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LEICA R on RED: Pictures

I own a set of leica summicrons. 35mm, 50mm and 90mm and in 2018 I want to invest in wireless focus(nucleus-m/n). Can I use these lenses straight away with a wireless focus system If i add some cheap grip on them from ebay? Or will that not work? As I do find the focus ring of the 35mm pretty stiff. What grip would you guys recommend?

Thanks!
 
Joe Cage said:
I own a set of leica summicrons. 35mm, 50mm and 90mm and in 2018 I want to invest in wireless focus(nucleus-m/n). Can I use these lenses straight away with a wireless focus system If i add some cheap grip on them from ebay? Or will that not work? As I do find the focus ring of the 35mm pretty stiff. What grip would you guys recommend?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

There are several options when getting gears for your lenses.

Duclos lenses can service your lenses with gears, standard front ring for filters, and de-clicking your aperture. ( http://www.ducloslenses.com )
You have everything you find on ebay, which could work with different results.
And you have some that make custom gears for specific lenses. Followfocusgears.com and cordvision are two great suppliers.

I fitted my four Leica-R's with gears from Followfocusgears, and I really enjoy them.
They fit perfectly, if not too tight in some cases which is no problem once they're on. Shouldn't be a problem with your 35mm either. Seamless all the way. 360 degrees. Keeps your lens looking very nice.
 
Hi Joe,

I too have a set of Leica R 19, 24, 35, 50 and 90. Each of them have been fitted with focus gears by TLS. At one of the first shoots I got with these lenses we began pairing them with a DJI wireless follow focus. When we ran the auto calibration, the motor went beyond one of the hard stop of the 19mm and the focus ring of the lens itself (not the one added by TLS) couldn't work anymore (it was spinning free, not focusing and pretty bad metal noises were heard when moved).
I have to mention that I was aware that the auto calibration could possibly damage old lenses so we set the torque to minimum and kept our hands on the motor to disconnect it from the lens if anything went wrong.

Fortunatly it just took me to retight some screws on the barrel of the lens to got it working again. After that experience I tried using different brands of Wireless FF (ARRI, C Motion, Bartech) and never had an issue with those.

My point with this story is : be careful with old lenses and cheap wireless FF, they might be less gentle when auto calibrating than more high end ones. Try to test the Nucleus M first before purchasing one and check that the torque doesn't have to much strength, although this may be relative to the age and condition of your lens. You could also manually calibrate your lenses but it's time consuming on set and let's be honest, quite a pain in the a** ;)

PS : if anyone here already used the Nucleus M i'm very curious about the possibility to use it safely with Leica R lenses ! Thx
 
Its not only old lenses or less then pro FF units.

My set of brand new Cooke Anamorphics have each been back to ZGC with the pin that is supposed to stop a focus motor at the end of the focus travel..... bent or damaged. ZGC's responce has been that its contemporary motors that are "too strong" for the lens design... Go figure.
Ive complained to Cooke lens Owner Les Zellen, that the design is the flaw which should be up to spec with whatever the Pro motors are that are being used these days. But 5 lenses multiplied (I think its was about 500 bucks) of work for each lens later...... yet NO response that sounded like Cooke had some responsibility for solving the problem or doing the repair work, gratis.

Edit: when repaired, they did install a larger and stronger pin, and the problem has not happened again. So in my mind they should have incorporated the stronger pin (in the first place) into the design and not charged me for the repair (ie design flaw). My guess is that current Cooke Anamorphic lenses are being produced with the stronger pin, but I don't know.

Contemporary Motors are very strong and capable of damaging lenses when calibrating or hitting the end of the lens travel. Beware!
 
I have been following this thread for quite some time and trying to build a R set. If anyone has a clean 35 1.4 they would part with I would be interested. If so you can PM me or email gm@allprohd.com . Love this thread, have a set of m’s for still projects and can’t wait for a complete set of R’s. Totally love the Leica look for sure.
 
So I was wondering how many of you still deal with iris drift? I had my lenses cine-modded by Paul over at RP Lens and usually they do fantastic work, but my 35mm & 60mm both have severe iris drift. I was told they completely removed the ball bearings so there shouldn't be iris drift. Anybody know if it's just a thing I'm going to have to deal with moving forward or can it be fixed?
 
