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Converting Nikons to PL mount... Anyone intersted?

Evin Grant

Evin Grant

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At Cinegear I spoke to the guys at Century Optics about the possibility of adding PL mounts to my Nikkor set. They said it was possible but not financially viable till I reached about 50 lenses. I'm not sure how much each conversion would cost, probably around a grand per lens, but if we could pool our resources I'm sure we could get 50 Nikkors ready for the chopping block.
Is anyone here interested? If so post the model/mm/F stop and number of Nikkors or Canon FD, Leica R Lenses you'd like converted.
If I can come to a consesus about the project I'll contact Century again and start making the first move towards the project.
E.
 
A grand a lens to add PL mount to a Nikkor? That seems an aweful lot for just the mount. Bulk order on rehousing for around a grand each and I'd be up for that, though I'm doubtful a grand would cover that.

What will you do for your Nikon cameras then? Get them rehoused with a PL mount or simply never use the lenses for still photography again?

Have you actually seen how easy it is to change the adapter on the Red camera Evin? Perhaps they've designed something that doesn't require collimating everytime you change it, goodness only knows. But when the fmount adapter is as cheap as $500 it doesn't make financial sense to go that route to me, you might as well just buy a second red body and have one nikon and one pl :)
 
Thank you Evin. I am vaguely interested but have similar reservations to Paul. They are just adding a PL mount, right? Not doing anything like fixing the focus throw or adding hard stops to the 17-35? From having used the lens, it still seems like a major problem - I'm going to need to either buy an Arri LFF or something motorized to control it. Or have I gone wrong somewhere? I'm sad because Matt Garrett and I did tests with it on a 35mm adapter that totally concur with your review, but we hate its usability. Maybe we could give them a batch of 50 17-35s to rehouse? Even if they keep it with a Nikon mount, just fix the focus. Not sure if that's possible.

I would be very tempted to rehouse the new 80-200 2.8 AF-D I have just bought though! Talking of that, Evin, email me if you want to test it...

Cheers

Bruce
www.boacinema.com
 
Doesn't that Century conversion include rehousing too? Not just PL mount? Yes, the 8mm is a good candidate, as are the 24mm 1.4, 50mm 1.4, 85mm 1.4 etc. 58mm noct, anyone? Just don't see how the 17-35 will work nicely. And the 28-70 will extend, which interferes with the matte box. What is your planned follow focus solution?

I am arguing mainly because I am interested in your solutions to these problems - if you can make the 17-35 and 28-70 workable it would be a dream come true for me.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
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I don't see the 17-35 as being that much of a problem, a focus gear that has hard stops will fix the drift issue and the short focus throw can be compensated for by either a Willytech or a motorized focus system like the Red motors or the BFD (Bartec). The price is a guess and would not include rehousing. Spending any more than $1000 seems silly when the 18-50mm CF Red lens is only $6500. There are some lenses like the 28mm 1.4 and the 58mm 1.2 Noct Nikkor that are unique and I'd like as a compliment to my Red lenses. I'll ask about rehousing the 17-35mm though I doubt it will be affordable.
 
Evin Grant said:
I don't see the 17-35 as being that much of a problem, a focus gear that has hard stops will fix the drift issue and the short focus throw can be compensated for by either a Willytech or a motorized focus system like the Red motors or the BFD (Bartec). The price is a guess and would not include rehousing. Spending any more than $1000 seems silly when the 18-50mm CF Red lens is only $6500. There are some lenses like the 28mm 1.4 and the 58mm 1.2 Noct Nikkor that are unique and I'd like as a compliment to my Red lenses. I'll ask about rehousing the 17-35mm though I doubt it will be affordable.
Click to expand...

I have played with the Bartech - it is nice. But it is $5000 or so, right? Maybe CVB's solution is the winner, don't know. I have catalogued the motorized and manual follow focus devices in other threads partly because of my desire to use your recommended 17-35 which I agree is stellar.

The DPs I work with like to have an option apart from motorized focus, so let's look at that too. First, the Willytec is no longer available. To me that leaves only the Arri follow focuses - maybe Petroff or others but not sure. Would love your opinion on this - to my mind I'm going to have to test the 17-35 with gears and an Arri LFF. Again I have been trying the 17-35 on adapters for HDV cameras and am not impressed so far. Hence the leaning towards the Red lens.

Evin, if you want to rent an Arri LFF-1, a Bartech and other solutions and give em a go on your Nikons (maybe attached to an HD camera via 35mm adapter) I would be happy to split the rental cost with you. Matt Garrett and I have tried the RedRock FF on the 17-35 and it made things suck less but the lack of hard stops in the end was a deal-breaker. Matt Jeppsen of Freshdv has been testing the lower-end motorized options (Foveas, RedRock, I think) as well as the Bartech on various lenses including the Nikon and Zeiss (ZF mount) primes - I'd want to gather info and figure out if we really can pull focus on these suckers before committing to the PL mount option, because if we convert the 17-35 Nikon to PL mount and find that there isn't a workable focus solution, then we're up the creek without the proverbial paddle.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
regista said:
I fail to see why would the 17-35mm be a problem. Granted, the 28-70mm isn't ideal because of its extension, but I don't think it's something that a little bit of ingenuity and effort can't overcome. The end solution may not be "elegant" (i.e.: adding an extension to the outer sleeve, etc.), but I can't see why it couldn't be made to work. This will be one of the little pet projects I'll be diving into once I get the RED and start measuring things and scoping out MBs, support and FF systems, etc. (that's why I had been looking at those Cinevate FF gears).

