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A lot has been questioned about this subject since it first showed up in >a> couple pictures uploaded to Redstan's flickr, or (four days later) in Andrew's first post about them, in late July, 2011. Almost three years have passed and still we don't have enough objective reviews and facts about this mod. I'm gonna try to achieve this goal here. I'm starting with a bit of history (which involves some guessing), but feel free to skip it. :) At first, it seemed that Alan (Redstan) was the one responsible for the whole thing, but now I believe he was the one who presented the the job to Van Diemen, and made a whole bunch of them at a huge cost and time. I don't think he sold any of these from the first batch, since we never heard of anyone reselling them, or using anything like that, but I might be wrong (Tony, feel free to chime in and correct me if this is wrong information). Then, time passed and a year and a half later comes Andrew Wonder, who was also featured on another EOSHD post involving a tuned iscorama, he called his "Wonderscope" and explained how he linked the pictures to Christopher Smith's machining job at Van Diemen. I come to believe it was only after this "indirect" advertising and lots of emails and questions from anamorphic shooters over the world that Van Diemen realised this "thing" could be a regular service they were the only ones able to provide. Partly thanks to Tony's many inputs on the original design and partly thanks to the sudden interest in the subject. If I'm not mistaken, early 2013 was the moment when other shooters from this forum started sending their lenses over, and we had all the fuss regarding HUGE delays in delivery and processing orders. People had their lenses trapped there for over six months, etc. Just search the forum for "Van Diemen" and some of these will be listed, followed by multiple users asking various questions about the mod. Mainly "is it worthy?", which is a VERY subjective question. I've sent my pre-36 Iscorama lens from Brazil in early December, 2013, after extensive emails with Christopher, at Van Diemen. My main concern was the time it would take to complete the job. He assured me I would have the lens back in 90 days. Recently, other forum members have reported they're >speeding the process to only a week, which is amazing (of course, this doesn't take into account the time spent during shipping). The mod is listed on Van Diemen's website, and costs £850.00 + shipping (and another £95.00 if you want special engraving). That rounds to about US$1500, which, we all should agree, is a big amount of cash. It's important to remember that not all Iscoramas are eligible for the conversion as well. Tony has pointed out that the inner workings of the anamorphot are kept intact, so if you have defective glass or bad internal mechanisms, these will be passed onto the mod. Christopher confirmed this by informing that all lenses are verified once arriving at VD's, and every single defect is reported back to the owner, as you're asked if you want to proceed with the conversion (mine has some faint markings on the rear glass). Now, what does the mod do, EXACTLY? The original Iscorama 36 weighs about 400g, has a fully plastic housing (which is pretty fragile) and focuses down to 2m without diopters (or >closer, through a hardcore mod). Rear thread is 49mm and you need some spacers to avoid hitting its rear glass onto the taking lens' front glass. Goes as wide as 50mm on a full-frame sensor and has a simple button feature for alignment. Focus throw is long (around 8mm), and if you modded yours for close focus, you need special attention so you don't drop the front element to the ground. The VD conversion weighs 680g (220g lighter than an Iscorama 54, and still much smaller than the 54 beast), because the housing is solid metal. Also, it has standard 0.8 pitch focus gears. At some point during assembly, Christopher sends you an email, confirming if focus engravings should be in feet or meters, and it focuses down to 1.1m (or 3' 7") without diopters (it's twists a little over 360 degrees, and that impresses me every time I do it), even though the closest focus engraving is 1.2m (the 1.1m mark would overlap with the infinity mark). Focus throw is 1cm long, beating the close focus mod and making your life really hard if you want a follow focus that is able to spin from infinity focus down to 1.1m. Rear threads are 58mm, and it does increase vignetting a little. It shows very slight vignetting on a Helios 44 (58mm) if stopped down, on a full-frame sensor. Aligning is still very simple, much like 1.33x lenses, where you have a rotating part with a small screw that locks the lens into position. Mine had the alignment buttons in really bad shape, so this new housing made aligning really simple, and I don't have to worry about breaking the lens apart in the process. They're also kind enough to include front and rear lens caps for safer transport. I also read - after my conversion was done - that Van Diemen redesigned the rear (clamp-like) part of the housing to avoid this extra vignetting. I couldn't find the link pointing to where I read that. If someone knows what I'm talking about, please comment below and I'll update the post! Also, if you want to improve it even more, you can follow >jaquet's tips and stuck it into a lens support so you don't even need to align it ever again. There's a recurring comparison between VD and a 54, and they are, indeed, different lenses. First of all, VD isn't necessarily multicoated, like all 54's, it's still a "medium" lens (not as small as the original 36 nor as big as the 54), but it doesn't draw so much attention, so you still have the stealth factor. Front thread is 72mm, which is a blessing for finding and using diopters, quite the opposite of the 95mm filter threads on the Isco 54. Please consider that I've owned (and used) an Isco 54 for over a year, so these aspects aren't guesses at all. The full metal body is very nice too, since many Iscoramas have had rough times since they left Isco's factory, 30-40 years ago. Mine had its filter thread broken to smaller chunks of plastic and was held together by an empty UV ring. This, added to the almost-stuck alignment mechanism, and close-focus mod made sure that I could not EVER rent the lens as it was. Damn, it's a $4000 lens, it would be nice to make some money out of it, right? VD's conversion lets you rest assured that your Iscorama will work like any regular professional lens should work: without any special information required (specially regarding quirks). Also, some other useful information not entirely related to the conversion: You should check in your country's customs office if there's a special form or procedure for items that are being sent out for servicing abroad and will return later. This will avoid paying extra taxes over the conversion costs. I know Brazil offers this option, and it's particularly useful, since I would pay a 60% tax over the declared value + shipping cost if it wasn't through this method. Plus Christopher is a really nice guy, who replies all messages and addresses every question you might have about the service. A good seller makes a hell of a difference for me.

