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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 :)

"You Get What You Pay For????"

Mark Andersen said:
Rent the Master Primes. Buy the RPP's. If you are in a rental business then it would make sense to buy Zeiss MP's. But if you want to own a set for your own use, the RPP will do in almost any situation, then you can still rent the MP's if you need to. There are many, me included who think that the RPP are pretty much on par with the Ultra primes, so It wouldn't make sense to buy those at far greater cost that the RPP's. just my 2 cents.
Click to expand...

A reasonable conclusion... except with Ultra Primes you get a lens set that is about half the weight, smaller, has consistent lens barrel length (up to 100mm), consistent contrast and color matching and better flair control. Not to mention well established rugged designs that are easy to service and maintain.

You get what you pay for.

M

M
 
All this being said you'll get a 'sharper' movie if you hire a talented AC - Lens resolution charts don't move around like actors. Pulling focus WFO and nailing it over hundreds of setups on regular cinema scenes can be ridiculously hard !

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com
 
Matt Uhry said:
All this being said you'll get a 'sharper' movie if you hire a talented AC - Lens resolution charts don't move around like actors. Pulling focus WFO and nailing it over hundreds of setups on regular cinema scenes can be ridiculously hard !

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com
Click to expand...

and the talented AC needs a workable focus scale. :thumbsup:
 
Pawel's comments are spot on.
I'm a "Cooke Man" as I love the gloss that S4s and Panchros put on images. I especially think digital cameras benefit from them, as the images from Reds, Alexas, etc. are, to my taste, sometimes a little "plasticky", for lack of a better term.
But that's just my subjective opinion. I'm sure others here have different opinions.
I work with Master Primes from time to time, more often on film jobs than anything else.
However, I did a job with a Red (not mine) a while back and was absolutely stunned at the sharpness and clarity delivered by the MPs.
I like the RPP's as well. A good friend of mine (here on the forum) owns a set; I've shot with them. They are really sharp and nice, seemingly well built and sturdy, and they are absolutely an amazing bargain for the price. But the analogy of the "Ford to the Ferarri" is spot on. There really is no comparing the two for large screen presentation. Others have made comments regarding mechanics, industrial design, and the accuracy and frequency of markings on the scale which are all true as well. Many pro cine lens manufacturers mark each lens barrel with custom engravings, after lens assembly and measurement on a track-and-chart system. This is very time consuming and expensive, but the lens marks are just absolutely, exactly right for that particular assembly of glass. Many steps in building a lens to this degree of quality are similar hand-finished processes. There is only so much hand finishing and precision you can get with such a low price point.
But the RPPs are really really nice lenses and an absolute STEAL for the money, and if someone had only $20,000 for a set of pro cine lenses I would personally steer them DIRECTLY to the RPPs.
Cheers,
Harry
 
Fredrik Callinggard said:
Only (more or less) 1 out of 10 Mp's makes it through quality control. That's one reason for their cost. I don't think that RPP's have the same quality control. I don't think RED can justify that cost, when manufacturing in higher quantity.
Click to expand...

Where'd you get this number? Honestly, it makes a lot of sense, more sense than claims that the RPPs out-resolve the MPs by virtue of more advanced design. Sample-to-sample variation seems to trump differences in lens design once you reach a certain level of quality:

http://www.josephholmes.com/news-medformatprecision.html

To sum up the gist of the article, Rodenstock digital lenses (not inexpensive) claim to be engineered with the protective glass and sensor design in mind such that they're diffraction-limited by f5.6 on medium format digital. In reality, the majority of samples are quite bad. Schneider's not much better.

It seems Mamiya and Rodenstock lenses in particular have extremely poor quality control, which is a shame because I own a lot of lenses from both manufacturers. I'd like to think that the increase in quality control is much of what you pay for when you buy MPs...
 
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Harry Clark said:
Many pro cine lens manufacturers mark each lens barrel with custom engravings, after lens assembly and measurement on a track-and-chart system. This is very time consuming and expensive, but the lens marks are just absolutely, exactly right for that particular assembly of glass. Many steps in building a lens to this degree of quality are similar hand-finished processes. There is only so much hand finishing and precision you can get with such a low price point.
Click to expand...

This is true, however this step can be easily automated and a rig for such a device could probably be built in the $150K range. The technology of manufacturing in high volumes hasn't been applied to professional cinema equipment yet. Not fully. I know of many technologies that could be harnessed to improve both the empirical and the "perceived" quality of mass-produced lenses.

