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Breathing with Canon USM lenses. . . which ones deliver a "breathless performance"?

Stephen Pruitt

Stephen Pruitt

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Breathing with Canon USM lenses. . . which ones deliver a "breathless performance"?

Hi all. . .

Since shifting from Nikons to the Canons with the Birger, I'm curious which Canon USM lenses have the least amount of breathing. In my little "off the cuff" tests, some of the longer Canon primes (notably the 85mm f1.2L USM II) exhibit significant breathing characteristics. I'd love to know if any of the zooms fare better in that area. I love the bokeh of the primes, but in instances where you really need to do a great pull, I'd love to know which ones will deliver the most breathless performance.

No question about it: My old Nikon AIS primes breathed a whole lot less than this newest generation of Canons.

Stephen
 
Hi Stephen,

when you talking about lenses for DSL cameras, there will always and inevitably be more Barrel distortion, Achromatic Aberration, Flaring, and yes, undoubtably there will be breathing, this lenses were never meant to be used for filming, especially attached with and adaptor to a camera such as the RED, but even when used with any other 35mm adaptor on any HD or SD cam, this lenses will not be at home, not ever, they were design for still photography.

Having said that, the EF series designate with the "L" markings are definitely the only ones I would use on RED, no matter how good some of the non "L" lenses are they just will not stay at par with the " L " marked ones, no question, I have used every single lens in the Canon line up since twenty years ago, and I know this for a fact.

Off course the new zooms are far better then they ever where, but even so they are more difficult to tell apart from their Primes, any expert eye will see the difference, breathing is one of those differences that you will notice the most.

Again said that as well, they are a terrific option given their price and size, which make great choices for budget restricted fellow REDUSERS, as well as for those that need the smallest and lightest lens possible mounted on their cameras.

They are many ways to avoid and or minimize some of this defects, but they will unlikely be removed all together.

At last I want to say that been one of the first in putting the EF Canons on RED/Birger, they perform very well, and only, note the word "ONLY" the expert eye will know what lenses you might have used on any of your filming, not the viewer or any of your clients will never know the difference, unless they are Professional FilmMakers, with a great eye as to distinguish any given characteristic of a particular lens, including off course their Bokeh.


The EF 85mm f/1.2 II in particular is the absolute best Portrait lens ever made, do to the extreme speed, the size and weight of the lens make so that the USM runs slower then other Primes, but since this is an issue only in AF. The extreme shallow depth of field is very difficult to focus on the run, and especially when pulling, the particular construction of the lens, and its design achieved an incredible level of quality, but unfortunately this quality are once again for Still, so when used for filming, you will see the bad side of the lens, which to my opinion is worth well dealing with on order to take advantage of such a great lens, thinks of it as a mini Master Prime.


ciao
 
So far, the lenses with the least amount ( non at all really ) of breathing for me is the 35mm f1.4 L and the 24mm f1.4 L

The 50 1.2 L is also pretty good.....
85 1.2 II L is pretty good.... I use this lens a lot on my stills bodies, but not so much on the red.... just a little to long for me....
but the 100 micro breathes a lot....
70-200 f2.8 a little.
17-40 a little.
24-105 a little.

If your birger is not colminated well then the breathing will be worse.

I find myself shooting 80% of the time with the 35mm f1.4 L... I just love this lens and it's field of view.

I
 
Which Lens

Which Lens

If your birger is not colminated well then the breathing will be worse.


I[/QUOTE]

Christopher
Which lens did you use to columinate the Birger?
 
This could be part of my problem. . . the lack of collimation, that is, as I do not have read-out idata in order to do so. I need to send my Birger back in anyway, so perhaps they will be able to address this issue for me (which I am certain is NOT Birger's fault!) at that time.

Stephen
 
colmination is pretty easy..... a trial and error approach if you don't have lens data.

the basic idea is to use a L zoom like the 24-105, 16-35, or 17-40.... turn the colmination ring until both full tele and full wide are in focus at the same distance.

It took me about 1/2 and hour..... I used my 17-40.

I think my colmination ring ended up being at around 10 in the end.

another quick ballpark way would be to set your lens at infinity..... and adjust the ring until infinity is in focus on the viewfinder. I'd think this would get you closer before you do the zoom out/zoom in adjustment.
 
I might try that Christopher. . . what do you recommend using for infinity? If it's a bright night, I might be able to try the moon? No mountains to speak of out here on the prairie.

:-)

Stephen
 
At just shy of 240k miles away the moon would suffice as infinity to most decent lenses... hehe. If I remember right, a full moon would expose around f11 @ 125th sec @ iso 100 on a still camera ( pretty much same as a human face in daylight ) so stopping down to f11 would make it harder to adjust as it gives a pretty long DOF.... so some ND filter to bring it back to wide open or a shutter speed that's pretty high. I'm sure you know your way around that. I'd guess the only problem with the moon would be that it moves... or we do.... or whatever.


I picked a tree outside in my backyard that's probably 600' away. If you have a long and fast lens like a 70-200 f2.8, I'd think would be a good choice. ( with some ND filters I'd imagine. again )
 
Jay A. Kelley has an excellent video which shows how to adjust the Birger. Check it out: http://blip.tv/file/1953739

Btw, a question about terminology. I've been curious since I've seen you Birger folks referring to this as collimating the mount. Aren't we really just adjusting the back focus? I always thought collimation had to do with making things parallel.
 
collimation schmollimation

collimation schmollimation

Jamison Stark said:
Jay A. Kelley has an excellent video which shows how to adjust the Birger. Check it out: http://blip.tv/file/1953739

Btw, a question about terminology. I've been curious since I've seen you Birger folks referring to this as collimating the mount. Aren't we really just adjusting the back focus? I always thought collimation had to do with making things parallel.
Click to expand...
That's absolutely correct- collimation means setting the lens at infinity when rays enter paralell... Believe me, I tried and got crucified...
Jacek Zakowicz, optitek-dot-org:thumbup1:
 
I can't use Jay's video technique, because I can't get lens idata out of the mount. I'm all but certain it is a bad idata connection, but since I have a beta Birger, I'm going to send it back to Birger to have them try their capable hands on it.

Thanks.

Stephen
 
Stephen Pruitt said:
I can't use Jay's video technique, because I can't get lens idata out of the mount.
Click to expand...

Are you using the Impero to control the Birger? I think if you use the BEI Device Interface software from Birger for PC or Mac instead of the Impero, you will be able to control focus and see distance readout even if you have a bad idata connection. Someone who actually has a Birger can probably verify this.
 
Tom said:
EF 24mm 1.4 L has bad breathing.
Click to expand...

christopher witzke said:
hmmm.... mine is hardly noticeable.
Click to expand...

Are we talking Mk I or Mk II here? I'm wondering if there is any difference with the newer model.

I will concur with David above that the 24-70 L (and older 28-70) has crazy little breathing - almost non-existent.
 
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