STILL vs CINE Lenses

[Jacek Zakowicz]

Nonsense posts

Nonsense posts

Here we go again:crazy:
What crop factor for cine lenses?!!
What does rolling shutter have to do with aperture?!!
Read the first post people!!
It started great and now it spiraled into some twilight zone...
I can't bear this nonsense, sorry, I'm done here...

 

[Stephen Pruitt]

Those of us who have used Canon L-series stills glass through an electronic control system like the Birger/Impero combination can tell you that the ability to smoothly focus a stills lens through a wide focus range is no issue at all. There are issues using stills glass, but effectively pulling focus isn't one of them.

To reiterate the initial post, these are the advantages of using stills glass on a RED One, Scarlet, or Epic (once the REDMote Pro is released, anyway):

1. MUCH lower price. (Excepting super long lenses, no Canon L-series lens costs more than $2000, and many cost less than $1000.)
2. MUCH faster speeds. (Yes, there are cine lenses with f1.4 and f1.2 apertures, but these are ridiculously expensive, whereas 1.4 and 1.2 Canon L-series lenses are very common.)
3. MUCH lighter weight. (People interested in minimizing weight will really appreciate the Canon glass. Even the heaviest lenses, like the 85 f1.2 is nothing compared to a cine lens.)

And these are the disadvantages of using still lenses:

1. No effective aperture control. (L-series lense cannot have apertures controlled in finer increments than about 1/4 of a stop. This means aperture control cannot be done during a shot.)
2. No snob appeal. (Using a Canon 50mm f1.2 will get you great images, but it won't get you any street credit with the cine crowd. And you probably won't get rentals, either.)
3. MUCH better mechanical design and construction. (A good cine lens will be here until the next millennium. But Canon L-series glass will not.)
4. Breathing CAN be lower on cine primes and zooms, but it may not be. (But breathing is totally overblown anyway, and is generally only evident on the longest throws.)

As to look, obviously to each his own. No one will deny that a new Cooke, Zeiss, or Angie will give you a great look. And no one SHOULD deny that you can get a great look using Canon L-series glass, as well. As noted by the OP, using FF glass on a S35 frame means you are just using the center of the lens. You're in the sweet-spot, as it were. Could a world-class cinematographer tell the difference in the glass in an A-B comparison? I have no doubts. Would anyone else ever know? Not a chance. Not in the context of an actual production.

It really is an economic decision. Buy one great Cooke S4 prime or a whole kit-full of Canon L-Series lenses. For us, there was no option: We went with the Canons and have exactly zero regrets for having done so. I can't afford $100,000 in glass. I could barely afford or RED One and the Canon glass!

May every decision you make be as easy as this one.

Stephen

 

[Dave Blackham]

I dont know if this list is accurate or not but would be interested in readers views.

]http://dougchinnery.blogspot.com/2010/01/canon-parfocal-lenses.html

 

[Sascha Rossier]

How about sum nice APS-C Lenses (since the Scarlet does 4K motion at max. = crop factor 1.6) ... Sigma has sum nice ones. And how about a FADER ND for smooth control of exposure. I know ... this is rather a Guerilla-Approach. But concidering the Price its worth looking into it, innit?

And honestly: Anyone still zooming while record? Thought this is only used in those great Kung-Fu-Movies Back in the Days ;-) Okay: I admit ... saw it extensively used in "Battlestar Galactica" and thought the zooming looked cool ;-)

 

[AJ Aguirre]

As to look, obviously to each his own. No one will deny that a new Cooke, Zeiss, or Angie will give you a great look. And no one SHOULD deny that you can get a great look using Canon L-series glass, as well. As noted by the OP, using FF glass on a S35 frame means you are just using the center of the lens. You're in the sweet-spot, as it were. Could a world-class cinematographer tell the difference in the glass in an A-B comparison? I have no doubts. Would anyone else ever know? Not a chance. Not in the context of an actual production.

