Poor Man's Epic S: RED Scarlet 2/3" with 35mm Adaptor?

[Chris Davis]

Hello,

Please kindly disregard this thread if the topic has already been discussed. I've been trying to "take a break," as I've been periodically addicted to this site since Summer 2008.:chillpill:

Oh, and, of course a RED Scarlet 2/3" with a 35mm adapter would not be in the same league as an EPIC S.

I just saw that the Scarlet will have HDRx. Unbelievable. Beautiful. 18 stops of dynamic range rules out any upcoming big sensor cameras from competitors, and makes me wonder about how to get "cinema look" of OOF blur with the Scarlet 2/3"...


I have a few questions about pairing a 35mm adapter with the RED Scarlet 2/3". If I may ask...


(1) I am assuming that the Scarlet 2/3" will be able to easily resolve 1920 lines horizontally on a test chart, with no aliasing.

Assuming the Scarlet 2/3" resolves 2K horizontally, what kind of horizontal chart resolution might the Scarlet 2/3" resolve with a 35mm adapter.

(To isolate variables, lets say cinema quality primes are used on the adapter, such as the RED lenses being made for the full FF35 EPIC.)

(2) What kind of penalty does one pay with color contrast (pop, snap), and low light performance with the newer 35mm adapters?

(3) Who is making the better 35mm adapters these days? From what I've read the M3 Cinema Lens Adapter quite nice. But what I've read is from redrockmicro.

BTW, what is currently the price range of the EPIC S?


Thanks for your time,

Chris

 

[Peter Moretti]

IMHO, I always thought SGPro made the nicest of the reasonably affordable 35mm adapters.

http://www.shoot35.com/products/SGblade/sgblademainframe.html

I do believe that 35mm adapters can have very interesting look.

All that said, 35mm adapters can be very difficult to set up. A lot of help comes from collective wisdom gained by trial and error by the user base. You will be using such a one-off setup, that you will be essentially on your own out there. And there will be a chance the combination of Scarlet and the adapter you choose simply won't work satisfactorily. You should thoroughly query the maker before buying.

That said, there are a lot of posts around here explaining that 2/3rd's can get pretty darn shallow.

 

[David Rasberry]

Seems like a waste of money that could be better invested in fast 16mm lenses.

 

[Zhibo Lai]

Poorman-wise, this doesn't make a lot of sense. Assuming you'll be adding adapter to fixed scarlet.
$6K for the fixed + several thousands extra for a high quality adapter, plus high quality cinema lens, mounts, rigs, and you'll be at the price range for the Epic-S at $12K, give or take a few extra K. I would just buy an Epic-S and not have to worry about all the extra components.

The other option is the Scarlet cinema with the super fast mini primes. With HDRx, you can shoot wide open in more situations. At T1.8 (can't recall the exact figures) it will give you a good sDoF.

My best advice is just to wait until the final specs and prices come out, no point in pricing and planning for a camera system that's unreleased and still subject to change.

 

[Elmer Tenkink]

IMHO, I always thought SGPro made the nicest of the reasonably affordable 35mm adapters.

http://www.shoot35.com/products/SGblade/sgblademainframe.html

I do believe that 35mm adapters can have very interesting look.

All that said, 35mm adapters can be very difficult to set up. A lot of help comes from collective wisdom gained by trial and error by the user base. You will be using such a one-off setup, that you will be essentially on your own out there. And there will be a chance the combination of Scarlet and the adapter you choose simply won't work satisfactorily. You should thoroughly query the maker before buying.

That said, there are a lot of posts around here explaining that 2/3rd's can get pretty darn shallow.

There prices are really affordable, do you know if the quality they build is reasonable also for the other products as follow focus etc.??
It seem like a bit like redrock build quality..or at least I hope.
I just bookmarked there site.. as it would be great stuff for a scarlet..
Thank you for sharing!