Eagerly awaiting your Pocket Cinema Camera? You already have a micro for thirds camera and some C-mount lenses? Want to know if they will cover the sensor of the Pocket? Lets find out! I hope you will add your results, so we can make this list growing. I will only add lenses to the lists when you have proof, in other words: images. How? Because we know the active sensor area of the BMPCC measures 12,48 x 7,02 mm, it is fairly easy to check if our C-mount lenses will cover the full sensor. Calculate this by taking a picture with a lens on your micro four thirds camera, and crop out the image area of theBMPCC. In Photoshop: Open the image. Go to Edit > Image Size, uncheck resample image. Change Image width to 19 centimeters, press ok Go to Image > Canvas Size, change dimensions to 12,48 x 7,02cm, press OK to crop the image to BMPCC size. Resize to 1920x1080 pixels Post your results! Note: If you shoot on the GH3 or other MFT camera's, the sensor size is 17 x 13mm, so change the width in step 3 to 17 cm! To lazy to do it yourself or you can't work it out? Upload the full resolution files and I'll do it. List terms explained: Yes = covers the full sensor of the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera No = doesn't cover the sensor Needs modification = Doesn't fit on C-mount to M43-adapter without modifications Equivalent = The focal length and depth equivalent on a fullframe camera (5D Mark III for example) Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera Compatibility list Primes Apollo 25mm f/0.85 - Yes = 72mm f/2.4 equivalent [link to proof] Angenieux 10mm f/1.8 Retrofocus (Fixed Focus) - Yes (dark corners) = 28,8mm f/5.2 equivalent [link to proof] [more info] Carl Zeiss Jena Tevidon 10mm f/2 - Yes - Needs modification = 28,8mm f/5.8 equivalent [link to proof] [more info] Carl Zeiss Jena Tevidon 35mm f/1.9 - Yes - Needs modification = 101mm f/5.6 equivalent [link to proof] Century 9mm f/1.8 - YES (poor quality) [link to proof] Computar 8mm f/1.3 - NO [link to proof] Computar 16mm f/1.4 - NO [link to proof] Computar TV Lens 25mm f/1.8 - YES = 72mm f/5,2 equivalent [link to proof] Cosmicar 8,5mm f/1.5 - NO [link to proof] Cosmicar 12.5mm f/1.8 - YES - Needs modification = 36mm f/5.2 equivalent [link to proof] Cosmicar 25mm f/1.8 - YES - 72mm f/5.2 equivalent [link to proof] Ernitec 6.5mm f/1.8 - YES (heavy distortion) [link to proof] Ernitec/Navitar 17mm f/0.95 - YES (v. blurry corners & distortion) [link to proof] Fujinon TV 12.5mm f/1.4 - Yes (blurry corners) - Mod.? (unknown) = 36mm f/4 equivalent [link to proof] Fujinon TV 16mm f/1.4 - NO [link to proof] Fujinon TV 35mm f/1.7 - YES - Needs modification = 101mm f/4.9 equivalent [link to proof] Leitz Macro Cinegon 10mm f/1.8 - Yes (dark corners) = 28,8mm f/5.2 equivalent [link to proof] Kern Switar 10mm f/1.6 - Yes (slight vignette & blurry corners) [link to proof] Nikon Cine Nikkor 13mm f/1.8 - Yes = 37,5mm f/5.2 [link to proof] Nikon Cine Nikkor 25mm f/1.8 - Yes = 72mm f/5.2 equivalent [link to proof] Pentax 25mm f/1.4 - YES - 72mm f/4 equivalent [link to proof] Schneider 10mm f/1.8 (silver version) - No (almost) [link to proof] Schneider-Kreuznach Cinegon 11.5mm f/1.9 - No (almost) = 33mm f/5.6 equivalent [link to proof] Schneider-Kreuznach Cine-Xenon 16mm f/2 - Yes = 46mm f/5.8 equivalent [link to proof] [link to proof (2)] Schneider-Kreuznach Xenon 25mm f/0.95 - Yes = 72mm f/2.7 equivalent [link to proof] Schneider Xenoplan 17mm f/1.7 - Yes (blurry corners) - [link to proof] SLR Magic 11mm F1.4 - Yes - [link to proof] (added by EOSHD) Tokina TV Lens 8mm f/1.3 - NO [link to proof] Tokina TV Lens 16mm f/1.6 - NO [link to proof] Taylor-Hobson Cooke Kinic 25mm f/1.3 - Yes = 72mm f/3.7 equivalent [link to proof] Taylor-Hobson 25mm f/1.9 - Yes - 72mm f/5.6 equivalent [link to proof] Wesley 25mm f/1.4 - YES = 72mm f/4 equivalent [link to proof] Wollensak Cine Raptar 12.5mm f/1.5 - Yes = 36mm f/4.3 equivalent [link to proof] Wollensak Cine Raptar 25mm f/1.9 - Yes = 72mm f/5.6 equivalent [link to proof] $ 25 noname 25mm f/1.2 CCTV - YES = 72mm f/3.5 equivalent [link to proof] Zooms Ernitec 6-12mm f/1.4 - NO [link to proof] Kowa TV Zoom 12.5-75mm f/1.8 - NO [link to proof]

