RPAs...

[Ryan S]

Forgive the elementary question but would a DP on here care to give a little background on this focal length selection? I'm not a DP and have not worked with anamorphic footage before in the post process. Specificallly, how does a 35mm anamorphic lens differ from a 35mm prime? I understand that the image is squeezed using an additional piece of glass in the lens so it fits the imaging plane and uses more available resolution, but once "un-squeezed" doesn't the image still retain the characteristics of a similar focal length prime?

Hey Todd,

A 35mm anamorphic prime with a 2x squeeze has the horizontal field of view of an 18mm spherical prime (roughly), but has the vertival FOV of a 35mm. I'm sure David Mullen or one of the other experienced DoPs here can add to this, but that's my understanding.

 

[Sean Cruser]

this is all extremely delicious.

 

[jbeale]

the case of the too-perfect lens

the case of the too-perfect lens

You can always flag off light sources, but you can't make a flare-less lens flare.

well... if you took it apart and scraped the coatings off each element with steel wool, I bet you could make pretty much any lens flare... :seeya:

 

[Bob Renalds]

Flare

Flare

Ha,

Ottom Nemetz has an old set of century conversions that have the coating rubbed off that folks actually like!!!!

 

[Ryan S]

It occurs to me that these lenses could be particularly interesting if used for stills, with the flares and bokeh being as they are. Has anyone here used Anamorphics for stills before? I know there's those Iscorama anamorphics that pop up from time to time on eBay...

 

[David Mullen ASC]

Forgive the elementary question but would a DP on here care to give a little background on this focal length selection? I'm not a DP and have not worked with anamorphic footage before in the post process. Specificallly, how does a 35mm anamorphic lens differ from a 35mm prime? I understand that the image is squeezed using an additional piece of glass in the lens so it fits the imaging plane and uses more available resolution, but once "un-squeezed" doesn't the image still retain the characteristics of a similar focal length prime?

It's like a spherical lens with a wide-angle adaptor in front, but it only expands the view in the horizontal direction. So a 2X anamorphic lens with the same focal length as a spherical lens has twice the horizontal view (more or less... in real life, the 4-perf anamorphic 35mm camera aperture is 22mm wide but the Super-35 spherical camera aperture is 24mm wide.)

So let's say you were shooting in regular 35mm but cropping the top & bottom to get 2.40 and you used a 20mm lens to get your wide shot.

In 2X anamorphic photography, you'd use a 40mm lens to get the same view.

This is why anamorphic photography has less depth of field, because you generally use longer focal lengths to get the same view as shorter lenses in spherical 35mm cropped vertically to get to 2.40.

 

[Todd M.]

It's like a spherical lens with a wide-angle adaptor in front, but it only expands the view in the horizontal direction. So a 2X anamorphic lens with the same focal length as a spherical lens has twice the horizontal view (more or less... in real life, the 4-perf anamorphic 35mm camera aperture is 22mm wide but the Super-35 spherical camera aperture is 24mm wide.)

So let's say you were shooting in regular 35mm but cropping the top & bottom to get 2.40 and you used a 20mm lens to get your wide shot.

In 2X anamorphic photography, you'd use a 40mm lens to get the same view.

This is why anamorphic photography has less depth of field, because you generally use longer focal lengths to get the same view as shorter lenses in spherical 35mm cropped vertically to get to 2.40.

Gotcha. Thanks for the replies Ryan and David.

 

[Stephen Williams]

So let's say you were shooting in regular 35mm but cropping the top & bottom to get 2.40 and you used a 20mm lens to get your wide shot.

In 2X anamorphic photography, you'd use a 40mm lens to get the same view.
.

Jim,

I have been thinking about the focal lengths. If I had to take only 4 lenses, I'd pick the 40mm, 50mm, 75mm, 100mm, not a 35mm, 50mm, 85mm, 100mm. 25mm? That's useless in anamorphic, better make a 180mm and a 60mm, those are really useful focal lengths...

Best Stephen

 

[PaulClements]

Jim,

I have been thinking about the focal lengths. If I had to take only 4 lenses, I'd pick the 40mm, 50mm, 75mm, 100mm, not a 35mm, 50mm, 85mm, 100mm. 25mm? That's useless in anamorphic, better make a 180mm and a 60mm, those are really useful focal lengths...

Best Stephen

Surely it all depends on the squeeze though Stephen. Without that tiny bit of info any suggestions at lengths are useless. If they are 1.33x then 40mm would be the equivalent of a 30mm... Even at 2x it'd only be 20mm eq. The 35mm 2x Ana has always struck me as the ideal wide anamorphic personally. What's your reasoning for 40mm?

Paul

 

[Stephen Williams]

Surely it all depends on the squeeze though Stephen. Without that tiny bit of info any suggestions at lengths are useless. If they are 1.33x then 40mm would be the equivalent of a 30mm... Even at 2x it'd only be 20mm eq. The 35mm 2x Ana has always struck me as the ideal wide anamorphic personally. What's your reasoning for 40mm?

Paul

Hi Paul,

From the proposed focal lengths 2x squeeze would make sense. OK Red's first S35 prime lens was a 300mm so anything is possible!
In Anamorphic a 35mm just has too much distortion for my taste.

