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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 :)

LumaTech Illuminas performance

Alexander Ibrahim said:
I was trying so so very hard to avoid being pedantic this time ... focusing on letting things go ... ;)
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:smile5:

and I was just about to call Abel and place a good sized order...

Seriously, Mitch, thanks for that clarification. I hate it when i make a joke and it's not technically correct.
 
Tim Whitcomb said:
I have been looking at these lenses for 2 years... they continue to improve and I am almost ready to make Fred's day... but I would love to see some motion
shot with your set... as its the most recent set in the wild.

Paul: How is the focus and iris rings mechanically Paul? Stiff? Loose? Just Right?
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Hey Tim,

I'll post a couple of clips in the next day or so. If you are really serious, come down to San Francisco and check them out in person. Or if you want to rent them for a day, I'll ship to you.

The focus and Iris mechanism is great. No play, and not too stiff. They are not a buttery as Cookes, more similar to Arri lenses...perhaps just a bit firmer, but they feel great and smooth all the same.



Alexander Mitchell said:
Paul,

Quick question, do the Illumina's all cover the EPIC 5K frame?

Thanks for the post Paul, look forward to the next one...

Alex
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Yes, Alexander, all the lenses cover full 5k. You can see that from the stills. The wides were all using the 18mm at 5k. Some were FF some were 2:1, no problems.
 
Illumina 18mm & 85mm sample videos with focus racks

Illumina 18mm & 85mm sample videos with focus racks

Here are 4 sample clips from the same Berkeley Pier shoot (I use that term loosely, because I just threw the epic, lenses, tripod, and few batteries on my back and hoofed it to catch the sunset).

The third clip is mis-labeled as an 18mm lens when it is pretty obviously the 85mm. You may have to watch closely, because these lenses have such a pleasant rock solid field of view through the focus its effect is quite subtle on all but the most extreme moves (like the city to board shot). To help, I rendered these as full-HD. If bandwidth starts to kill me, I'll move them to YouTube and change the links. Anyway, I hope this helps for those that are interested in these lenses.
I'm planning to shoot human-beings pretty soon and will post some of that when its ready.

Cheers

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C002_09162D_S000.mov[/video] 25mb

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C005_0916RH.mov[/video] 55mb

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C028_09167K.mov[/video] 9mb

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C030_0916ND.mov[/video] 250mb
 
Paul Nordin said:
Here are 4 sample clips from the same Berkeley Pier shoot (I use that term loosely, because I just threw the epic, lenses, tripod, and few batteries on my back and hoofed it to catch the sunset).

The third clip is mis-labeled as an 18mm lens when it is pretty obviously the 85mm. You may have to watch closely, because these lenses have such a pleasant rock solid field of view through the focus its effect is quite subtle on all but the most extreme moves (like the city to board shot). To help, I rendered these as full-HD. If bandwidth starts to kill me, I'll move them to YouTube and change the links. Anyway, I hope this helps for those that are interested in these lenses.
I'm planning to shoot human-beings pretty soon and will post some of that when its ready.

Cheers

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C002_09162D_S000.mov[/video] 25mb

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C005_0916RH.mov[/video] 55mb

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C028_09167K.mov[/video] 9mb

[video]http://www.embstudios.com/vids/illuminas/pier/A002_C030_0916ND.mov[/video] 250mb
Click to expand...

Were these wide open? I thought the first shot looked a little soft before the rack focus. Did you use any sharpening in Red Cine X? Could you maybe post an R3D frame grab for us to process?

Thanks for doing all this. The set looks pretty promising. :)
 
I like the look of these images so far. Thanks Paul.
 
The shots were wide open, no sharpening in RCXP, just curve and sat. Many of the pre-sunset shots had some HRDx. My purpose for doing this particular shoot was not to evaluate sharpness. If that was the case, I would have shaded the lens or pointed it away from the sun. I already did a comparative look with the Illumina 35mm against Arri Supers, Ultras, and Masters. Sharpness was on-par with Ultras. I also did a more detailed comparison between the Illuminas and Cooke Panchros/i. Of course there is no way to compare them at T1.3. But at T/2.8 sharpness was great on both lenses, Panchro's had less CA on edges, Panchros breathed more, Illuminas had a bit more distortion. I'll shoot some more tests where sharpness can be better evaluated and that will be directly ABed with Ultras...much more informative than this shoot for evaluating relative sharpness/contrast. At that point, I'll put up an R3D frame or two.

BTW- is sharpening disabled in RCXPro, or am I just doing something wrong ?
 
Paul Nordin said:
Hey Tim,

I'll post a couple of clips in the next day or so. If you are really serious, come down to San Francisco and check them out in person. Or if you want to rent them for a day, I'll ship to you.
Click to expand...

I would love to rent them for a day or over a weekend. shoot me a regular email please at tfw(at) indentstudios.com thanks!
 
Paul Nordin said:
:smile5:

and I was just about to call Abel and place a good sized order...

