Review by Edward Hor.

Price: 3 out of 5
Ease of use: 4 out of 5
Build Quality: 4 out of 5
Usefulness: 3 out of 5
Overall: 4 out of 5
Total: 18

The much anticipated and talked about compact digital camera of 2008 amongst photography enthusiasts would have to be the Sigma DP-1, their debut compact digital camera. The DP-1’s Foveon sensor is taken straight from Sigma’s SD14 digital SLR camera and is matched with a fixed 28mm (35mm equiv) f4 lens.

Pros

• The APS-C Foveon sensor, there are only a handful of compact digital cameras on the market that come close to the DP-1’s image quality in all conditions.
• Digital SLR quality in a pocket sized camera.
• Has a hot shoe for an external flash.
• Manual focus dial comes in handy.
• Nice simple design that does not scream “look at me”.
• Lens is sharp (but that doesn’t suprise as Sigma is a lens maker afterall).

Cons

• Not well suited for average-joe low-light happy snaps.
• Aperture controlled via buttons. A dedicated aperture dial would have been better.
• Slow shot-to-shot times.
• Maximum of 800ISO combined with the f4 lens means slow shutter speeds in low light conditions.

Other thoughts
A faster lens like an f2.8 would have helped in low-light conditions. Shot-to-shot times and write speeds could be faster.

Conclusion
This definitely is not a camera for the masses. The enthusiasts who are after quality photos and are willing to sacrifice slow shot-to-shot times will be happy with this camera. It will make for an excellent travelling camera for enthusiasts or professionals who need high-quality photos from a compact camera.

Tags: DP-1, review, Sigma

This entry was posted on Monday, September 22nd, 2008 at 12:29 pm and is filed under Reviews | . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.