Sigma BF Hands-On: The minimum of one error
In February, Sigma Sigma BF announced. It is just a full-frame, a convertible lens camera with a shutter release, dial and three buttons. That minimalism speaks to me, and I thought the BF would be transformed. Photography is one of my favorite interests, and I always thought that modern cameras were very complicated. When I received the unit of Sigma BF to test, I thought it was to love it. Unfortunately, it can be very easy.
All this starts with the design. Sigma is one of some of the Unibody cameras of the BF industry. It is carved from a single slab of aluminum, taking seven hours to complete a process sigma. The result is the camera, in contrast to what I have used earlier, with the quality of my current Fujifilm models, X-E3 And and X-S20. Now, I know what you think: BF looks like a ergonomic nightmare. Surprisingly, this is not so bad, thanks for adding two beveled edges to your hands to meet the bottom of the camera body.
However, due to the limitations of its unibody design, it has lost some of the features that are more convenient to use. For one, the right grip is good, especially when using a huge 50 mm lens like Sigma you sent me for the test. BF does not even mount the hot shoe, so the third party toe grip is from the table. Above all, it is only a single strap velot, so if you don’t want to use the neck strap, you need the one that adds the camera’s tripod mount. I didn’t have one of them, so the whole time I use had to take around $ 2,000 BF in my hand. You can get a can.
BF offers a very different shooting experience from your distinctive digital camera. As I mentioned, there are only one shutter release, single dial and three buttons (one to turn on and off the camera, one to review your photos and footage and one to access the menu). There is also a touchscreen, but you don’t know it first, because you do not use it when choosing a focus point and togle some options, rather than shooting.
The basic way to communicate with a dial camera of BF. To adjust your exposure, you first press it in a wheel to a certain setting on the left or right side of the dial, and then spin it to adjust the levels as desired. The second small screen above the dial allows you to adjust those parameters without interacting with the main appearance.
Alternatively, you can press the BF’s “Dual Layer” menu system in the middle of the dial. As the name suggests, Sigma has maintained most of what you need in two level menu. For example, tell you to convert the camera from Matrix to spot metering. This includes pressing on the dial, scrolling to one of the exposure settings, pressing again in the middle of the dial, and then using your toe to press the touchscreen and start spot metering. Accessing most of the settings you want is not very laborious, but in this garbage scenario shows where the experience of shooting with Sigma BF is falling.
BF is not great for capturing fleeting moments. In eliminating many physical controls for modern cameras, Sigma BF makes it difficult to change multiple settings at once. Whenever I want to shoot a fast -moving scene I am very angry by the BF.
One of my photo was walking with Sigma BF and a father was riding a bike in his back seat with his son. With my X-E3 or almost any other camera, it is easy to summarize that moment. I was able to turn the drive mode, the focus system and the shutter speed independently. In BF, I had to adjust each setting in a row. By the time I finished, the father and son had long passed.
If Sigma at least allows you to modify the quick setting screen to show less options, you can fix some of the BF some shortcomings. For example, I do not need access to easily to change them like a aspect ratio. In 2025, each new camera shipped with the excessive bulging menu system and in that case Sigma BF breathes the fresh air. However, it is a very good experience to allow the user to make their own tweaks.
And it is the subject: with BF, the Sigma camera interface breaks down, which are for a good reason. I will give you one of the more frustrating examples: the camera will not provide an easy way to measure the reveal of the scene. I don’t have a meter to indicate whether the shot is low, and I can’t add one to the main screen.
The only way I can see the histogram, my preferred method for nailing exposure, accessing the second layer of the interface from one of the capture settings. This is a particularly confusing decision, because you can quickly press the shutter to make exposure compensatory adjustments quickly with the control dial, but as soon as you do, you will jump out of the menu you see. If you are not your thing to dig through the menus, there are two live viewing overlays to see if you clip your shadows or highlights. The first is your normal zebra pattern. Second, Sigma calls false color, converts very screen grayscale and uses warning colors. The correct exposure is not considered perfect as a meter or histogram.
On paper, the BF video has a good camera, 6K recording, HEVC encoding and L-log. Unfortunately, minimalism of BF is also weakness here. To get started, shot framing is a challenge as the camera has a fixed screen. Getting useful footage is also tricky. BF does not provide in-body image stabilization, and with built-in stabilization, despite some L-mount lenses, most of them are practical to use with BF due to their size and weight.
If you earn so far, you are wondering whether there is something positive about BF. Well, the best of the camera is that it takes real great photos, which makes all its shortcomings even more disappointing. The 24-megapixel, backside Illuminated sensor and sigma’s lenses are beautifully captured and providing details without clinical. BF also has a great subject detection autofocus, making it easy for people and pets shooting portraits.
Sigma has some interesting ideas about what the camera looks like in 2025, but those thoughts often hurt without implementing it. As the first stab in the minimalist camera, the BF was enough for it, and with refinement, I was able to see future versions developed. For example, I like to find a way to add flip-out screen in the BF’s unibody frame. Until then, there was a lot of $ 2,000 to ask for a very high camera.
