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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 :)

Chasing FF3 or FF4

Contact AbelCine. I bought my FF-4 a few months ago from them and they gave me a really good price, had it all in-stock and ready to ship. The price I paid for a new one was less than what I see a lot of used FF-3 and FF-4 units sell for. ...Just sayin'
 
I just did...$3800 for a pretty full kit with the FF4...fantastic price. I have found FF3's going for nearly that money, so unless i find one for well under 3K i'm going a new FF4. Do you know it it fits with 19mm rails and Red's 18-85mm on the ET 19mm bridging plate by chance?
 
The FF3 and older do not fit wit Red's baseplate and their 18-85mm, no way, been there done that through a lot of pain. I heard the FF4 does though, no biggie, i bought a Cinevate to fit with the 18-85mm so all is good.
 
The RED bottom plate as well as the ET Arri-style baseplates set the rods at the standard distance from optical center. The FF-4 (with BA-2 19mm attachment) works just fine on the RED with any of the proper 19mm baseplates. And works just fine with the 18-85.

Yeah, the FF-3 was a bit different design and didn't have enough clearance for the 18-85. I tried using that combo once before and didn't have much luck.
 
The RED bottom plate as well as the ET Arri-style baseplates set the rods at the standard distance from optical center. The FF-4 (with BA-2 19mm attachment) works just fine on the RED with any of the proper 19mm baseplates. And works just fine with the 18-85.

Yeah, the FF-3 was a bit different design and didn't have enough clearance for the 18-85. I tried using that combo once before and didn't have much luck.

Jeff... didn´t you have trouble with FF-4 and the 18-85? I tried that in a rental house and the bottom of the zoom was slightly touching the center of the FF-4.
Not the case with the FF-5 that had a couple of millimeters of clearance... but the FF-5, by the way, needs 3 full turns of the wheel to go from minimum to infinite in the 18-85!

Guido
 
Guido, that's the problem i have had with the FF3/2 and with a couple of chrosziel's as well. I heard the FF4 fits though, but your saying it doesn't?? Hence i bought the Cinevate. Don't want the FF5, too much turn.
 
Nope, haven't had trouble with the 18-85 combo. I've actually only used that lens on a job once as I don't own it. And on that particular job it wasn't my camera/lens/etc... But they were using the lens with the FF-4 and had it set up and working fine.

The FF-5 is geared differently, but you can put a larger lens drive gear on there to reduce the amount of knob rotations.
 
The FF-5 is geared differently, but you can put a larger lens drive gear on there to reduce the amount of knob rotations.

I guess if the larger lens drive gear in the FF-5 will go with such a fat lens...
Anyway, I´ll try again more carefully the 18-85 with the FF-4. Maybe the lens was a bit "low" and rising a little the lens support...
I´ll try to check both things next week and I´ll post the results here.
Guido
 
I guess if the larger lens drive gear in the FF-5 will go with such a fat lens...
Anyway, I´ll try again more carefully the 18-85 with the FF-4. Maybe the lens was a bit "low" and rising a little the lens support...
I´ll try to check both things next week and I´ll post the results here.
Guido

We own The 18-85, the FF-4 and the "Hybrid" 19mm, just to confirm it all work together perfectly, even if there isn't much space left between the 18-85 and the cut in the FF-4.

The FF-4 must be positioned very precisely in the dent of the 18-85, and prior to putting the zoom in the lens mount.

It must be noted that the 18-85 is very tricky to properly insert in the lens mount, and you need to be really careful otherwise it may not fit anymore with the FF-4, and the focus marks would be totally off.

Emmanuel
 
yeah the ff-5 sucks to turn from near to far focus, way too far of a pull on that- even with a big gear. the ff-5 is meant for the smaller pull lenses like eng. The ff-4 works great. There is a tiny clearance, but once its on it works great.
 
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