Hee guys,

I was wondering how much this scratch will impact the quality of the lens. As I cannot test it atm. Will I see a smuch on whatever I am filming, rendering it useless? Can it be fixed, or smoothened out even further?
25qem0y.jpg


Thanks,
 
usually rear element scratches/smudges are much more visible but the 19 is pretty wide so I think it could be affecting it somewhat.

I suspect not by much tho...
 
I am still looking, had a few guys send Leica R 35mm 1.4 with black specs throughout. I am looking for a clean lens. I have cash for anyone ready to sell.
 
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Joe Cage said:
Hee guys,

I was wondering how much this scratch will impact the quality of the lens. As I cannot test it atm. Will I see a smuch on whatever I am filming, rendering it useless? Can it be fixed, or smoothened out even further?

Thanks,
Click to expand...

Can't be fixed easily but probably not too much effect. When light is hitting it, may render a bit brighter in that area with some loss of contrast. When not directly lit, I'd imagine it wouldn't be noticeable.
 
Tony Yang said:
So I was wondering how many of you still deal with iris drift? I had my lenses cine-modded by Paul over at RP Lens and usually they do fantastic work, but my 35mm & 60mm both have severe iris drift. I was told they completely removed the ball bearings so there shouldn't be iris drift. Anybody know if it's just a thing I'm going to have to deal with moving forward or can it be fixed?
Click to expand...

Ball bearings should have nothing to do with iris-creep. They are spring-loaded and as long as the spring is intact there's pressure to close the iris. Though its not an exact science, Duclos seems to have gotten down the dampening part pretty well to prevent iris drift from occurring. And if they do drift say 1-2 years later, you can always send it back to Duclos who will redampen it free of charge.
 
Gunther Meisse said:
I am still looking, had a few guys send Leica R 35mm 1.4 with black specs throughout. I am looking for a clean lens. I have cash for anyone ready to sell.
Click to expand...

I just tested one with some spots on it as well, as soon as light hits it, is was all over the image. Also the contrast and color was off vs my 35mm summicron. So I ended up not buying it. The search continues..
 
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Hi Mark,

I hope that all is well. I was told in a facebook group that you were the guy, with a vast knowledge when it comes to Lecia R glass! I have recently began investing in leica R glass, however I am on odds whether i should go with cron or lux glass. I've seen a few people say that crons are more three dimensional, more contrasty, Sharper WO....and Lux produce a flatter image, with less distortions. For me the price difference is a bit much, however i dont like to cut corners with my gear. I will save as long as I can, then spend when I have to.

I just wanted to know your opinion on the matter especially seeing that I am planning on purchasing a 50mm lux E55.


Thanks.
 
Hey Tony, we had issues with iris drift after having our lens set declicked. As said before, there is an spring needed to close the iris as there is no hardware to do that. Declicked and without appropriate dampening the iris closes. We had a lens declicked and despringed, with a hard connection made between iris and lever, but that link broke after around a week and we were back at zero. We decided to declick the lenses and tried to dampen them the right amount. While at room temperature and in the case, everything was fine. After have an hour of shooting with on an older Red Epic Dragon though, the lens mount and thus lens got heated up by the camera and we started having iris creep. I tried 2 different dampening greases, but with no luck. Ultimately I re-clicked all of them and we're shooting hassle free again. It's been quite rare for us to need to adjust the iris during a take. Nothing worse than an iris that is slowly closing up on you during a five minute take...
 
Hi Kevin, there is some Cron vs Lux discussions earlier in this thread, which may be worth digging up but to me there is not a huge difference in performance. I'd say invest in the Summilux if you're after that extra stop for low light and/or more extreme shallow depth of field and it works with your budget. Comparing all at F2, I've found the 35/80 Lux capture more micro-contrast than the 35/90 Crons, whereas the 50 Cron is likely a hair sharper than the 50 Lux at F2. At around F4 and above it becomes difficult to tell them apart.
 
Mark M said:
Great imagery Kristopher!
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Thanks Mark!
Alex Sworik said:
Beautiful frames! What was your setup?
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Thanks so much! Pretty lightweight setup as we were running around like madmen. My Raven was barebones, just with short rails and a follow focus. Dual outrigger handles and a top handle for my easyrig. Oh and obviously and my set of leica R's. I tend to shoot mainly on my 24 & 35 just because I love those focal lengths. I'll grab the marco lenses if I need something more interesting for inserts or what not. As for lighting we just augmented what was there and were clever/patient about blocking and picking locations that we liked. Played a lot with negative fills and diffusing/bouncing, the usual whatnot :).
 
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