No they really shouldn't. A lens does not "resolve 6MP". A lens renders a certain spatial frequency at a certain contrast ratio. It might take detail at 20 line pairs per millimeter and produce 70% contrast, detail at 50 line pairs per millimeter results in 30% contrast etc. This relationship is captured by the modulation transfer function (MTF), a quantity which varies according to the distance from the image centre, and the direction you measure in (sagital vs tangential). Manufacturers already publish MTF charts for their lenses, which is the equivalent of what you're suggesting, only much more meaningful. There are some differences in how these charts are computed (e.g. whether diffraction is included or not) so they're not always directly comparable, but they aren't anywhere near as misleading as trying to attach a single "megapixel" rating to lenses. The other reason stating "this lens resolves 6MP" is meaningless is that the important thing in determining how you images will look is not the lens MTF itself, but the system MTF. The system MTF is the product of MTFs of each part, the lens the filter stack and the sensor (and image processing to an extent). Because it's a mathematical product (a lens delivering 80% contrast combined with an AA filter that delivers 95% contrast results in 76% contrast (0.8 x 0.95 x 100)) you can improve the system MTF by improving the MTF of any component in the system. Hence you "6MP" lens will give you more resolution on a 24MP body than on a 6MP body. It's exactly this thinking that leads people to declare that there's no reason to have a 50MP sensor as there are no 50MP lenses in existence. Even the kit lens in your example produces some contrast in the centre of the image at 50MP.

Hey Andrew clearly this bothers you the he thing is you are making statements based not upon facts not assumptions. We don't know the full story here but I can tell you this if the presenter of a show I was working on (allegedly) punched a producer the show would be most likely suspended until this was sorted out. Love him or loathe him he is the show. He is what you see, a loutish, arrogant loudmouth. That's why he is so polarising. I personally grew tired of him a couple of decades ago but my post here is not about my personal feelings towards Mr. Clarkson. He does what he does very well indeed. There clearly is more to this than we have been told but hypothetically if Clarkson punched this producer unprovoked just because there was no catering that is beyond acceptable behaviour. He should be fired. If it was the other way round and producer punched Clarkson would the show be suspended like this? Would the producer still have a job a half million petition to bring him back? If there was a fight between them behind closed doors then maybe, just maybe they could sort it out between them. But in the public? It becomes something more...this is public behaviour. If Clarkson did punch him then it's assault pure and simple. Do we just ignore it and give out the message this is ok to do? No we do not. Last time I checked punching someone was still illegal. Yes, it's a massively successful show and brings in huge amounts of money. I think what the BBC have done is show balls! The cynical amongst us would have expected the Beeb to not want to lose their cash cow and sweep it under the carpet, pay off producer and carry on like nothing happened for danger of losing said cash cow. The BBC have to be beyond reproach. It's part of their remit. They are not a broadcaster like all the others. If they want to do away with the licence fee and make it a commercial station like all the rest then they could get away with the aforementioned cynical behaviour. They are the BBC. They cannot. They have a really bad stigma these days about very serious past incidents that they ignored. We all know what those are. They HAVE to be seen to not protect their stars and brush stuff under the carpet. No company should but especially the BBC given what's happened the past two years or so. so there are my thoughts. if you miss the show watch the movie version. It's more believable. "fast and the furious"

SAMPLES ! Sony A7 + Novoflex adapter ring + Nikon 50mm E Serie f1.8 + Redstan clamp + Bolex System Moler 16/32/1.5X anamorphic lens More samples and larger on my Flick'r : http://www.flickr.com/photos/43243778@N04/sets/72157638698522816/

Hi guys, We just shot this video with the BMCC, Metabones Speedbooster, Nikon Lenses and Iscorama 54MC. RAW files were developped in After Effects CS6 (with Camera Raw) to Prores444 2400/1350. Color grading was done in AE. Please let us know what you think, we'd love to get some feedback. Cheers, Mihnea

lesson learned....     not one person dealing with this issue seems to have contributed positively at all to this forum.  Just come here to take take take.  either selling or buying, they bring NOTHING to the forum.  Personally I think there should be a stop to all this posting of ebay listings, personal sales, etc.  at least topics of this nature should be only postable and visible by regulars.     Also, someone please close the ebay listings topic.  this has to be the most ridiculous idea ever.  Share your findings with the world, kill any chance of you or anyone else savvy to anamorphics getting a bargain because everyone and their grandma can come in and see a run down of anamorphics worth bidding on.  If it were a secret topic to regulars I'd understand, but literally, I'd say that topic alone is contributing 50% towards the current silly inflation of anything with a squeeze ratio! 

