I had a really long talk with the general manager of Sigma UK, Graham Armitage, at the recent PMA show. Normally Graham is on a tight schedule as he's a popular guy with reporters at the PMA show. Not this year; as so few UK journalists ventured to PMA this year we had all the time in the world to gossip.

An interesting point Graham made is that the ratio of DG (full frame compatible) lenses Sigma sells compared to DC (APS and smaller format sensors) lenses is closing. It's now down to 1:10, so for every DG lens sold, Sigma sells 10 DC lenses.

Clearly, Nikon's entrance in to the full frame sphere a couple of years back with the D3 and D700, and Sony's Alpha A900 and A850 models, along with Canon's continued championing of full frame (and APS-H in the 1D) has increased demand for full frame compatible lenses.

But let's assume that if you can afford a full frame camera you are more likely to be buying additional lenses than the average smaller sensor DSLR user, and compute in the fact that a decent chunk of Sigma's DG lenses are being used with cameras that aren't full frame, then it's likely that full frame DSLR camera sales remain substantially less than 10%, by volume.

And I wonder if the emergence of the hybrid interchangeable lens cameras, with their mirror-less compact and lightweight dimensions, could even reverse the trend and compromise the recent growth in full frame DSLRs?
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