A couple of questions on Nikon Lenses

[Nicholaus James]

I have the 17-35, 28-70, and the 80-200mm FILM lenses from Nikon. They have an iris ring and they are designed for film cameras, but, of course, are good on digital as well.

Couple of questions.

Are these good or great to use on Red? Am I getting the true focal point or is there some "magnification" I will have to do. For instance, my 17-35 really is like a 25.5-52.5 on my Nikon D80.
Is f/2.8 going to be fast enough in low light conditions (I know this is very generalized, but answer to the best of your ability) or should I invest in some faster prime lenses as well?
And, from what I heard, most lenses aren't their sharpest at there most wide open f-stop, so should I not go faster than f4? Is this going to need a lot of light? Will I still get the coveted shallow depth of field in relatively wide shot instances?
Or should I just find a miracle way in financing the huge leap into cine lenses, particularly the Red lenses at first.

I just want to be able to get crisp good pictures from affordable, but good glass. Just wondering if I already posess some.

 

[Nicholaus James]

No one can throw a bone???

 

[Jim McKinney]

My suggestion: Go with the lenses you have now and once you get your Red, look for yourself. Put those lenses in situations that you anticipate encountering.

Obviously, an Ultra prime will be sharper - but much, much more expensive! Perhaps the reason no one has replied yet is that there are so many variables and in the end it boils down to your subjective opinion.

For those upscale jobs you can always rent nicer glass.

One of the nice things about Red is you can do all sorts of dry runs and tests to see how your particular kit performs, without having to spend any money on film or processing.

 

[Fergus Meiklejohn]

In terms of Performance and Magnification if you put them on your D80, you'll get a very good idea of how they will look on the RED 1. I think the D8 is 1:1.6 no ?? And we worked out months ago that RED is around 1:1.7

In term of aperture and depth of field, I am also swinging between options. My Nikon 18-200VR is a wonderful lens but it starts at F3.5 and likes to be at F5.6 or F8. So a bit dark, but on the other hand I think that focussing for docos or low budget features (which will be my work) will be very difficult with RED at F1.8.. So the real world available-light decision for me may be between a little bit noisy and a little bit out of focus.

Also, I'm wondering how VR will work on RED. It could be awesome for many of us

 

[PaulClements]

Hi,

In terms of magnification take a look at this to work out how to crop an image so that you can see what the Red will see using the same lens when shooting 4K RedCode RAW. It gives you the math, all you need to do is find out the size of the sensor and vertical and horizontal pixels for your camera.

The 17-35, 28-70, and the 80-200mm are certainly three lenses I'll be hoping to test out on a RedOne in the future. I put up a list of the available AF-S on redwiki earlier (See other post) and these three zooms certainly represent three of the best. If you go the Nikon route you can't do much better, so yeah you already possess some good still lenses.

Paul

 

[Stephen Williams]

[ For instance, my 17-35 really is like a 25.5-52.5 on my Nikon D80.
[/QUOTE]

Hi,

Your 17-35 on your D80 will look very similar on a RED. The RED sensor is nearly the same size as the D80.

Stephen

 

[Nicholaus James]

Thanks a lot guys!!

I knew I had good Nikon glass, I was just wondering if it was good enough for RED.

 

[Nils J. Nesse]

I have the 17-35, and used to have the 80-200. Both give nice images on the Red. f/2.8 is not very good for low light shooting. Other than that, the biggest downside is the short focus throw. And the 17-35 does not have hard stops at the ends of the focus scale -which messes everything up if you're using marks on the follow focus, for example. The AF-D 80-200 has hard stops, the AF-S version does not.

I would consider having the lenses cine-modded by Duclos Lenses http://web.me.com/ducloslenses/DL/New.html

 

[M Hsu]

it all comes down to what you're going for, I have a nice set of the best canon primes, I also have all the canon L zooms and some very nice leica glass, but at the same time I have a pretty complete set of old manual nikon primes that are really great and very cheap on ebay. I use them when I want lens flare or a more vintage vibe. They aren't the sharpest lenses, but the old manual AI-S nikons are pretty great in my opinion. Plus they weigh very little. They're not cine glass but I definitely shoot with them.

 

[Ariel Weiss]

Hi

I recommand adding some fast primes, depanding on budget you can start with 50 f 1.8 or 1.4, 35 f 2 and maybe if you use 85 alot prais the 85 f 1.4 ais but if you realy want to keep it low budget start with the 50 and see what it gives you. For available night light f 2.8 is not enough.
Depth of fiels is phisycal, for the same focal lengh and f stop you get the same whether its nikon or zeiss. Other factors will vary like sharpness, distortion and bokeh.
For wide shots with shallow focus look you need very fast wide angle lens such as the 28 f 1.4 which is rear and expansive. The 50 f 1.8 wide open can give some nice shots also and its very cheap.You will need nd's to shoot these apertures in daylight.

 

[Matthew Duclos]

Far too many variables in this question.
Yes, Nikon makes great glass.
No, they are not better than motion picture lenses.
Everyone else here already beat me to the important points.
Experiment as much as you can with the glass you have. If it works well for you, good.
If not, time to upgrade.