This is another existential filmmaker post spawned by a few recent threads. You've been warned. Also spoilers for a film. Recently I saw a film that articulated a question I didn't know I was asking. That film was "Frank" the story of a talentless, wannabe songwriter/keyboard player who is recruited to join a band led by a man who wears a fake head at all times. You might have seen it floating around Netflix, and maybe you even disregarded it because it sounds gimmicky, or the poster looked like quirky nonsense, but I decided on a lark to watch it, and it was absolutely devastating. The "protagonist" of the film seems like a nice, sweet guy in the beginning, until he starts exploiting Frank's talent by secretly filming and posting videos of their rehearsals to youtube, eventually earning them a slot at SXSW. He tells Frank "People love us." to which Frank replies "People love us?" The pressure of the show, and pleasing an audience cause Frank to have a nervous breakdown. This film resonated with me in a major way. I watched it once, over a week ago, and I'm still thinking about it. I thought about how fame and success never occurred to Frank. He just created music for the art and expression of it, and when faced with the pressure of a major debut performance at a festival, he creates a terrible song that he thinks is his "most likeable song ever". The entire experience breaks him. The whole film forced me to think of my goals as a filmmaker. I've wanted to be a filmmaker since I saw the Making Of Jurassic Park on TV when I was six years old. In high school, I got serious about having a career in film after seeing Pulp Fiction and El Mariachi. I then discovered the French New Wave and John Cassavetes, and I wanted to make honest, devastating, achingly truthful and beautiful masterpieces of cinema. I made my first feature at 21...and now I'm almost 28, with not many shorts, and not a single follow-up feature since my first. My first feature was extremely disappointing to me. I was obsessed with it for years, and even tried to make a quasi-remake of it, which was a disaster. I've been struggling to come up with an idea for another film that I like. I haven't been able to finish even a first draft in two and a half years. I used to be able to crank out script after script, draft after draft with all the blind confidence in the world. And since my feature, I've come to the realization that I only really have a few basic themes that I keep going back to, and I keep trying to force myself to think of something different, to be a different filmmaker, but I'm not. And now I'm questioning my goals. I've wanted a career making indie films so I wouldn't have to work a crappy day job. I've been working the same crappy day job for almost four years straight, except for the nine months where I moved to LA to pursue my career. I could't even find a day job to pay the rent. Toys R Us interviewed me twice and wouldn't hire me to work in the stock room during the holidays. I sold a bunch of my lenses, and the DVX100 I didn't use anymore, for rent money. I moved back to my hometown a year ago, broken and miserable. A year later I'm in a great relationship with a woman I'm moving in with in a month. She also has a three year old daughter, and though I thought I never wanted kids, now I can see myself raising this child with my girlfriend, and marrying her. We both see it. She's extremely supportive of my filmmaking, and doesn't want me to give up. But I just feel discouraged. Discouraged that my films will never look good enough, have good enough acting or be important enough. And I still want to make films, but I'm wondering why I want, or need, to be successful at it. Before I got "serious" about it, I used to have fun making movies. The same group of friends and I would get together and film shorts on the weekends. Most people here I'm sure had the same experience. I think all I want now is to form a troupe of actors/crew members and make cheap movies in our spare time for fun, and perhaps never even show them to anyone else. I'm accepting that I'm nowhere near the level of talent as Francois Truffaut, Paul Thomas Anderson, or David Lynch, and it's okay. I'm giving up on success. I just want to make shit.

I'm not offended by your post, but I do find it a load of tub thumping nonsense. 1) If a lead star on a production punched a producer, there would be consequences, even if it were Tom Cruise. 2) You seem to conveniently paper over the fact that he was caught saying nigger on camera and also called an asian guy a "slant'. Two of numerous offences that went unpunished and led to his final warning. If you want to move into this sort of editorial you need to put down both sides of the story, especially when your followers are not all UK based. This isn't bending over to political correctness, it is very lightly punishing someone for a constant stream of problems. Most other presenters would have been kicked in to touch long ago. You cannot let someone go unpunished, time and again, just because he is a creative asset and pulls in big bucks. I don't mind Clarkson, he can be funny, entertaining, no nonsense and clearly knows his cars. But that isn't a green light to do absolutely anything.

This is the best new camera of 2010!

I am upgrading some members to moderator status. If they choose to exercise their newfound abilities, this upgrade comes with the ability to delete and lock posts as well as the all powerful, all conquering ability to ban members who misbehave!   Thanks for their positive contributions to life here at EOSHD I am promoting RichG101, mtheory and jonpais to moderator status for the main forum and all sub-sections.   It carries no extra work or obligations - exercising their privileges will be entirely at the discretion of the moderator. I'll continue as the main admin. But I think having extra eyes and ears plus a few more trusted people with the ability to clean up posts and ban members will help me a lot.   Also since they expressed an interest, JohnBarlow will moderate the Anamorphic forum and Andy Lee will get his own sticky thread on lenses and lighting which may build into it's own forum section if it is successful.   I'll create the moderator privileges later in the week. Any objections or any opt outs please have your say on this thread!