Something to keep me busy for a while (read: out of trouble). :ninja:

Cheers, Bruce!
Click to expand...

Yep, I agree that we can probably overcome everything. Again, I'm happy to chip in with anyone on things like FF system rental so that we can test...

I have posted about those Cinevate gears multiple times before (a few months ago). They look great but there is a problem if the focus ring moves backwards & forwards as it does on some Nikons. Then RedRock seem better.

Cheers

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
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I'm relatively sure that a less expensive, reversed, low geared follow focus will eventually hit the market. As Red begins to dominate low to medium budget production more and more owners and rental houses will begin to find ways of overcoming the shortfalls of still lenses so they can stratify thier rental packages. And where ther is a market there is eventually a product.
E.
 
Evin, if you can find out from them the possibility of bulk rehousing 17-35mm nikkors, lets say 50 of them as per your suggestion. You could count me in if the price is right. At the end of the day rehousing a single lens is an expensive job. But if you are creating the components for 50 at a time it ought to vastly reduce the costs surely? Heck I'd probably get a few done because they'd have a good resale value if bulk rehousing is as uncommon as I expect it to be.
 
evin,

thanks for your research - i am interested!

nikon 17-35mm
nikon 50mm
nikon 135mm
(nikon 300mm)

if technically possible with these lenses ...

kind regards,
martin
 
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PaulClements said:
Evin, if you can find out from them the possibility of bulk rehousing 17-35mm nikkors, lets say 50 of them as per your suggestion. You could count me in if the price is right. At the end of the day rehousing a single lens is an expensive job. But if you are creating the components for 50 at a time it ought to vastly reduce the costs surely? Heck I'd probably get a few done because they'd have a good resale value if bulk rehousing is as uncommon as I expect it to be.
Click to expand...

Paul, unfortunately rehousing a 17-35 Nikkor will be a very costly endevor.
Schneider/Century already offers a rehoused 17-35mm Canon EOS lens and it retails for a cool $15,000! I think the only chance we have is a PL mount addition. But I'm trying to make this happen, stay tuned.
E.

0S2-CZ17-00.jpg

http://www.schneideroptics.com/ecommerce/CatalogItemDetail.aspx?CID=1102&IID=1218
 
Evin Grant said:
At Cinegear I spoke to the guys at Century Optics about the possibility of adding PL mounts to my Nikkor set. They said it was possible but not financially viable till I reached about 50 lenses. I'm not sure how much each conversion would cost, probably around a grand per lens, but if we could pool our resources I'm sure we could get 50 Nikkors ready for the chopping block.
Is anyone here interested? If so post the model/mm/F stop and number of Nikkors or Canon FD, Leica R Lenses you'd like converted.
If I can come to a consesus about the project I'll contact Century again and start making the first move towards the project.
E.
Click to expand...

Hi guys,

as I have a complete new set of the ZEISS/f mount in order(do not buy at Zacuto as they are way more expensive then B&H) to use with a 35mm adaptor in my new XH-A1 canon(as the RED's come home) it will be great to be also able to use them in the RED cameras PL mount.

My main question is it there to be a gain in the PL mount vs, F mount?

Like for exemple with the 35mm adapter such as the Redrock M2 or SGpro or with the RED, the same 35mm SLR ZEISS lens is it going to change in any way if the mount it self is F or PL?

thanks in advance for your responces on this one.

Oh, if PL is the answer then yes I also will be interested in converting this four ZEISS F mount lenses to PL.

Ciao

KETCH ROSSI
www.KETCHFRAME.com
 
KETCH ROSSI said:
Hi guys,

as I have a complete new set of the ZEISS/f mount in order(do not buy at Zacuto as they are way more expensive then B&H) to use with a 35mm adaptor in my new XH-A1 canon(as the RED's come home) it will be great to be also able to use them in the RED cameras PL mount.

My main question is it there to be a gain in the PL mount vs, F mount?

Like for exemple with the 35mm adapter such as the Redrock M2 or SGpro or with the RED, the same 35mm SLR ZEISS lens is it going to change in any way if the mount it self is F or PL?
Click to expand...

Ketch, I am in the same position as you. I'd like to take Evin up on his offer but don't know how the M2 or SGpro work with PL mount (projection distances, focus, etc may change with their different mount system?). 95% chance that it'll be fine (especially full-frame Nikons with their larger image circle), but it's stressful, since very few tests have been released of M2 with PL mount lenses. No tests available from SGpro. I asked them to send me their PL mount for testing (and to buy it on condition that I got decent results) but so far no dice. They want me to buy the whole thing without tests? I am in touch with one guy who has the PL mount and some Zeiss standard primes but he is shooting (using Nikons) and doesn't have time to test.

It was great meeting you at Cinegear by the way. Good to see you smiling and healthy and fit-looking. Glad you met my Steadicam operator friends too.

Cheers

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
Yes Bruce it was a placer meet you at Cinegear, and to meet also your Steadycam operators friend was just a bonus as I intend to use extensive steadycam work on this film.

I will be more then available for any needs as far as to use the equipment I have in combination with any that we may test for this purposes or others, so again count me in for anything.

CIAO,

KETCH ROSSI
www.KETCHFRAME.com
 
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