Laowa Anamorphic Lenses Coming Soon

[rand thompson]

By Newsshooter

ARTICLE
https://www.newsshooter.com/2022/04/04/laowa-anamorphic-lenses-coming-soon/

 

[Robert Hart]

They should be worth seeing when they come out. Useless information warning for what follows in this response.

For what it is worth knowing. the Laowa 1:33 PL to PL rear anamorphic adaptor can be rebarrelled for PL (rear) to Nikon F-Mount lenses - just, but doable. Why would one do so? If one is an unmoneyed individual with a Nikon F-Mount stills set of lenses, then there is an element of "not because one should not but because one can." It would be possible by use of a custom made extra part to remachine the Laowa genuine barrel but its utility as a PL-PL adaptor would be ruined.

I examined adapting the Laowa anamorphic tail for attaching to an EF-Mount or Nikon F-Mount. However this is not easily possible, doable maybe but with interference to the anamorphic adaptor's focus trim adjustment system which would by necessity have to become the EF lens tail. I also examined the possibility of making an EF-Mount to EF-Mount version but there is not enough workspace between the front of the internal anamorphic optical cell and the rear of EF-Mount lenses, a pity because there is only 2.5mm difference between Canon EF-Mount and Nikon F-Mount flanges.

Venus Optics' website suggests that mount options other than PL- PL will become available in future. I imagine Venus Optics will choose a different design path to my hacks.

By making dedicated anamorphic lenses, the need for their rear anamorphic adaptor except for their OOMM lens will be much reduced.

 

[Zack Birlew]

They should be worth seeing when they come out. Useless information warning for what follows in this response.

For what it is worth knowing. the Laowa 1:33 PL to PL rear anamorphic adaptor can be rebarrelled for PL (rear) to Nikon F-Mount lenses - just, but doable. Why would one do so? If one is an unmoneyed individual with a Nikon F-Mount stills set of lenses, then there is an element of "not because one should not but because one can." It would be possible by use of a custom made extra part to remachine the Laowa genuine barrel but its utility as a PL-PL adaptor would be ruined.

I examined adapting the Laowa anamorphic tail for attaching to an EF-Mount or Nikon F-Mount. However this is not easily possible, doable maybe but with interference to the anamorphic adaptor's focus trim adjustment system which would by necessity have to become the EF lens tail. I also examined the possibility of making an EF-Mount to EF-Mount version but there is not enough workspace between the front of the internal anamorphic optical cell and the rear of EF-Mount lenses, a pity because there is only 2.5mm difference between Canon EF-Mount and Nikon F-Mount flanges.

Venus Optics' website suggests that mount options other than PL- PL will become available in future. I imagine Venus Optics will choose a different design path to my hacks.

By making dedicated anamorphic lenses, the need for their rear anamorphic adaptor except for their OOMM lens will be much reduced.

Robert, I've seen your hack around and I was wondering, wouldn't a Nikon to PL adapter work with the adapter as it is?

EDIT: Forgot to mention, the footage looks quite nice! I prefer 2X with my SLRMagic/Kowa/Isco anamorphic adapters but with Laowa and soon the (hopefully more affordable) relaunch of the Iscorama 1.5x, the odd 1.5x look could be more of an option in my book.

 

[Björn Benckert]

They should be worth seeing when they come out. Useless information warning for what follows in this response.

For what it is worth knowing. the Laowa 1:33 PL to PL rear anamorphic adaptor can be rebarrelled for PL (rear) to Nikon F-Mount lenses - just, but doable. Why would one do so? If one is an unmoneyed individual with a Nikon F-Mount stills set of lenses, then there is an element of "not because one should not but because one can." It would be possible by use of a custom made extra part to remachine the Laowa genuine barrel but its utility as a PL-PL adaptor would be ruined.