Hey guys, I've written a really simple command line app for Mac that will resample GH4 footage from 4K 4:2:0 to 2K 4:4:4 using pixel summing. This will give you real 10 bit data in the luminance channel, so it's not just doing a brute-force bump from 8 bits to 10 bits. There actually is some interesting pixel finagling going on here: http://www.mediafire.com/download/f7h950spj5hrn9f/gh444.dmg There's no GUI, so you'll need to run it from the terminal. Do this by copying the app into the directory that contains the GH4 MOV files and using the following command in a terminal: ./gh444 INPUTFILE.MOV Make sure you cd to the current directory first if necessary. You can do this by typing "cd" into the terminal, add a space, and then drag the folder containing the MOV files into the terminal window. It will automatically add the path to the cd command. It'll look like this: cd /path/to/gh4/files The app will spit numbered DPX frames out in a folder named "dpx_out." I'd love for you guys to give it a try and see if you find it useful!

Even with a 16stops camera, shitty light will always look shitty.

I think we should be happy that 'the masses' are still buying Canon because it is 'the brand to get'. We, as enthusiasts and some even professionals, earn their living with shooting video's. I'm so happy that 80% of video shooters still shoot 720p on their Canon 7D / 5D. Why? Because my GH3 looks amazing compared to it. And my clients go 'ooeh' and 'aah' when they see my footage. Of course it is composition, grading, talent, etc. But the camera is also important. So I say, stop spreading the word about Canon camera's being shitty. You gain nothing from it, but you take the edge, of us video makers who spent lots of time selecting the best gear carefully, away. Buy Canon folks! Great reliable gear! Never had any problems with them! Furthermore, even though your articule is spot on Andrew, it accomplishes nothing. It's like asking Sony why they don't release a Mac Pro competitor for less money. Clearly there is no interest from Canon in this market. But also, they will still sell the most camera's for years and years to come. And you should buy a Canon, because they are great!

I've been playing with the GH4 for a while now. I'll share my video's here. Shot a lot more material, still have to edit/upload it. Will do so in the following days. Go over to Vimeo/YouTube for all the details in the lenses/profiles/settings used. You can download 4K files or high bitrate on Vimeo. Cinema 4K mode - sunset and lowlight. The 14mm makes razorsharp 4K images. Also used a cheap 200mm f/3.5 Vivitar lens. Hard to get the focus exactly right and maybe not really suitable for 4K. For the video on Vimeo I used pretty high iso values. Shots with the birds are 3200 for example. 96 fps slomo test: with shallow dof shots it is pretty sharp. I have some slomo sufing shots as well, the resolution looks less good with very detailed scenes. Short test shot at ISO6400 in C4K. Anamorphic test with Minolta MD 28mm f/2.8 and Petit Cinevision 1.5x

Check EOSHD 5am GMT Friday 7th

  I enjoyed Phil when he was genuinely putting out useful regular posts. Super 35mm adapters, DSLRs, all workarounds he endorsed. Built his name on DSLRs in fact, wouldn't have a well known blog without them. Now all I see is extreme self love and a formidable self obsession. Pics of Bloom on a plane. Pics of his cats. Instagram self portraits. Fooling about at NAB, Looping Vine videos. Posing here, posing there, posing doing this, posing doing that. It's enough to make you go insane. HAD ENOUGH   The cult of personality has overtaken the filmmaker for me. Hate all the moral posturing too. Philip uses the moral high ground and his sense of humour as defence mechanisms against those he doesn't agree with. His ego HATES any form of criticism however constructive. Sad really, as in doing so one is left with just Bloomies and groupies around you. Say you don't like so many ads on his blog and you are met with standard response THIS BLOG COSTS SO MUCH TO RUN, and he tries to claim the high ground. I know how much blogs cost to run. Very little. In the past I did EOSHD one-handed on a shoestring for years. So make no mistake, the blog is to promote Philip Bloom. It is not only a selfless act of sharing he makes it out to be.   Met Phil quite a few times, each time has been odd. Charming and coldly indifferent at the same time. At Photokina, he belittled me and basically humiliated me in front of two strangers in the name of humour knowing it was inappropriate in the circumstances - very barbed passive aggressive exchanges disguised as humour, really uncomfortable to be subjected to. On other occasions he was fine. I think he has issues.

The official EOSHD discussion thread for all things lens related!