I'd like to see some exploration in using highly thermo-stablized polycarbonates as lens elements. I'd also like to see vacuum-pressure lenses and Argon filled lens housings. This would be a serious R&D effort, but I can only imagine the optical improvement.

I think we're going to see credible venues larger than IMAX in the near future, so lens technology has to evolve past the current formats. I'm particularly impressed by the possibilities of Red's 617 sensor. And as I said before, as sensors increase in resolution and size, legacy lens makers won't be able to generate solutions that meet the price pressures of the market. Maybe it will require a rental business model?
 
Fredrik Callinggard said:
Only (more or less) 1 out of 10 Mp's makes it through quality control. That's one reason for their cost. I don't think that RPP's have the same quality control. I don't think RED can justify that cost, when manufacturing in higher quantity.
Click to expand...

If anyone asks where I am, I'm dumpster diving at the Zeiss factory.
 
>>>This is true, however this step can be easily automated and a rig for such a device could probably be built in the $150K range. <<<

Really?

How?

Cheers,
Harry
 
It's not me to whom you should send a bid. Rather, you should send one to the folks at Cooke, Zeiss, Angeniuex, Panavision, and Hawk. I'm sure they would love to capture all the profits generated by the wasteful process of hand finishing.
Come to think of it, offer your bid to Canon and Fujinon's broadcast divisions first. They get something like $24,000 for a good-quality zoom. I'm sure you can find some wasteful process that you can automate and they can keep the difference as profit.
Look, I'm just being cheeky...
I'm not a designer or machinist. However, I am impressed by processes that combine modern industrial design and manufacturing with enhancements only achieved by an actual (yes EXPENSIVE) human being with uncanny craft and precision in excess of that achieved by a CNC machine. So maybe I'm biased.
For example...
I was lucky enough to get a tour of the Cooke factory while on vacation in the UK this summer (though my 11-year old son did not feel lucky to be dragged along) The following are my impressions on the process (and you can read Jon Fauer's more detailed and excellent report in Film And Digital Times online)
Glass billets arrive from their supplier and are quality checked. Any defect means the dumpster for that billet. They have million-dollar CNC systems for grinding glass to a very specific and critical tolerance. Obviously that is a modern, automated approach to cutting a lens element. They also have machines from their original factory that were made c1914 for final polishing and finishing. That requires a technician to monitor and measure the progress of the polish, using another very expensive machine that plots the curve of the element. They have a room where three custom made multimillion dollar vacuum machines deposit lens coatings on finished elements. It's a slow and expensive process that deals with poisonous chemicals. Every element is then cut down and sized exactly to fit the lens assembly, and has its cut edges black coated to eliminate stray reflections. That is a totally hand crafted process. I'm sure a Cooke executive can describe these processes better and in detail, as well as add steps I've forgotten.
At every step of the process there is intense QC that results in something between of 40%-70% of elements (depending on the batch of glass billets) being thrown away. If an element has occlusions, they throw it away. If the cut is wrong (to within a micron in three dimensions!) and cannot be corrected, they throw it away. If the element does not transmit the required quantity of light, they throw it away. Each element that passes is assigned a serial number and entered in a database. When a lens is assembled, every component has a page in the database with comments from the QC person.
The assembly room is large and staffed with craftsmen carefully hand-assembling lenses. If mechanical parts are not to spec, they are thrown away. There is no assembly line. One person assembles a lens from start to finish, noting and correcting any issues along the way. For example, today, James will assemble an i5 100mm lens. Tomorrow, a Panchro 21mm. Lenses are assembled "dry-fit" first to make sure all is within spec. They are checked and custom engraved (in a fully human executed, precise process) as described in my previous post and reassembled with dry lube, fastener retainer, etc. as a final assembly, and QC'd again.
There are offices for the small executive staff and a CAD design room, where I'm told new designs for lenses are proposed and designed. Existing product lines are tweaked and improved. They will often make a prototype and decide the market is not there for that design and abandon it. Sometimes a new lens or line will be introduced (15-40 S4, Panchros, etc.)
Again, a process that combines modern computer controlled machine, and hand processes where each is advantageous.
And keep in mind they sell lenses in the low thousands every year, not hundreds of thousands or millions like still photo lenses.
I cannot speak firsthand about Angenieux or Zeiss, but I would not be surprised if their cinema lens divisions used many hand finishing techniques combined with modern production, similar to Cooke. Again, Jon Fauer has profiled both companies in his magazine. I have seen the lens room at Panavision and it's damned impressive, although, as I understand it, the elements arrive finished from Leitz.
Stuff costs money. People cost money. Low production runs combined with super high precision means that each unit will be expensive. Red changes that paradigm a bit with 7,000+ cameras (but not at all compared with the still photo or broadcast world) but there is still a limit to what things will cost and how they will perform for that cost. Why shouldn't Red come out with a really low-cost set of primes? Maybe $500 a lens? Cause it's virtually impossible at that price point, and not worth it for the profit potential.
I've already said that the RPPs are an astounding value for the money and anyone with $20,000 to spend on modern cinema lenses should run, not walk, to buy a set! For those folks who can afford more (whether via renting or owning) there IS a difference, whether it's the absolute razor-sharp perfection of Master Primes, or the "Cooke Look", or the amazing Optimo 24-290 that holds aperture and is distortion free throughout the zoom range.
That's about all I can say on the subject. I just do not believe that you can make a Ferarri at a Ford price point...
Cheers,
Harry
 