Seriously, Mitch, thanks for that clarification. I hate it when i make a joke and it's not technically correct.
Click to expand...

Hey guys, I know you're taking it lightheartedly, but I wasn't trying to tease or be a smartass. Remember that there are lots of people who read these forums who never post. That little bit of exposure difference all the way open can really be meaningful to someone working at the hairy edge. Thought it worthwhile to point out.
 
Mitch Gross said:
Hey guys, I know you're taking it lightheartedly, but I wasn't trying to tease or be a smartass. Remember that there are lots of people who read these forums who never post. That little bit of exposure difference all the way open can really be meaningful to someone working at the hairy edge. Thought it worthwhile to point out.
Click to expand...

When ketch Rossi was here in march we had set up in my family room with the earlier version of the illuminas and had a wide open shot where we switched from the illumina to the master prime he had and the illumina was noticeably brighter on both the LCD and the histogram.

I think it is hard to overestimate the extra capability you have over t1.8 or 2.1 on budget-minded productions.
 
Michael Hastings said:
with the earlier version of the illuminas and had a wide open shot where we switched from the illumina to the master prime he had and the illumina was noticeably brighter on both the LCD and the histogram.

I think it is hard to overestimate the extra capability you have over t1.8 or 2.1 on budget-minded productions.
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Yeah, to me that extra stop or two is huge, massive, and it opens up possibilities that are closed to slower glass. In my side-by-side comparison of the new Illuminas, they are faster wide open that supers, Ultras, and Masters Primes at the same T1.3. To determine exactly how much, I would have to put the cam on a scope and get technical. But at that time, just looking at the false color and histogram gave me enough information to know these are seriously fast lenses. And wide open they are about as sharp as Ultras.
 
Paul Nordin said:
Yeah, to me that extra stop or two is huge, massive, and it opens up possibilities that are closed to slower glass. In my side-by-side comparison of the new Illuminas, they are faster wide open that supers, Ultras, and Masters Primes at the same T1.3. To determine exactly how much, I would have to put the cam on a scope and get technical. But at that time, just looking at the false color and histogram gave me enough information to know these are seriously fast lenses. And wide open they are about as sharp as Ultras.
Click to expand...

Ultras are T/1.9
 
Paul Nordin said:
And wide open they are about as sharp as Ultras.
Click to expand...

I had no idea Ultras were that soft. I love the speed you're getting, but the softness is a big turn off right now if I'm being honest. I like creamy, not soft. I would really appreciate an .r3d grab if you can so that we can rule out RedCineX processing and the normal R3D softness (a touch of sharpening is almost always needed). It may be the sharpness is there and the processing is getting in the way.

This seems like a great underdog story: the lenses look great overall, and the mechanics look pretty f*cking great for a $35K lens set, not to mention the speed which is a big deal in a lot of situations. If the sharpness is manageable, that'd be a slam dunk.
 
Mitch Gross said:
Hey guys, I know you're taking it lightheartedly, but I wasn't trying to tease or be a smartass. Remember that there are lots of people who read these forums who never post. That little bit of exposure difference all the way open can really be meaningful to someone working at the hairy edge. Thought it worthwhile to point out.
Click to expand...

I, for one, did not know it was 1/4 of a stop -- that's an even bigger reason to consider these guys a serious contender.

And with the t/1.24 rating does that makes them the fastest Cinema Lenses currently being made?
 
Good question. I'm not sure if they are the fastest gun in the west or not. They beat Arri's offerings. Cooke 5/i is T/1.4. Leica Summilux-C is T/1.4. They just might be. Of course raw speed is only one metric. I'd take a master prime or summilux-c any day. But then there is the house-payment sized mortgage they bring with them.
 
Out here in the "real west", people can't believe anyone would pay $1000 for a lens. So having ANY set of super speeds would be rare if not a complete first for this part of the world.
 
Andrew Patterson said:
Out here in the "real west", people can't believe anyone would pay $1000 for a lens. So having ANY set of super speeds would be rare if not a complete first for this part of the world.
Click to expand...

If they only knew the mad excesses of the degenerate lensbians in Hollyweird...

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com
 
Paul! Thanks for much for getting around to this.

I just had my first Super Speed shoot on the Red One last weekend. I was very impressed, of course, with the speed. The softness wide open was something to be wary of, but the option is always amazing. I was shooting in Royal Oak, in a dim city park, with an old Red One M, not MX, and I was able to keep things at iso 320 because I was able to open so far.

I REALLY want a set of Illuminas (2 if I go 3D on my feature) and I like what I have seen so far.

One thing I would like to hear more on is the color rendering. To my eye these are not in the overly cool Zeiss color space, which is a big plus to me. I like fairly natural images in the lens, because post is where I make things cool or warm, contrasty or milky... So far so good on the Illuminas!!!!

Oh, and the lenses themselves look nicer than I had guessed, lol.

Also, do the focus or iris rings travel at all? I noticed when focusing the super speeds that the iris ring would travel...

Cheers!!!!!!
 
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