One chapter at a time, I'm translating to english my graduation work which is 90% focused on anamorphics. I hope it brings some light onto common questions as well as works as a good follow-up read after the original EOSHD Anamorphic's Shooter Guide. I'll keep updating the links to each chapter on this post, please feel free to comment and correct me along the way. There are 22 chapters/topics and roughly a hundred pages. WHO AM I AND WHAT IS THIS ABOUT? http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7166 INTRODUCTIONhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7174 LENS RESEARCHhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7195 a ) FOCUS THROUGH (1.33x)http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7204b ) ISCORAMAS (1.5x)http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7225c ) DOUBLE FOCUS (2x)http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7235d ) CINE LENSES (2x)http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7260e ) DAMAGE AND SERVICINGhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7278f ) DIOPTERS AND CLOSE UPShttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7282g ) LENS-YCLOPEDIAhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7280h ) FAKING THE LOOKhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7283 MAGICLANTERN RAWhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7304 a ) CUSTOM CROPMARKShttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7305 ZONA SSPhttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7310 a ) LOMO: EPISODE 01http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7311b ) ISCORAMAS: EPISODE 02http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7317 THE PROCESShttp://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7318 a ) CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7319b ) ON SET PREVIEW http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=7320c ) WORKFLOW CONCLUSIONBIBLIOGRAPHY

The A7RII isnt even out yet, and for some reason this makes the GH4 (which is now over a year old and a third of the price) insignificant? Do brand new camera releases suddenly mean the previous awesome camera (GH4) isn't awesome enough to film with? I haven't bought a GH4, A7S, NX1, FZ100, LX100, G7.. (or any other 4k mirrorless). Still using my GH3 as the small camera. It does fine, still makes money. Doesnt have V Log or 4k and is just as good as when I bought it 2 and a half years ago. All on cheapo FD lenses. Firmware is a simple equation. Either crippled for product segmentation or promising the world (whilst delivering poorly in other key areas such as battery life!). Let's just buy ALL the cameras and we can have all the firmware we want! I do agree firmware is very important though. Poor firmware affects my creativity. The slow, sluggy speed of the FS7 menus means I have less time to work on the shot. The Monitor LUT dissapears. WHY!? The 1DC (official cinema DSLR champion) doesn't have peaking. And this camera launched for $634,000,345 as a Cinema EOS whatever thingy. "Modern" firmware is the way forward. Samsung has ideas and Blackmagic really seem to be onto a really simple, inutitive, elegant system. Sexy.

Watch your language or your going to be the subject of Ed's upcoming documentary.

I would like to give my platform to up and coming musicians around the world to showcase their music through my cinematography to an audience of around 250,000 people per month. This is the EOSHD Music Challenge. Readers act as DJ - they can pick music from up and coming singers and bands, with suggestions that might suit the mood of my cinematography and future camera tests. Cinematic music is really important to me but I haven't been satisfied with The Music Bed or similar resources so far. How does the challenge work? 1. Suggest a band or musician on this thread. They have to be up and coming not signed to a major label or already huge. 2. I investigate and do the contacting of those which I like and credit you for the find! 3. If they agree to let me use their music, they will find a new audience through my blog and hopefully sell some tracks on iTunes from a link on EOSHD. You will be designated as the discoverer of talent and winner of the challenge. 4. You can have fun with this challenge and play DJ - use your taste to select the right standard of music to fit EOSHD and in turn you might discover new music yourself which you really enjoy listening to. 5. My cinematography at EOSHD is purely an artistic endeavour and experimental, non commercial and does not make any money but for all videos featuring unsigned acts I will consider enabling the Vimeo Tip Jar and sharing the proceeds with the musician 50:50! This is a new idea and it will start off as a trial. If it works then great! If not then we will swap things around until it does, because I am determined to find new music and up and coming artists. Good soundtracks are really important for filmmakers and I believe in finding new talent. Perhaps you know some artists yourself? Perhaps you are one?

I love NAB, been more than a few times, but maybe it's my age and where I am in life, but the more stuff I see the more I'm starting to believe that the tech has maxed out for me. So I ask myself, when any semi-affluent middle-school kid has access to comparable IQ that I have, what's the point of chasing the best IQ? 12 stops of DR vs. 14 stops of DR. This color science vs. that color science. If not applied to a good story and a foundation of compelling shots, using the best isn't really much of an advantge. Love great new capabilities. It's exciting, but rarely do I leverage it in any similar exciting storytelling way. For far too long I've focused on playing with the cool toys in the sandbox. Ultimately, I'm thinking I would have been better off learning how to build a superior sandcastle. All one has to do is wander around Vimeo to see a bunch of decent looking IQ and lousy filmmaking. And god forbid you're on a film festival selection committee. So much stuff looks great these days, you're forced to sit through feeble storytelling until you realize the narrative isn;t going to say anything remotely interesting, is just a bunch of hoary tropes, and the story doesn't come close to matching the imaging. Dang near everybody has great IQ devices...and if they don't they will soon...even if they're not actively searching it out to acquire it. It will come with their phone, watch, eyeglasses, pocket drone, or whatever. For me it's time to ignore the camera and go back to the concentrating on ideas and story. That skill is truly where any advantage in this career will allow advancement.

