Red One and ND filters

[David Mullen ASC]

Now that I understand the question better :wink: ... I have to admit that someone who knows more about front rod systems, etc. can answer the question better as to whether you can get a mattebox on the end of that lens.

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There are a lot of factors that determine the f-stop you want to work at, partly being what sort of depth of field do you want, and if you are balancing a foreground to a background of "x" brightness that cannot be easily changed.

For outdoor work in sunshine, I am generally content to work in the middle range of the f-stop scale (f/4 to f/8) unless I specifically want a deeper or more shallow depth of field.

Indoors in daytime, I sometimes like to light to a higher stop so that I don't have to use ND gel on the windows, which can be annoying to deal with. Of course, having lit to a higher level for balancing, I do have the option of using ND filters to shoot at a wider open stop. In general, f/4 is a nice stop to work at, all-around.

Indoors at night, I am more likely to be at f/2.8 so that I'm not overlighting compared to the practical sources, so I can keep some of the natural ambience in the room. Of course, I could do that at f/2 or wider, but then I start to make life harder on the focus-puller, and when you are working fast, I like to give the focus-puller a fighting chance.

Outdoors at night, you often end up wide-open or close to it, depending on the situation.

 

[Jim Hoffman]

Thanks - I'm always curious as to what people prefer - this is such a cool artform.

 

[Steve Murray]

Well, in the case of the 14-24 lens, stills photographers are still going to want to use filters too, so if the wide angle filter holder from Lee is not already wide enough to squeeze at least one filter on there, I guess there will be something coming.

http://www.leefilters.com/camera/

Its wide enough... but how are you going to attach it to this lens? The built-in lens shade will cause problems and I do not think you will be able to use any standard photo attachments which require a screw-in ring on the lens since this lens has no threads. All the 14mm lenses (any brand) have the same style shade and while you can use them with a matte box there is not much room for any filters without vignetting. You also have to be sure that the back of the matte box is really blocked / covered as this lens is very prone to seeing even the slightest reflection on a filter.

Someone may have to design a special clamp-on shade for this lens or you may find that one of the LW clamp-on boxes will work.

 

[Alexander Christ]

I'm not sure that the indicators really correspond to the RAW data when you set the camera to ASA 320. It may be as close as you can get but still the indicators seem to be based on the preview RGB picture.

When I light a scene for ASA 100 I surely want to preview it as ASA 100. Otherwise it seems overexposed. But I really expect the indicators to show me if I clip anything in RAW and how the exposure looks in RAW. This has nothing to do with the RGB preview.

I think you are right with your concerns. A DSLR works in the same way: if you shoot RAW and use the histogram to check exposure, you can't fully trust on what you see, because the histogram is the translation of a JPEG-transformation, which differs from the information of the RAW-image.

 

[Eddie]

Thanks for the tip... with the variNDs. Seems like a good product.