 

[Ash Worth]

Chris,

Adapters are really difficult to use. They have to be calibrated separately, cleaned separately and have their own power supply which has to be charged and planned for. In addition they increase the size of the camera which for verite work is not ideal. You would be losing all the benefits of the Scarlet. If you are using them in a more controlled environment then you could use light to get the desired shallow DOF or as someone else suggested rent fast lenses. Alternatively consider buying a Canon 60D for the shallow DOF which would give you a back up camera.

Fanboys please spare me the endless rants about how rubbish DSLR's are All cameras have limits.

 

[Peter Moretti]

There prices are really affordable, do you know if the quality they build is reasonable also for the other products as follow focus etc.??
It seem like a bit like redrock build quality..or at least I hope.
I just bookmarked there site.. as it would be great stuff for a scarlet..
Thank you for sharing!

Their stuff has a very good build quality, easily at the Redrock level.

There are a few issues, however, that you may or may not care about. One is that their follow focus is not reversible. For real cine lenses, this is not an issue, but if someone is using Nikon or Nikon compatible lenses the follow focus will be rotating in the opposite from normal direction. The other is that the matte box is 4X4, not 4X5. I'm not sure how much of an issue these would be for you.

Finally, as for using an adapter w/ the fixed Scarlet, it will be very uncharted territory. And even in the best of setups, adapters are challenging to setup and maintain.

 

[Justen Nguyen]

IMHO, I always thought SGPro made the nicest of the reasonably affordable 35mm adapters.

I second that. When they were their most popular, before dslrs, I had the sgpro. (They have sinced moved onto a design resembling the letus line of products.) But I think they are still the cheapest and best looking adapters out there. Their quality is top notch. Actually, I still have my sgpro laying around somewhere...


Interesting that you'd use the adapter on a scarlet. I saw video of someone who put an adapter on a 16mm film camera once. The image was quite unique.

 

[Elmer Tenkink]

Their stuff has a very good build quality, easily at the Redrock level.

There are a few issues, however, that you may or may not care about. One is that their follow focus is not reversible. For real cine lenses, this is not an issue, but if someone is using Nikon or Nikon compatible lenses the follow focus will be rotating in the opposite from normal direction. The other is that the matte box is 4X4, not 4X5. I'm not sure how much of an issue these would be for you.

Finally, as for using an adapter w/ the fixed Scarlet, it will be very uncharted territory. And even in the best of setups, adapters are challenging to setup and maintain.

Thanks for your advice..I'll look deeper into it. It seem perfect priced for Scarlet accessories. And worth the try and error for the scarlet fixed.

 

[Tim Hole]

This has been talked about a few times before. Despite the shortcomings of adaptors they can work well. With scarlet though I think they will have more of a destructive effect than a positive one. You will lose light and because of the resolution and sharpness of the Scarlet it is very likely that it will visibly destruct the image. It will affect the dynamic range, particularly affecting contrast and soften the image. Remember that the light loss will not be linear. But how much it is affected depends greatly on the quality of the ground glass. For exceptional quality costs money, and then you are back to the argument of just going with a EPIC, or buying a HDSLR for specialist shots.

 

[Peter Moretti]

Tim, no doubt that an adapter will visibly destruct the image. Personally, I stay away from adapters, there is just too much to futts with. But like you also said, they can create an interesting look. Putting nylon pantyhose behind the lens also visibly destructs the image, but sometimes in a very interesting way.

I think Scarlet + adapter <> to Epic-S.

I do think Scarlet + adapter could yield some visually interesting images.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

This has been discussed before... Generally the same consensus is reached and it looks like this discussion is heading the same way. An adapter will degrade the imagery and such an adapter that has adequate quality of ground glass and other components to handle the high resolution of Scarlet, will probably cost about the same as the camera brain itself and most likely more. Look at what adapters like the SGPro or Letus HD Extreme are selling for. Yikes. Hate to say it, but you could probably buy the 2/3" Scarlet Cinema (interchangeable model) and the complete set of RED T1.5 mini-primes for less than the Scarlet fixed + lens adapter. Just sayin'

