how big of an issue the electronic shutter is. Not planning on using it as an action, or flash, camera so I'm hopeful it won't get in the way.
Initial impressions is Sigma definitely does their own thing. The menu is reasonably similar to the SD/DP Quattro. I thought the Cine/Still switch was a gimmick but it is actually really nice that when it is in Photo the menus are all Photo based and when you switch it to Cine they switch to show all the Video based settings.
A few other notable things they do differently...
ISO from 6 -102400 (expansion on for high and low). Anything under ISO 100 is accomplished by taking multiple shots and blending in camera. That should reduce noise and maybe increase DR too. Edit: Found
elsewhere that ISO 6 gains about 1 2/3 stops of DR compared to ISO 100.
The MF zoom function is different. If you turn the dial on a native lens you get the PIP zoom box that disappears after a few seconds. If you hit the button for the MF zoom it stays on and doesn't shut off, even after taking a shot. At first I hated that but I see the logic in it. When you half press the shutter it goes away to let you frame, otherwise it is on as a focus aid and you don't have to keep hitting a button to keep checking focus. When you want to frame you just half press to make it go away temporarily.
This Sigma has a very interesting option for adapted lenses that I haven't seen in camera before. You have 10 slots where you can record focal length and F stop and a Note for each lens. But what is really interesting is for each of those slots you can have a shading correction, you take a picture of a monotone surface and the camera will figure out the shading correction needed. Sort of like an in camera 'Corner Fix' for those that have used that software.
If Sigma ever ships their next Foveon this function will be very useful. I ended up getting shading errors with lenses I adopted to my SD Quattro H.
hdrmaps.com
