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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Best cinematic lenses for Scarlet X

Look for used Leica R lenses. It seems to be the consensus in relation to price/quality/value. Search for Josh Beadle's thread on lenses- there's very good info there. Seems like Nikons are the second best on the still lenses category.

I own however a very complete set of Canon L lenses and plan to use them on my Epic with Canon mount. Like someone said, the best lenses are the ones you have :) However, investing in good lenses is probably the best one in the whole production package. They will last you -if handled with care- for a lifetime, and several cameras!
 
and sorry, maybe I'm just in a mood tonight, but the title of this thread is getting to me too. Cinematic lenses? Do we mean cinema lenses like CP.2s, superspeeds etc? Or are the Canon L lenses really considered cinematic lenses now just because they fit on a digital cinema camera? :rant:
 
i would buy used pl glass, or the red pro zoom 17-50 as a start. its a superb lens. i also own a set of cooke s4 and say that :)
 
Used PL glass in good condition got very scarce since the R1 came to market. Your best bet is the older RED zoom 18-50mm
 
I kinda regret not going for that Digioptical bundle that B&H had a while back. I believe it was the 18-50mm and 50-150mm for like $6k. I remember some people got them and they were surprisingly decent lenses.
 
On a Scarlet . . . Canon 24-105mm or the coming updated 24-70mm . . . which might have video style image stabilization. Then a good prime like the 35mm F1.4 for narrative work. I would rather have modern EF style technology / lens coatings than a used 10 year old cine lens if the money is the same. Here come the cinesnob wails . . .
 
Josh Beadle said:
On a Scarlet . . . Canon 24-105mm or the coming updated 24-70mm . . . which might have video style image stabilization. Then a good prime like the 35mm F1.4 for narrative work. I would rather have modern EF style technology / lens coatings than a used 10 year old cine lens if the money is the same. Here come the cinesnob wails . . .
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I'll just be the one to say it: good luck doing real focus pulls!

no offense intended. Just can't understand how people actually use still lenses on a day-to-day basis without going nuts. At least the ZEs/ZFs have real focus rings.
 
Trevor Meeks said:
I'll just be the one to say it: good luck doing real focus pulls!

no offense intended. Just can't understand how people actually use still lenses on a day-to-day basis without going nuts. At least the ZEs/ZFs have real focus rings.
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The throws on the Zeiss are much longer.

I have a couple Canon L zooms if I want to do some fancy touch focus stuff, but my primes I kinda wanna keep mechanical.
 
AndrewThomas said:
The only thing that changes when putting a 50mm lens on a crop sensor is that the FOV is narrower than if it were mounted on a larger sensor.
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EXACTLY WHAT I WAS SAYING. THANKS FOR CONFIRMING.

Here is a visual aid. Its a pair of (poorly captured) images superimposed to show that the same lens, used on two different cameras (in this case a film camera rather than a digital camera).

This is a lens designed for a 6x6 camera used on a 6x6 camera and then the same lens used on a 35mm film camera (a Russian Konvas).

Same thing happens when using 35mm still glass on an EPIC/Scarlet. Its just not as dramatic because the different sensors are nearer in size than in this example. Hence, a 50mm behaves like a 64mm (in terms of the captured FOV).
 

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Steve Yager said:
Compact primes aren't rehoused ZEs.
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I remember when they were announced every video I saw of them with a few different Zeiss reps, the reps explained them as "ZEs in cinema lens housing". All the same glass elements, but the apertures and housing are different. If thats not rehousing than I don't know what is. Not trying to start an argument but this is what I've constantly heard since they were announced, including from Zeiss reps.

It's brought up in this lens test thread that jim posted as well: http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?65362-Peter-Lik
 
Michael Panfeld said:
Also note that there is a crop factor when using still glass on the EPIC/Scarlet sensor. A 50mm Canon EF will behave like a 64mm "cinema" lens on the EPIC
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But Michael that is wrong...

A 50mm canon EF lens will have the exact same framing on the epic as any other 50mm lens, no matter if the other lens is "Cinematic" or not... The definition of focal length is: the distance between the lens nodal point and the focus plane no more no less.