It really is an economic decision. Buy one great Cooke S4 prime or a whole kit-full of Canon L-Series lenses. For us, there was no option: We went with the Canons and have exactly zero regrets for having done so. I can't afford $100,000 in glass. I could barely afford or RED One and the Canon glass!

May every decision you make be as easy as this one.

Stephen

Exactly my point of view, I am very happy to be going the Canon L route. Now someday I may get a PL mount and a RED 17-50... But for now, I am all set

 

[Dave Blackham]

I've just discovered we are apparently a photocinematography company which so far as I can tell is using a mix of Photography and Cinematography kit and techneques. So we have a number of lens options.

Lecia R lens Series 19mm to 800mm with lens gears, declicked iris, A mount or Canon EF mount.

Canon EF L Zooms and Primes EF mount Electronic control.

Nikon ED Zooms and F mount Primes. manual control, lens gears and declicked Iris.

Cooke 25 250 and 18 100

Red 18 50 and 50 150 zooms

And others....

By preference we like the Leica sets. But depending on the job in hand we can select the lens set thats most appropriate for the job in hand. We are not in to major Hollywood style drama and for the most part for optical quality have never had any major issues.

 

[Troy Bakewell]

I'm of the opinion that Canon L primes (or Nikon once the mount is out) along with the REDmote Pro when it finally becomes available will be the best solution overall. Plus the ability to pull focus wireless... OMG Awesome!

Anyone know the latest on the REDmote pro?

 

[Patrik Kisucky]

There are exceptions like parfocal still zooms that also maintain aperture. Also if you are lucky the image doesn't jump while zooming or focusing but since that is not requirement for still lenses it's just matter of luck (or cherry picking from selection of examples).
On the image quality front I will add that modern Still zooms and primes are as good or better than their cine counterparts but there is not nearly the selection of fast primes in still world compared to the cine glass.
Having said that the summary above is very comprehensive, accurate and clear- thank you.
it should be a mandatory read for every "new kid on the block" here .....

Hi Jacek, what particular glass do you recommend, or like to work with, that fits your above description. Thank you for the kind words, I appreciate that. Btw, are you from Poland? I'm from Slovakia originally.

It's fun. In fact, lenses are probably the greatest joy in cinematography. Learning how they operate is useful, but learning how they draw images differently is just fascinating. It's one of the great pleasures of photography.

Thanks for all of the great advice David. I'm looking forward to try different lenses, and learn about their look with my soon to arrive (hoping), Scarlet - X. I see you are from Maine, I'm in Boston, and just want to say, that anytime you need help, please let me know. I'd love to learn, and get to meet locals.

This feature only works with lenses with electronic connections that Red supports. Currently this limits you to Canon lenses at the moment, but they are working on a Nikon mount. There was talk of Red creating a pro series of lenses with electronic controls a while ago.

Thanks Phil, those electronic zoom lenses would be very useful, especially for run & gun.

And honestly: Anyone still zooming while record? Thought this is only used in those great Kung-Fu-Movies Back in the Days ;-) Okay: I admit ... saw it extensively used in "Battlestar Galactica" and thought the zooming looked cool ;-)

Hey Sascha, well, I'd love to know, if you can actually use the zoom function to zoom while you are recording, instead of using a dolly. It seems that it would be difficult with Stills, but smoother with Cine?? Please correct, if I'm wrong.

So to sum it up a bit:

It seems, that the majority would choose stills, mainly because of the price, and the quality of the image being fairly similar to the Cine Lenses.
The fact that Stills are lighter could be an advantage (because they are lighter), but that also means the quality of the build is better with the Cine Lenses (Plastic vs Metal).
The fact, that you can't control the aperture on a still lens and while you're shooting, is a definite minus for the Stills, and a plus for the Cine, to have a smooth action through the stops, and the ability to change the aperture while shooting.

I'm sure it is also important to try different lenses, before you actually buy one, especially when considering Cine lenses, to form your own opinion, with the combination of the knowledge, and experience of others.