Harry Clark said:
It's not me to whom you should send a bid. Rather, you should send one to the folks at Cooke, Zeiss, Angeniuex, Panavision, and Hawk. I'm sure they would love to capture all the profits generated by the wasteful process of hand finishing.
Come to think of it, offer your bid to Canon and Fujinon's broadcast divisions first. They get something like $24,000 for a good-quality zoom. I'm sure you can find some wasteful process that you can automate and they can keep the difference as profit.
Look, I'm just being cheeky...
I'm not a designer or machinist. However, I am impressed by processes that combine modern industrial design and manufacturing with enhancements only achieved by an actual (yes EXPENSIVE) human being with uncanny craft and precision in excess of that achieved by a CNC machine. So maybe I'm biased.
For example...
I was lucky enough to get a tour of the Cooke factory while on vacation in the UK this summer (though my 11-year old son did not feel lucky to be dragged along) The following are my impressions on the process (and you can read Jon Fauer's more detailed and excellent report in Film And Digital Times online)
Glass billets arrive from their supplier and are quality checked. Any defect means the dumpster for that billet. They have million-dollar CNC systems for grinding glass to a very specific and critical tolerance. Obviously that is a modern, automated approach to cutting a lens element. They also have machines from their original factory that were made c1914 for final polishing and finishing. That requires a technician to monitor and measure the progress of the polish, using another very expensive machine that plots the curve of the element. They have a room where three custom made multimillion dollar vacuum machines deposit lens coatings on finished elements. It's a slow and expensive process that deals with poisonous chemicals. Every element is then cut down and sized exactly to fit the lens assembly, and has its cut edges black coated to eliminate stray reflections. That is a totally hand crafted process. I'm sure a Cooke executive can describe these processes better and in detail, as well as add steps I've forgotten.
At every step of the process there is intense QC that results in something between of 40%-70% of elements (depending on the batch of glass billets) being thrown away. If an element has occlusions, they throw it away. If the cut is wrong (to within a micron in three dimensions!) and cannot be corrected, they throw it away. If the element does not transmit the required quantity of light, they throw it away. Each element that passes is assigned a serial number and entered in a database. When a lens is assembled, every component has a page in the database with comments from the QC person.
The assembly room is large and staffed with craftsmen carefully hand-assembling lenses. If mechanical parts are not to spec, they are thrown away. There is no assembly line. One person assembles a lens from start to finish, noting and correcting any issues along the way. For example, today, James will assemble an i5 100mm lens. Tomorrow, a Panchro 21mm. Lenses are assembled "dry-fit" first to make sure all is within spec. They are checked and custom engraved (in a fully human executed, precise process) as described in my previous post and reassembled with dry lube, fastener retainer, etc. as a final assembly, and QC'd again.
There are offices for the small executive staff and a CAD design room, where I'm told new designs for lenses are proposed and designed. Existing product lines are tweaked and improved. They will often make a prototype and decide the market is not there for that design and abandon it. Sometimes a new lens or line will be introduced (15-40 S4, Panchros, etc.)
Again, a process that combines modern computer controlled machine, and hand processes where each is advantageous.
And keep in mind they sell lenses in the low thousands every year, not hundreds of thousands or millions like still photo lenses.
I cannot speak firsthand about Angenieux or Zeiss, but I would not be surprised if their cinema lens divisions used many hand finishing techniques combined with modern production, similar to Cooke. Again, Jon Fauer has profiled both companies in his magazine. I have seen the lens room at Panavision and it's damned impressive, although, as I understand it, the elements arrive finished from Leitz.
Stuff costs money. People cost money. Low production runs combined with super high precision means that each unit will be expensive. Red changes that paradigm a bit with 7,000+ cameras (but not at all compared with the still photo or broadcast world) but there is still a limit to what things will cost and how they will perform for that cost. Why shouldn't Red come out with a really low-cost set of primes? Maybe $500 a lens? Cause it's virtually impossible at that price point, and not worth it for the profit potential.
I've already said that the RPPs are an astounding value for the money and anyone with $20,000 to spend on modern cinema lenses should run, not walk, to buy a set! For those folks who can afford more (whether via renting or owning) there IS a difference, whether it's the absolute razor-sharp perfection of Master Primes, or the "Cooke Look", or the amazing Optimo 24-290 that holds aperture and is distortion free throughout the zoom range.
That's about all I can say on the subject. I just do not believe that you can make a Ferarri at a Ford price point...
Cheers,
Harry
Click to expand...