Best Stephen

EDIT RED please don't rush these lenses, the first Hawks would be an example not to be imitated IMO.

 

[Pawel Achtel]

well... if you took it apart and scraped the coatings off each element with steel wool, I bet you could make pretty much any lens flare... :seeya:

Good tip. :iagree:

 

[James T Mather]

As someone who owns and uses Anas I can say that a 40mm as a widest is useless (if your next lens is a 50) -

Yes they distort but if you can't abide distortion then don't shoot anamorphic (even the 50mms have distortion) - all a part of the look I would have thought - and difficult to prevent due to the optical principles of anamorphics in general.

We frequently have to flip to spherical (and yes that is with a 35mm ana) as it won't capture anything but a mid-shot on an interior.

40mm (unless you plan to flip between spherical and anamorphic as required) is not wide enough IMVHO


Wes Anderson:Tenenbaums - Woooah nelly! Distortiontastic!

 

[Stephen Williams]

Hi James,

Your in favour of a 24mm?

Stephen

As someone who owns and uses Anas I can say that a 40mm as a widest is useless (if your next lens is a 50) -

Yes they distort but if you can't abide distortion then don't shoot anamorphic (even the 50mms have distortion) - all a part of the look I would have thought - and difficult to prevent due to the optical principles of anamorphics in general.

We frequently have to flip to spherical (and yes that is with a 35mm ana) as it won't capture anything but a mid-shot on an interior.

40mm (unless you plan to flip between spherical and anamorphic as required) is not wide enough IMVHO


Wes Anderson:Tenenbaums - Woooah nelly!

 

[James T Mather]

H Stephen - put it this way - I've had my finger poised over the "buy" button more than once to to drop eleven g's on a 22mm Lomo - sanity generally prevailed but who knows what the future holds.

All I'm saying is that on Red one according to the artemis directors finder (I'll confirm soon) -

red at 4k Ana mode
35mm ana on red - 41.7 horiz AOV
50mm ana on red. 29.9 horoz AOV
75mm ana on red 20.2 horiz AOV
100mm ana on red - 15.2 horiz AOV

at 4k 16x9 red one.
28mm spherical is 41.1 horiz = ana 35
40mm sph has 29.4 horiz = 50 ana
50mm sph has 23.7 horiz = 75 Ana
85mm sph has 14.1 horiz = 100 Ana

This software (artemis) has been pretty accurate in the past (I'm just back from a 3 day shoot in Kiev so taking a day on the couch - When I get the energy up I'll build the camera and confirm) -

This means (despite the twice-the-horizontal ana-to-sph conversion we use) that the 35mm actually would be approx 28mm on the R1 - In my working experience this seems accurate (I seem to recall swapping out the 35mm ana for a 20mm sph and getting a wider field of view on a shoot) - this is no doubt due to the crop 4/3 factor vs the R1 super 35mm sph neg.

I find that anamorphic sets tend to be a little on the long side but they were developed at a time when westerns and setbuilding was popular so it's no wonder - no walls to back up into.

So 24mm? Hell yeah...Its an imperfect world. embrace the arch - learn to love it

 

[Gavin Greenwalt]

We also don't know the coverage. The REDOne's crop factor with Anamorphic is greater than 4-perf and 4-perf is greater than FF35. If these were to cover a FF35 or ever 4-perf academy portion of the sensor then you would get a much wider 35mm than you're getting now. We only have 1 of the 3 important details to make an educated guess as to what their AOV is.

 

[David Mullen ASC]

I've done four 35mm anamorphic features and personally, I try to never use anything shorter than the 40mm because it just looks too wide and distorted, but I always carry a 35mm anamorphic lens just for those occasional shots where I have no choice. I've never used anything wider-angle than that in anamorphic.

Basically it's similar to using a 17.5mm lens in spherical 35mm cine to get your wide shot -- some people do that all the time, I tend to try to avoid going wider than a 24mm most of the time, unless I'm working with a wide-angle style director.

Again, a 40mm anamorphic is like shooting in Super-35 with a 20mm spherical, more or less, so ask yourself if a 20mm lens is not wide enough for your needs. If it isn't, you are going to need a 35mm anamorphic or shorter.

But I'm talking about shooting 4-perf 35mm. The anamorphic camera aperture is 22mm x 18.5mm in that case - on the Red One it is closer to 15mm x 12.5mm. With that degree of cropping, you need a 28mm anamorphic just to get what a 40mm anamorphic gives you on a 4-perf 35mm camera, and a 24mm anamorphic to get you what a 35mm anamorphic gives you.

 

[Jose Poernomo]

is it open for deposit yet ?

 

[Martin Stevens]

Thank you David Mullen ASC. Great info as always.

 

[Stephen Williams]

Thank you David Mullen. Great info as always.

Indeed!

 

[David Mullen ASC]

A lot of these lens discussions seem to break down into people who like really wide-angles and those that think they are a necessary evil but not preferred.

To me, they are visually "cool" and "neat" but that's also the reason I tend to avoid them, they make the shot "artificially" interesting, just because of the lens distortion. For a commercial or music video, that's fine, or for a stylized moment in a movie, but for more traditional narrative driven by performance, I find it hard to justify being that flashy.