I don't want to come across as being self-serving with this, but I work at one of the retailers that received pre-release firmware to test on the GH4. There are "reasons" V-LOG-L is not part of the v2.2 update, but I can assure you, Panasonic would not have let us release the footage we shot with it if they weren't planning on actually bringing it to the GH4. We tested it in some fairly low-light conditions and, yes, it is noisy, but the footage was still a dream to work with in post compared to CineD. Here is a link to a basic before/after color grade test I did (sorry if the colors are "dodgy" ;-) ): https://youtu.be/AhPK56Ii5sw And our full presentation: https://youtu.be/_aEMUDQlRFE Lens used was a Cooke 40mm t/2.3 2x anamorphic. Again, really not trying to come across as self-serving or spammy here, just wanting to contribute to the conversation.

That video is brilliant!

Have a great one, and cheers to my EOSHD friends wherever you are

https://www.dropbox.com/s/oa3tmrtw8d3stn6/Screen Shot 2014-12-22 at 9.43.18 PM.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/6v9z5z6eim4kc88/Screen Shot 2014-12-22 at 9.42.56 PM.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/9rcnqo8etwrcwfh/Screen Shot 2014-12-22 at 9.43.27 PM.png?dl=0 Screenshots and the video should be live below shortly.

Here's my video to share. Had some trouble nailing focus shooting T2.8 on some crap BMPC LCD screen, but here you go! EXPERIENCE I enjoyed using this. This is a final production prototype that I am testing. What makes it great is that the setup was really light, pretty well-built, and the learning curve is pretty easy. It can resolve sharp images, especially with the achromats. On the small LCD of the pocket camera though, getting focus can be a crapshoot. Focus peaking does not always work and I had to guess a lot. I did have to tell Ying to slow down a couple times because there was no way I could pull focus, especially on a fairly fast aperture of T2.8 and pretty much 100mm equivalent lens. Really should have a large monitor. But then it's not really a run and gun lens like I was using here though. I don't feel like anamorphic in general is normally for documentary style work. Neither is the pocket camera. Hope this helps you. Erik

I had been a projectionist for a long time (now this profession has died), and from 2000 on I had also been a digital projectionist. Until 2011, when automation finally killed the job, I used to compare my own stuff to the DCPs, side by side on the big screens, in the last two years also as DCPs, when easyDCP and openDCP became available. The largest screen was 78 feet x 32 feet (that's for scope, for 16:9 the width then was 58 feet). First thing I noticed is that resolution doesn't influence sharpness to the expected degree. And it also doesn't influence subjective quality very much. In fact, an upscaled SD DVD ( anamorph pixels with scope-crop, really the worst way to treat a video) could be shown to a big audience, and (back then) nobody complained, the class-A hardware scalers made it look good. I know this is hard to believe, but we once had a festival with student films, ranging from DVD, BD to genuine DCP (a Red!), and the one best looking was a masterfully graded HVX200 short, played from SD DVD. On the other hand, there was a way to know instantaneously what was film and what was video: Colors. I know this comparison is only 8-bit, but I have to find a way to describe aesthetic subtleties here. With a camera like the GH2 ("Musgo"), for example, one would be well advised to fill the frame with detail, textures (resolution, that's the GH2s strength) and not with skies and other big areas of glorious colors. Right now we grade for 8-bit, so 12-bit raw is *just* a bigger palette for grading. Color depth seems to add a new dimension to our video. It's fun to tear the, er, bloom off the images and to dive through the colors. Would it stand against an Alexa? I can't tell, really, but I'm convinced it would do better than many others. I can't wait to see a DCP with the 12-bit preserved in my old cinema.

More samples : :)

My latest short film!!! "The Quiet Escape." Shot on the Samsung NX1 with 35mm Nikon AIS f2 lens and Leica R 100mm lens - one shot. Used Filmconvert and Gorilla Grain to treat it in Davinci Resolve. Came out so nicely. THANK YOU EOSHD and Andrew Reid for this camera!! Minus 5 contrast Minus 3 saturation Minus 12 (all the way) sharpness Before Gamma DR existed. The olden days.

