Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • 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 :)

Lens Looks

Rick Darge

Rick Darge

Banned
Joined
Dec 29, 2006
Messages
3,775
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
44
I've seen and shot a lot of material on the Red. From what I've seen, older lenses seem to have a more organic feel when coupled with the hi res sensor of the R1. A few DPs I've worked with share this same sentiment. It's a perfect marriage in my opinion of a super sharp HD sensor coupled with an older, lower contrast, flary piece of glass. Newer glass has a hyper real, ultra clean, sterile look that I don't think you can really copy with an LUT. Not saying it's bad. There's just something unique about older glass on the R1 that makes the footage 'feel' more 'real' to me.

What are your favorites if we were to split them up into 2 leagues?

ORGANIC
-----------
Cooke S4, Zeiss T2.1, Zeiss T1.3, Canon K-35, Cooke Speed Panchros, Some of the Lomos, Super Baltars, Older Anamorphic Primes, Older Nikon AI & AIS lenses

CLEAN
-------
Newer Nikon Still Glass (14-24, 17-35, 80-200), RPPs, Ultra Primes, Master Primes
 
Lens looks...

Lens looks...

The lens looks for the most part decline to a common one as you stop down, it is the parts that are not in sharp focus and the way the lens flares that make it have personality.

Older lenses had their reflections computed to avoid in-focus flare since they were not coated, then when coating came in they made the same lens, but with coating.

Newer lenses depend on their coating and maybe are not computed to de-focus the relfections.

Before computers the desiginer depended on some rules of symmetry because that reduced the calculation and let the elements balance each other, but newer lenses are computed by machines, so sometimes an element is taken out to save money and you get somewhat different results in the out-of-focus parts.

It's a bit like the space shuttle, it can fly, but only with a computer doing the control, people made the 707, and people can fly it, the 707 has a look and feel not quite the same as a space shuttle.

When you get to f/11 most lenses look much the same after the DI, maybe... I wonder what effects compression has on the more subtle aspects of different lenses, since part of compression is to low pass and block up out of focus parts of the image...
 
I like look produced with a vitage lens on RED1.

One of my favorite lens in the collection is Carl Zeiss Jena Olympia Sonnar 180mm f/2.8 made at 1949 (now 60 years old!!!) and the lens was designed at 1935.

Have a look on the screenshots and quick and dirty footage from today:

Zeiss_Olympia_180mm_02.JPG

Carl Zeiss Jena Olympia Sonnar 180mm f/2.8 on RED1 (Nikon F mount).

A018_C001_05179W_M.jpg

Shot with Carl Zeiss Jena Olympia Sonnar 180mm f/2.8 on RED1, @ 5.6, Filter: Formatt Circ-Pola, ISO 320, no CC, straight exported from QT_M proxy file.

A018_C001_05179W_M_2.jpg

Shot with Carl Zeiss Jena Olympia Sonnar 180mm f/2.8 on RED1, @ 5.6, Filter: Formatt Circ-Pola, ISO 320, no CC, straight exported from QT_M proxy file.

A018_C001_05179W_M_3.jpg

Shot with Carl Zeiss Jena Olympia Sonnar 180mm f/2.8 on RED1, @ 5.6, Filter: Formatt Circ-Pola, ISO 320, no CC, straight exported from QT_M proxy file.

Quick & dirty test fotage>>>
 
One more vintage lens look from one another of my oldest lenses:

Leica Visoflex M Telyt 200mm f/4.5 made 1956 and lens design is from 1935.

Leica_Telyt200mm_01.JPG

Leica Visoflex M Telyt 200mm f/4.5 on RED1.

A019_C001_0517GN_M.jpg

Shot with Leica Visoflex M Telyt 200mm f/4.5 on RED1 @ f/6, ISO 320, no filters, no CC, straight exported from QT_M proxy file.

Quick & dirty footage>>>
 
Hi Sanjin,

The Zeiss Jena looks incredible.
Something magical in the image.

Remember me some superb old Canon FDs. (That i keep, love them)
Tons of details without looking "edgy".
Very different fron my new Zeiss ZFs.

Thanks!

Antoine
 
Yes, I've worried about this too. Originally, I wanted the extremely sharp and bright lenses we're starting to see, such as the RPP's, but over the years as my inner cine has matured, I've grown quite fond of the slightly softer and warmer look of older lenses, with the exception of anamorphics, the sharper and clearer the better on those. I haven't been too worried though because even if I got a RED I couldn't afford cinema lenses anyway and I'd be stuck with my Nikon still lenses, which isn't bad at all thanks to the Long Valley G-lens Nikon mount mod.
 