My dad was an Optician... got force feed with this kind of stuff already as a kid. :)
 
Björn Benckert said:
But Michael that is wrong...

A 50mm canon EF lens will have the exact same framing on the epic as any other 50mm lens, no matter if the other lens is "Cinematic" or not... The definition of focal length is: the distance between the lens nodal point and the focus plane no more no less.

My dad was an Optician... got force feed with this kind of stuff already as a kid. :)
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I am sorry about your childhood :)

But I respectfully and 100% disagree. Perhaps its a semantic issue. To be clear, the engraved letters 50mm do not magically change when mounted on a smaller sensor (or film gate). Likewise, the image circle does not change. And the 50mm lens still projects the same framing. However, you are capturing a smaller chunk of that image circle - hence I am saying that a 50mm "behaves" like 64mm. Behaves, as in it gives the same framing as a 64mm lens designed for that smaller sensor, ceteris paribus. Yes, the lens still transmits the same image, But the portion of the image outside of the sensor is wasted. Of course, it goes without saying that the only variable that is changing in my example is the sensor size. If you put a Canon 50mm on a Canon 5D and the same Canon 50mm on an EPIC, and put them side-by-side (i.e., the same distance from the subject, you will not see the same thing in the viewfinder. You can definitely move the EPIC back some and find the same framing, but then your are changing things, which was not my point.

In fact this is the same phenomenon, but in the opposite direction, when you use a 16mm lens on an EPIC. You will get vignetting because the image circle won't cover the EPIC sensor (unfortunately, you cannot solve this side of that scenario by moving the EPIC closer to the subject.

Take an 8 x 10 photograph (old school). Now place a matte on it that is smaller than 8 x 10. You lose part of the image, right? What you can see with the matte is a smaller field of view than without, correct? The exact same thing when going from a 24 x 36 sensor, that the Canon still lenses are designed for, to the 15 x 30 sensor of the EPIC/Scarlet.
 
Maybe it is semantics but only because you keep comparing "35mm Still-camera frame field of view" to "Academy 35mm frame field of view"

And your example should phrased as "A 50mm lens on an EPIC has the same FOV as a 64mm lens on a Canon 5D"

Very few motion picture 35mm films were shot on 35mm still cameras (well there was Vistavision...) so for most cinematographers the reference of crop factor is irrelevant, and for all practical purposes did not exist until full frame HDSLRs came about.

The only time this would come into play is if there was some technical reason to match the field of view of a 35mm still photo to the film.

Yes, the image circle on a 35mm still camera lens is necessarily larger than that of a 35mm cine lens, and so then does a 35mm Cine lens have a wider image circle than a S16 Cine lens.

Each of these lenses were constructed to have an image circle that covers the size of the film (or sensor) it was designed for.

And in this case, an epic shooting a 2k still has exactly the same field of view with a 50mm canon lens, or a 50mm RPP, or a 50mm S16

Conversely the field of view (or crop as you like to refer to it) for an S35 50mm lens is still exactly the same as an S16 50mm lens on an S16 camera.

Crop comes into play when you are shooting multiple cameras with different sized sensors and you need to match shots, I don't think most people would plan to do that in a shoot. (Well, in a low/no budget feature: the directors Scarlet is the A-Cam, the B-cams are his brothers 5D and the sound guys GH2)
 
Michael Panfeld said:
Same thing happens when using 35mm still glass on an EPIC/Scarlet. Its just not as dramatic because the different sensors are nearer in size than in this example. Hence, a 50mm behaves like a 64mm (in terms of the captured FOV).
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No, a 50mm behaves like a 50mm. The sensor is seeing less of the projected image than a 5d would but for those of us that grew up shooting 35mm motion picture film or super 16 or even redone, any 50mm lens performs like a 50mm lens.
 
Shane Kelly said:
The sensor is seeing less of the projected image than a 5d would
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EXACTLY!!!!! Thanks for making my point. The field of view of a 50mm still lens on an EPIC is the same FOV of a 64mm cine lens designed wth an image circle matched to the EPIC (if a 64mm lens existed and notwithstanding that there is a slight difference between EPIC's sensor and S35)
 
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