Fixed Scarlet + adapter will indeed happen. People will try it for various reasons, most probably artistic in nature. I don't see people going down that path to save money on a new setup -- as I don't see money being saved and too many other compromises.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

You ussually wont get much comprehensive information outside pepple in the know that are.interested in replying, but you have been lucky to get the info so far. I would suggest in going to specific forums for this, maybe the originsl diy optical adaptor forums over at dvinfo has people that have researched this. I have been away from optical adaptor stuff, but was arojnd nesr the start (actually had been planning a low light optical adaptor the previose year the projects started there). But see the short movie marla, for artistic but low resolution quality.


In the digital cknema camera projects over there that led to red concept (the original thread asking for suggestions are there and my posts), I came up with ideas related to.my low light adaptor idea (then irrelevent because of low light high lstitude advances in camera technology, hdr for example I have on a cheap camera from the period).


Firstly, quality. Most old systems worked on a opaque projection plane, ussually grond glass or dpinning disk etc. This wonderfully softened the moronic oversharpening used in those days on condumer camers it also wonderfully softened the over colorisation as well and sqeezed the latitude, very sensual film like, but nothing you cant do on, or post process for, a scarlet fixed now days. The shallow dof, providing the lens is fast enough you can get that on 2/3rd inch adequately (but has limitations before the light is at such an angle sensor structures interfere with it or it starts bounc oi ng off behind the lens leading to chromatic abberatikns etc. But with all these sysrems, appart from some chromatic/latitude considerations, you are likely going to have a softer lower rssolution image, as the grains on the ground glass and spread of lateral light through it are too wide and noticable as a fixed patter on screen. To get rid of the grain they started vibrating the projdction surface, or rotating discs (which very film l ok ke would glimmer as they wobbled in turning ). The finer the grain it started ploishing the glass and letting light straight through, so there was issues even going hd. We then went onto manufactured relay screen technology using variouse items including micolensing to get more resolution and light (they ussualy lost at least a couple of stops in the early days). I had determined the basis by which the optical adaptors were.producing a better image (as mentioned before) and a idea to reduce the thickness of opaqued projected surfaces to reduce the softness spread to a sub pixel level. At his piont I was well and truely in rt he diy digital c oj nema camera projects and stopped keepibg up with the optical adaptor developments, and stopped many of my own more advanced lens format conversion latitude compresion low light gathering, pixel firmat conversion, compression quality and resolution increasing designs that have not been matched as advances in sensor technology made much obsolete, unless you have a camera that does not have a suitable sensor. I in matter of fact had planned to do such a design for the scarlet etc when it was first indicated, as the red one and scarlet closely followed my suggestions back pre red, of couse the fixed resolution is now hopelessly outdated as a compromise resolution with cameras of nearly the same resolution being relwased this year for hubdreds of dollers and truely shd cameras as well. Sony were the only company to really get it and released an orignal exmor sensor that was used in the casio fx1 camera to shoot 6mp at 60fps around 2007 or something, which they also did with a original multiple region etc suggestion on the pre suggestion page for the z1 at ccinfo.


As for my adaptor I am not interested on wating time on childish things and plan to stick to something simple, unless somebody wants to pay me big dollers for the advanced design (very high number of stops).


Anyway what yiu can do.


Variouse microsurfaced manufactured projection screens ptobably hold promise. Movinv/vubrating that have thin enough disoeraal lster might help, but unless it is not opaque you should loose light. A fibroptic.is another traditional system used for sensor firmst conversion, which is like a bundle of fiberoptic cables, but I dont know if.you can get one of suitable resolution even for hd. However these all give you an idea.of what to look out for when buying or planning a optical adaptor for this. I am interesting in exploring the use of I relay lens on lts own (again many are not built for the resolution and triplets versions are normally desirable for preventing color abberations in all adaptors) other more telecentric (forget if thst is the right version) lens.