I examined adapting the Laowa anamorphic tail for attaching to an EF-Mount or Nikon F-Mount. However this is not easily possible, doable maybe but with interference to the anamorphic adaptor's focus trim adjustment system which would by necessity have to become the EF lens tail. I also examined the possibility of making an EF-Mount to EF-Mount version but there is not enough workspace between the front of the internal anamorphic optical cell and the rear of EF-Mount lenses, a pity because there is only 2.5mm difference between Canon EF-Mount and Nikon F-Mount flanges.

Venus Optics' website suggests that mount options other than PL- PL will become available in future. I imagine Venus Optics will choose a different design path to my hacks.

By making dedicated anamorphic lenses, the need for their rear anamorphic adaptor except for their OOMM lens will be much reduced.

Could you explain when having a Red camera why one would fiddle around with rear ana element? For what reason / shooting situation would you need such? Sure it makes your less twice as wide, but in the process you loose a lot in optical sharpness and also have to dick around with all the issues of the lens not being perfectly aligned etc. and as its a rear element you get none of the appeals that front element anas comes with.

 

[Eric Santiago]

Any speculation on pricing?
With the XEENS coming soon, it looks like this poor boy will finally get into anamorphics

 

[rand thompson]

Any speculation on pricing?
With the XEENS coming soon, it looks like this poor boy will finally get into anamorphics

Eric,

I couldn't find that out either. Hopefully the announcement for these lenses along with the price will come soon.

 

[Eric Santiago]

Eric,

I couldn't find that out either. Hopefully the announcement for these lenses along with the price will come soon.

Hopefully a lot lower than a Vazen....not enough paper routes for that one

 

[Robert Hart]

QUOTE. ("Bjorn Benkhert. Could you explain when having a Red camera why one would fiddle around with rear ana element? For what reason / shooting situation would you need such? Sure it makes your less twice as wide, but in the process you loose a lot in optical sharpness and also have to dick around with all the issues of the lens not being perfectly aligned etc. and as its a rear element you get none of the appeals that front element anas comes with.")

Yours is the very case that other folk have made regarding their preference for front anamorphics. They seek the vintage aesthetic of the "defects' of front anamorphic imaging, broad horizontal flares and a curious vertically and horizontally stretched bokeh close before and far behind the subject in focus.

The rear anamorphic was originally developed to reduce artifacts, improve clarity and enable some lenses which were not suited to front anamorphic adaptors to be integrated into a cinemascope shoot. The Laowa optic certainly achieves that compared to the hacks people have been doing with retired anamorphic projection lenses and some older front anamorphic adaptors.

Curiously, with a close subject chosen, if the focus trim adjustment of the rear anamorphic adaptor is detuned and the lens itself is refocused to compensate, the signature bokeh artifact can be introduced but sharpness also suffers.

When correctly set up, the rear anamorphic steals little apparent clarity compared to the direct-to-camera image but as you correctly observe, the field of view seen by the sensor is reduced a little. My rough estimate is about 5%. The clarity changes however when the Nikon lens apertures are opened up wider than their sweet spot of about f4-f5.6.

Except for integrating an unsuitable lens like a zoom or telephoto lens with a wide front element into cinemascope shoot and retaining some of that signature apparent difference between horizontal and vertical sharpness, there may be little advantage gained by using a rear anamorphic compared to shooting with spherical lenses and cropping top and bottom of the recovered image to match the de-squeezed anamorphic images.

The anamorphic adaptor optically enables a Nikon F-Mount lens to be mounted on a PL-Mount camera. There may be non-optical adaptors for Nikon F-Mount lenses to be mounted in a PL-Mount camera. I have not found any but that is not to say they don't exist.

 

[Robert Hart]

For curiosity sake, here is a clip of a trst drive I did with the Nikon version of the adaptor on an original "big" Ursa 4K camera with a Laowa-for-Nikon 12mm f2.8. By the time the vision had gone through Resolve, then Premiere CS6, then .wmv encoing then Youtube's process, things are not quite as crisp as the original vision.