Hi, I’m George, and after a week of shooting with the Sigma BF, I’ve figured out all its quirks so you don’t have to. This isn’t your typical mirrorless camera — it’s got a radically different interface, and some things (like the power button!) took me way too long to find.
In this guide, I’ll walk you through exactly how to set up the Sigma BF for photos and video, so you can start shooting smoothly right away.
So, where’s the Power Button?
Tucked discreetly into the design, it took me a minute, too. Hint: It’s a haptic button (more on those later).
When you first power on the camera, all exposure settings default to auto—you’ll only have exposure compensation control. Here’s how to take full control:
Leave other settings in auto if you want (e.g., shutter priority, aperture priority, or auto ISO).
The Sigma BF has two main displays:
The main thumb wheel and hte D-pad controls these settings directly, and you can sort through with your thumb to select each setting.
This interface admittedly takes some getting used to, but after a few tries during your photoshoot, you'll get the hang of it rather quickly.
Instead of physical buttons, the Sigma BF uses haptic touch controls for:
Haptic controls feel rather Apple-like and futuristic, and they're not tactile or easy to grasp at first. And while these operate as you'd expect, two of them are multi-functional:
While you can control all of your exposure and settings using the mini LCD, you may want to tap on the main LCD screen to tap on the subject within your frame to begin focus tracking (works in AFS or AFC).
To begin autofocus, just track the subject with your thumb and tap the top-right icon to cancel tracking.
Pro Tip: The BF’s subject detection is great — you might not even need manual tracking.
In addition to autofocus, you can press the center of the D-pad to bring up exposure controls on the main LCD.
Press a second time to dive deeper for more manual controls:
You'll quickly notice that the BF camrea only has one strap mount point, but here’s how to adapt it:
While I'd recommend using this camrea for photography more so, you can shoot good video with a few key settings.
You will find the Video Mode option among the shooting modes in the mini display. With Video Mode selected, our info display changes to video-centric settings, such as:
By tapping on the main menu button, you'll see a Quick Menu with settings like:
At the bottom, you can select System to bring up the main menu, which has less of an effect on your shooting experience, but still some super important notes of interest, like Storage & File Management. This is arguably the most critical setting option, where you can see our internal storage status and delete your files once you have backed them up.
You simply connect via USB-C to your laptop. You will use an Access Camera display, and here you can select “Mass Storage” on the camera.
You'll then have access to the Sigma BF on your laptop and access files like an external drive.
This is a sit-down conversation answering the most frequently asked questions about Sigma’s first mirrorless camera. The BF is fun, it’s fre...