I appologise for the typos in advance I am using a new tablet. ahh now i find out it was the wrong keyboard. lt also looks like reduser is not accepting the return line spaces propperly from this device. My appologies again.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

I forgot, one thing that a 2/3rd lens cant do on it's own is get the width of capture, which is something people are largerly ignorant of. width of capture is a term i use to describe the effect of a bigger lens surface dragging in a wider plane of image. allowing it to see around corners a bit more flattening the warping of the image. the closser you get to the optical width of the human eye the more natural the image, as both eyes see from a opposing angle around things and the kind flattens out the image. A 2/3rds camera just does not see as far as a full format imax camera (on 3d shooting it probahly wont matter as the eyes/brain get to integrate it anyway). Of course this also depends on the active light gathering area size of your lens (ie a small lens opening is a small lens, a pin hole lens is a pin hole lens). Sizable lens are big. My own new flat pancake lens design gets around this size problem.

 

[Chris Davis]

My sincere apologies for taking so long to post again. I appreciate everyone's time. (Got two "quick turnaround" graphics projects right after I posted).

…All that said, 35mm adapters can be very difficult to set up. A lot of help comes from collective wisdom gained by trial and error by the user base. You will be using such a one-off setup, that you will be essentially on your own out there. And there will be a chance the combination of Scarlet and the adapter you choose simply won't work satisfactorily. You should thoroughly query the maker before buying…

Chris,

Adapters are really difficult to use. They have to be calibrated separately, cleaned separately and have their own power supply which has to be charged and planned for. In addition they increase the size of the camera which for verite work is not ideal. You would be losing all the benefits of the Scarlet…

Peter & Ash,

Thanks for the heads up. I had no idea 35mm adaptors were so difficult to use/maintain. Something always goes wrong on a shoot, which is OK because usually I put some backup in place (err, "usually"). But I do not think I can handle one more thing that may not work.

… With scarlet though I think they will have more of a destructive effect than a positive one. You will lose light and because of the resolution and sharpness of the Scarlet it is very likely that it will visibly destruct the image. It will affect the dynamic range, particularly affecting contrast and soften the image. Remember that the light loss will not be linear. But how much it is affected depends greatly on the quality of the ground glass. For exceptional quality costs money, and then you are back to the argument of just going with a EPIC, or buying a HDSLR for specialist shots.

This has been discussed before... Generally the same consensus is reached and it looks like this discussion is heading the same way. An adapter will degrade the imagery and such an adapter that has adequate quality of ground glass and other components to handle the high resolution of Scarlet, will probably cost about the same as the camera brain itself and most likely more. Look at what adapters like the SGPro or Letus HD Extreme are selling for. Yikes…

Tim, no doubt that an adapter will visibly destruct the image…

Poorman-wise, this doesn't make a lot of sense. Assuming you'll be adding adapter to fixed scarlet.
$6K for the fixed + several thousands extra for a high quality adapter, plus high quality cinema lens, mounts, rigs, and you'll be at the price range for the Epic-S at $12K, give or take a few extra K. I would just buy an Epic-S and not have to worry about all the extra components…

Tim, Jeff, Peter, and Zhibo,

I do care that the Scarlet 2/3" is on of few cameras under $10K that will (almost certainly) produce (in post) a 1920x1080 image, with each pixel having distinct information (and no aliasing). If the resolution and contrast will be greatly compromised, it sounds like this puts the adapters into DSLR territory (aside from DSLR Moiré and less dynamic range – no small things).

Most of the people here advise the Scarlet 2/3" with fast primes for OOF Blur. I just don't see how this would work for me. I would LOVE to be wrong, especially if RED does come out with some AF option for the Mini Primes.

I recently got into still photography, and now what I know as "video" has started to "feel" sort of gross. I think what's hitting me viscerally is the total lack of OOF Blur from 1/3" sensors at relatively short focal lengths and standard f/2-f/2.8 zooms (maybe it's the small dynamic range too, I donno).

I don't need the kind of OOF blur that would produce the classic cinematic close up, in which the background is just a blob of watercolor.

