SIGMA 24mm F1.8 EX DG ASPHERICAL MACRO

Review and Photo example of the SIGMA 24mm F1.8 EX DG ASPHERICAL MACRO.

Gallery

The example photo was taken using a SIGMA SD14.

Review

The 24mm F1.8 EX DG ASPHERICAL MACRO is a lens that is part of the 20mm, 24mm, and 28mm lenses, and has been around since the days of film cameras before the digital camera Sigma SD9.

It is a 24mm wide-angle single focus lens with a shortest shooting distance of 18cm, allowing you to get close to the camera.Accessories include a case and a flower-shaped hood (LH-825-03).

Full-size sensors have some problems in the peripheral areas, but cameras with smaller sensor sizes such as SD9, SD10, SD14, SD15, SD1, and SD Quattro have fewer noticeable defects in depiction. Since it is used cropped to approximately 40mm, it no longer feels like a wide-angle lens, and is more like a standard lens.

I purchased this lens after purchasing the SD14 in 2022, but compared to the large Art lenses available in 2024, the brightness is a little lower (F1.4 → F1.8). Since it’s compact, it’s a good size for casual shooting around town. Sigma lenses of this era do not have good backlight resistance, so I feel that a hood is essential.

Looking at the table below, given the constraints that the 24mm and 28mm have the same lens configuration and barrel size, the 24mm has a 4mm wider focal length and the minimum focusing distance is 0.02m shorter. Considering the above constraints, this is to reduce costs, and it is hard to imagine drastic changes to the lens.There are two things that can be done to make a difference: changing the lens thickness and adjusting the lens position. The fun of lens design lies in the ingenuity that went into creating two lenses.

As of April 2024, if you look at the discontinued 24mm lens on the Sigma official page in the reference link, the same diagram as the 20mm lens with 13 elements in 11 groups is pasted on the lens configuration diagram. This is probably a mistake. The 24mm lens configuration diagram should be almost the same as the 11 elements in 9 groups on the 28mm page. Also, regarding dimensions and weight, there seem to be some descriptions that include values for the NIKON-F mount and values for the SIGMA-SA mount. The table below lists plausible values based on some information.

It is thought that the 20mm has the same basic parts as the 24mm and 28mm, such as the focus ring, but it seems that a focal length of 20mm could not be achieved using the same method as the 24mm. It is thought that the parts that housed the lens were designed separately, such as the filter size becoming larger due to the larger diameter of the front lens.

Focal lengths of 20mm, 24mm, and 28mm are focal lengths that are swallowed up by zoom lenses for lenses for APS-C sensors. It was popular due to its advantages such as low price, brightness of the lens, ability to focus on macro images, and better correction of aberrations than a zoom lens. I have fond memories of talking about which of the three focal lengths I prefer on a Sigma user bulletin board.

It’s a long-lived lens, released in 2001, and should have been available new until the late 2010s.
The lens used in this introduction is a later model with a single vertically elongated knurling on the focus ring. Lenses whose focus ring knurling is divided into smaller pieces in the longitudinal direction are early model lenses.
The lens configuration is the same between the early and late models, but it is unclear whether there were any changes other than the design of the lens barrel.

Specification

focal length(mm)	20	24	28
Maximum aperture	1.8	←	←
Minimum aperture	22	←	←
Lens configuration	11groups 13elements	9groups 10elements	←
Minimum distance(m)	0.2	0.18	0.2
Lens length(mm) SIGMA-SA (NIKON-F)	87.0 (89.5)	80 (82.5)	←
Lens max diameter(mm)	88.6	83.6	←
Filter diameter(mm)	82	77	←
Weight(g) SIGMA-SA	520	485	480 (500/official)
Price(Yen/No-tax)	70,000Yen	60,000Yen	50,000Yen

SIGMA-SA,CANON-EF,NIKON-F,MINOLTA-A,PENTAX-K
The numbers are quoted from yodobashi.com and SIGAM’s official page, and are based on values that the author believes are correct.