Antoine Fabi said:
Hi Sanjin,

The Zeiss Jena looks incredible.
Something magical in the image.

Remember me some superb old Canon FDs. (That i keep, love them)
Tons of details without looking "edgy".
Very different fron my new Zeiss ZFs.

Thanks!

Antoine
Click to expand...

Hi Antoine,

Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar Olympia 180mm f/2.8 is one of legendary and extraordinary lenses ever made.

You could still pick up one in some of vintage shops where I did it>>>
 
Again...the colors and the texture are gorgeous!

Thanks Sanjin

Antoine
 
Again one more thing is to get rid of QT gamma shift in the case that you have QT Pro version then go to QT A/V controls

and increase Color and Contras like in the picture below to get sort of "Aaton 35mm/Kodak Vision Premier film type of color rendering and feeling"

with RED1 if you use especially this type of vintage lenses.

a-v-controls.jpg

An example of A/V controls for "desired" gamma look in QT movies.
 
Very nice Sanjin

Your clips display what I'm talking about. They're sharp, but not clinically sharp and the contrast is just right. Nice falloff of highlights too. I played with some uncoated Cooke Speed Panchros once.. now THAT is a cool set of primes with a very unique, almost-damaged, look.. Call me crazy, but I just don't think you will be able to match these looks in post. This is something that needs to be baked into the image if it is desired
 
Richard,

when this RED "madness" started a couple of years ago when I watch a movie on DVD (on computer with 30" display), Blu-ray player (on plasma screen)

or in theater I used to immediately informing myself about who is cinematographer and about Technical specifications (mostly at www.imdb.com

or magazines like a American Cinematographer or similar European).

I learned a lot with that approach to realize a different lens looks there.

Also I learned that the two crucial and the most important staring points about getting a look are:

1. LIGHTING (natural, type of daylight (time in a day, season, geographical position of the place for a specific sunlight quality), artificial/electrical lights, available light, night light, etc...).

2. LENS(ES) types, age and brands (anamorphic or spherical)

Those two can determine your look from the beginning on...

All other things are coming later like a film stock, digital sensor, software/debayer, DI, color grading, distribution format with a look of specific film stock or digital projection/compression, etc,...
 
Sanjin Jukic said:
One more vintage lens look from one another of my oldest lenses:

Leica Visoflex M Telyt 200mm f/4.5 made 1956 and lens design is from 1935.

Leica_Telyt200mm_01.JPG

Leica Visoflex M Telyt 200mm f/4.5 on RED1.

A019_C001_0517GN_M.jpg

Shot with Leica Visoflex M Telyt 200mm f/4.5 on RED1 @ f/6, ISO 320, no filters, no CC, straight exported from QT_M proxy file.

Quick & dirty footage>>>
Click to expand...

So if I remember what a Visoflex does you were able to view through the lens?
 
I am no lens expert, but I totally and completely agree with the topic of this thread and the opinions expressed here.

Great samples included too, thanks!

To my eyes, footage shot with older lenses and the RED1 looks... well, I like it better.

:)
 
Remembers me the first shot i did with the RED and old Canon FDs.
Geeeze, i was going to sell all my FD lenses collection...
...no way!!!!!!!

I keep them just in case.
There is something going on with some lenses.

Antoine
 
ALMOST AN ANAMORPHIC 3D FEELING!!!!

One more shot from today also with a vintage and not so expensive lens Leica Summicrom-M 90mm f/2 (Made in Canada):

Leica_SummicronM90mm_01.JPG

Leica Summicrom-M 90mm f/2 on RED1.

Leica_SummicronM90mm_02.jpg

Shot with Leica Summicrom-M 90mm f/2 on RED1 @ f/5.6. Filter: Formatt Circ-Pola, ISO 320, no CC, straight export from QT_M proxy file.

Leica_SummicronM90mm_04.jpg

Shot with Leica Summicrom-M 90mm f/2 on RED1 @ f/5.6. Filter: Formatt Circ-Pola, ISO 320, CC adjusted at QT A/V controls with color and contrast, 2K crop from 30" desktop screen shot.

Leica_SummicronM90mm_03.jpg

To get rig of QT gamma shift always open A/V controls in QT and adjust a bit of Color and Contrast.

Download 4K jpeg file>>>


Download 1K Quick & Dirty lens test footage>>>
 
totally agree with you richard.
speed panchros, zeiss standards, and the baltars are my favorite.
I think the anamorphic format in general helps cut that edge too. Even the super sharp ones never get that too sharp feeling for me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top