But I have come to lust for the look of what one would expect from, say a 50mm f/1.4 or f/2 at a Horizontal FOV of 5 ft.

Maybe some OOF blur is better than none. Maybe some OOF blur is enough to get away from the aesthetic "yuck" of 1/3" sensor video. I donno.

As I understand it, the amount of OOF blur is determined by two factors: FOV and Absolute Aperture (the diameter of the aperture, after dividing f/stop). With this in mind, I just shot some stills with a 35mm f/1.8 at various apertures and HFOV's to try to see what a Scarlet 2/3" might look like with the fast RED Mini Primes.

It looks like Mini Primes would work if I use a longer focal length and a narrower field of view than on my crop sensor DSLR (again, just referring to OOF blur – of course DOF is determined by more factors, such as distance to focal plane, circle of confusion, magnification factor, etc.). Correct me if I'm wrong, but based on my experience with stills, an 8mm T1.5 (f/1.4?) would produce almost no OOF blur, unless the horizontal FOV is less than about 2 ft. The 16mm T1.5 (f/1.4?) would produce nice OOF blur up to a FOV of 3 ft., maybe a little wider, but would produce almost no OOF blur at a FOV of 6 ft. And I would be a little limited regarding what I could do with a Glidecam with a 16mm Mini Prime, as it is about 58mm in 35mm equivalent (16 x 3.6).

At any rate, it's looking like a Scarlet 2/3" (fixed or interchangeable), and rent an Epic S when I'm feeling the need for extreme beauty…

 

[Ivan Kovax]

Hello,

Please kindly disregard this thread if the topic has already been discussed. I've been trying to "take a break," as I've been periodically addicted to this site since Summer 2008.:chillpill:

Oh, and, of course a RED Scarlet 2/3" with a 35mm adapter would not be in the same league as an EPIC S.

I just saw that the Scarlet will have HDRx. Unbelievable. Beautiful. 18 stops of dynamic range rules out any upcoming big sensor cameras from competitors, and makes me wonder about how to get "cinema look" of OOF blur with the Scarlet 2/3"...

Hey there Chris,

I will let the other guys answer your questions regarding the adapters themselves, but I would like to write something about what you call "cinema look" and DOF. I have never understood why DOF = "instant Cinematic" for our DSLR generation. Shall we forget dynamic range, resolution, texture (feel), lighting and movement? I believe these are just as important components of achieving a "film look".

In fact, it is often desirable to have a deep depth of field.

A long while ago when I attended film school in Sydney, I asked my DP mentor how I was supposed to ever get a cinematic feel when I only had the budget to shoot my project on HDV with no shallow "cinematic" depth of field. I will never forget his answer for as long as I live. He told me, "Ivan, go watch 'Citizen Kane', go watch any Terry Gilliam movie... Then if you still think you can't make a movie without a shallow depth of field, then please quit and stop bothering me with your questions because I obviously haven't taught you a thing."

Needless to say, I am still shooting today

I hope you find the answers you are looking for regarding your adapters.

Ivan

 

[paulherrin]

it is a poor man indeed who tries this setup. go with the epic-s...

 

[Graeme Hay]

This does seem to be a backwards way of being a "poor man".

If I needed DOF on a scarlet that was insane I would be looking towards a nokton 25mm f0.95 or similar lens on the cinema version of the scarlet, otherwise your spending a lot of money to avoid spending just a little bit more and seriously complicating your workflow and quality along the way.

 

[Gary Paul Walker]

"Ivan, go watch 'Citizen Kane', go watch any Terry Gilliam movie... Then if you still think you can't make a movie without a shallow depth of field, then please quit and stop bothering me with your questions because I obviously haven't taught you a thing."


Ivan

I completely agree with this! I've never watched a film and thought, 'ugh! needs a more shallow depth-of-field'

 

[Jeff Coatney]

If only Red could issue Gift Cards. If you received a Red gift card from every friend and relative for every Birthday and Holiday since you've been saving up for this camera, how much could that possibly be worth?