I agree with you and everyone else on the subject of lens quality. The idea that one could make a machine that automates some of the processes you have observed is only possible with high-volume manufacturing. Until now, the pro-cinema industry has not been able to support high-volumes. This is what Red changed.

I'm not taking apart your Ford/Ferrari analogy, I think it communicates your sentiment effectively. I don't have a high opinion of Ford. But in that spirit, I have a very high opinion of Toyota and Honda. I've visited a state of the art Toyota factory and I've seen a brand new Ferrari stripped down to the bone.

Hence my perspective is somewhat different on the topic. My experience in manufacturing has led me to the somewhat unbelievable conclusions that I reach on subjects like these. Its been my experience that setting a price for a product is more about the perception the buyer has about what they're getting than it is about the reality of what they're getting.

I actually believe you can make a Ferrari for the price of Ford, as you put it-- but you can only do it in high volumes because that's the only scenario which allows you to amortize the highest-quality engineering over the maximum number of units.
 
Jeff Coatney said:
...
I actually believe you can make a Ferrari for the price of Ford, as you put it-- but you can only do it in high volumes because that's the only scenario which allows you to amortize the highest-quality engineering over the maximum number of units.
Click to expand...

Jeff I actually believe that YOU could add new perspective to lens manufacturing and make it more effcient and cost effective, esp. at higher volumes. I believe you and trust you on this front.

But as for high performance sports cars :driving: you don't know :furious3:.

The "just" the F1 paddle shifter and leather seats are well beyond Ford's capabilities. A :Chevy_anim: (sorry no Ford icon) will never be a Ferrari.

But I DO agree w/ your original satement that you could modernize certain aspects of lens production.
 
Peter Moretti said:
Jeff I actually believe that YOU could add new perspective to lens manufacturing and make it more effcient and cost effective, esp. at higher volumes. I believe you and trust you on this front.

But as for high performance sports cars :driving: you don't know :furious3:.

The "just" the F1 paddle shifter and leather seats are well beyond Ford's capabilities. A :Chevy_anim: (sorry no Ford icon) will never be a Ferrari.

But I DO agree w/ your original satement that you could modernize certain aspects of lens production.
Click to expand...

LOL! I hear you! We can't have highways filled with 200+ mph commuters...
 
This is getting so boring - RED has proven that you can modernise cine lens production, but they've also proven that you can't make that last little percentage of what hand crafted perfection takes.

Final, end of discussion. Ask any gifted, experienced AC, DP or film maker who has tried enough lenses and they will tell you likewise.

Is the price tag worth it for you? That's another topic. I think it was best said when someone here said - Buy RPP's for you and rent MP's (or whatever) for your production.
 
Agreed Fredrick!
Jeff, I'll admit that I don't honestly know enough about manufacturing processes, and will just have to trust you that there is a point where you can achieve super high quality in an assembly line process.
I'm still not sure if the same volume of production exists in the pro cine world...
Anyway...
Cheers,
Harry
 
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