Seven years after Sigma claimed its original fp to be the world’s smallest and lightest full-frame mirrorless camera, the company has announced an equally compact follow-up with several welcome upgrades, including an improved sensor, articulating LCD screen and longer battery life. But this time around, Sigma only claims that its new FP2 is the “world’s smallest” full-frame shooter, since these improvements have increased its weight by about 6 grams.
The Sigma FP2 will be available on November 11 and starts at $2,199 for the camera body alone. For $2,749, you can pair it with Sigma’s upgraded EVF-21 viewfinder, which has a 5.76 million-dot OLED panel and an eye sensor that the camera uses to switch between its LCD screen and viewfinder. For the same price, you can alternatively bundle the new camera with a 50mm F2 DG I-series lens.
The FP2’s biggest upgrade is a new 24.5-megapixel, partially stacked, back-illuminated full-frame CMOS sensor. In terms of resolution, it’s a small step below the original FP’s 24.6-megapixel sensor, but the new architecture allows for faster reading of data on the FP2’s sensor. This has many benefits, including a reduced rolling shutter effect in still images (the camera is still limited to an electronic shutter), faster autofocus capabilities that now include bird recognition in addition to people and animals, still shooting at up to 20 fps, and video capabilities that max out at 6K at 60 fps, or 4K at 120 fps using only a cropped portion of the sensor.
The Sigma FP2 carries over the sleek, compact body of the original, which can still sometimes lead to difficult ergonomics, especially with a longer lens. But multiple tripod mounts make it easy to use optional accessories, like an extended grip and the aforementioned viewfinder. Its 3.2-inch, 2.1 million-dot LCD touchscreen on the back can now tilt up and down to facilitate more shooting angles while improving airflow and cooling so the FP2 can record longer videos.
Sigma added a full-size HDMI port, more durable than the original fp’s micro HDMI option, as well as two USB-C ports. One is limited to USB 2.0 speeds and is primarily designed to be used to power the camera or connect accessories like headphones or the viewfinder. The other is a 10Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2 port that can be used for high-speed data transfers or to connect an external SSD to capture footage in Apple’s ProRes RAW format.
There’s only one SD card slot, so there’s no redundant backup storage option, but the FP2 comes with 70GB of built-in storage that can be used when your memory card unexpectedly fills up. Sigma has also increased the battery capacity of the FP2. This makes the new model 40 grams heavier than the original fp with the battery inserted, but provides 30 percent longer battery life, which equates to about 370 photos, or about 130 minutes of video capture, according to the company.
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