PREFACE: I have been doing some testing with this lens for a while now, but lately I have been swamped with work. Also, there has been some sadness surrounding the girl who appears in the demo video (and several other anamorphic tests of mine), so anamorphic shooting has been on the back burner for a while now. But I'm seeing now that someone else has had the same idea, and is trying to make an unrealistic profit from it. And so I feel that I must post this write up, because this isn't a $1400 lens. The search for the perfect anamorphic lens is over (at least for me). Some months ago, I saw a post here from a member named frerichs. He claimed to have purchased a Bell & Howell 2x 16mm Anamorphic Projection lens (not the excellent Kowa model) for cheap and discovered that it was single focus, like the coveted Iscorama. I was skeptical, but since they can often be had for between $75 and $150 on eBay, I bought one to try out for myself. At first glance this lens does not look like a winner. It has neither the steam punk appeal of the Lomo square fronts, nor the timeless curves of the Iscorama. The impossibly long and narrow build of the lens suggests that this would never be viable match for anything but the longest taking lenses. And yet it works. The front element is a -7 diopter that focuses the other two elements in the housing as the head is turned, similar to the Iscorama. Unlike the Iscorama, the lens takes about five full rotations to go from infinity to close focus, which is limiting for practical use. But I have been working with a CNC machinist to resolve this, and I now have a prototype that allows me to do a full range rack focus in a one and a half turns: (Want to do this yourself? Ask a machinist to design a new front housing with a "multi-start thread" that will house the front diopter and screw directly onto the existing thread on the tube; this could also conceivably be done for Iscoramas to the same effect). We have also added a standard 58mm threading for easier filter mounting, and I've since installed a custom seamless ultra-wide delrin focus gear to add just a little torque for even easier focusing (not pictured). The Bell & Howell projection lenses that originally shipped with this lens were f/1.2 and f/1.4, so it is designed to be sharp at faster apertures -- and I find that it is. Perhaps not razor sharp, but as sharp as I'd ever want an anamorphic lens to be. And once you've removed the two limiting screws from the "head" of the lens, you can focus as close as two feet without diopters. Too much closer than that and the head will screw right off, but it's just as easy to screw right back on. Flaring is nice: The lens is not without its drawbacks. For one, it focuses to about 40 feet, not true infinity. That's not an issue for me, but it might be for some shooters. It's all-metal construction makes it a bit heavy which combined with its length will benefit from a lens support (which eliminates the shake that appears in my rack focus test). It vignettes when paired with wider lenses, so it is a better fit for smaller sensor cameras or Canon DSLRs with Magic Lantern raw crop mode enabled. For instance, I can shoot 1600x1200 with a Pentax Takumar 105mm f2.8 lens on my 5D Mark III and I don't see any vignetting before f/8. I also tested it with a Nikkor 50mm f1.8 AI-S on my GH2, and it was vignette-free so long as I cropped my 2x image down to 1.5x. So how does the footage look? Here's something that I shot with it: I am excited to add a sharp, easily rack-focusable, short minimum-focusing anamorphic to my arsenal. It won't be the right lens for every anamorphic user, especially those who want to be able to shoot as wide as possible, but for the price, it could make single-focus anamorphics more accessible to those who have not had a chance to work with them yet. Happy shooting!

Wow, my bad. I see enough shitty footage on here that sometimes it's hard to tell who's doing it on purpose and who doesn't know any better. Now that I know you're in the former group, I'll be sure to leave you to your own devices from now on.

Just did the update, too. 50Mbit like the A7s! Very nice. Will do a A6000 vs A7s comparison later this week.

Little short shot with iscorama and GH2.

From the DP. Alot of great information. https://vimeo.com/127381179

​Dude you made a feature film how many people can say that NOT many Nobody likes their work name me one artist director that loves his films or art and say Shit man i am good this is good No for some HARD CANDY LOVE stop bitching and moaning you wont get any sympathy from me and go have fun by making short films and stop thinking that one day you will be some bog movie director. You think all those directors you mentioned started because they wanted to be big and important at the beginning NO they do what they love. Keep doing what you love and if one day you make it then more power to you my philosophy is if i don't like it if it is giving me stress i don't do it. PS I was in a war 4 years at age 14 (Bosnia) lost 2 brother and father to that war escaped to Croatia over the mountain took me 3 weeks to travel 230k almost got killed in doing it, from there went to Pakistan for 2 years as refugee almost got raped in one of the refugee camps, come to Canada with red cross was homeless for 6 months in Toronto barely spoke any English lived from shelter to shelter could not get work thanks to my English took me 3 months to get welfare got my education went to collage for graphic design and film All that was 15 years ago do i make films NO do i work as Graphics designer NO I fabricate kitchens in a small town make good money have a beautiful family my own place nice SUV car there is clean water coming from my tap i have electricity and this film staff i do it as hobby and threat it as professional hobby why because it makes me happy But i am the happiest when i take my 2 kids to the park every day watching them play while i sip my coffee what i am tying to say don't over think just do what makes you happy if you make it then good I don't know it any of this makes any sense

​Besides 12 bit RAW and 10-bit prores with 13 stops of dynamic range, better rolling shutter, and WAY nicer color?

andrew & mods this thread is unnapropriate and has nothing to do with eoshd its all based on specula, and we should really not be involved in personal grievances of people. my humble opinion.

Weird. Not a single word about Clarkson's behaviour or responsibility ? It's everyone else's fault according to you ? Never mind him being drunk while at work and hitting a superior, right ? I only see 1 person doing any moral posturing here. Defending alcohol abuse in the workplace and physical violence. And if you're going to get upset with every person disagreeing with you, maybe you simply shouldn't allow comments. That'll save you the trouble of responding. I don't have a problem with your opinion. But calling this a threat to democracy and free speech is ludicrous. A soccer player getting sacked can still find another team to play for. A recording artist dropped by their label, can still sign somewhere else. If he's really that special and unique he'll find another sponsor and you'll continue to enjoy him. You've now posted 3 times about the same thing. And plenty of people have disagreed. Are you going to keep posting until we all agree ? Or all leave ?

As these user names seemed familiar to me, and I felt I had seen useful and helpful post from these guys in the past I decided to see what kind of trouble the were causing. Of baltic's 8 posts I would consider 7 o them to be helpful normal discussions, this being the only exception. And of Nog's 13 posts I didn't find any that were looking to cause trouble, the were all offering opinions, help, or information. This was by far his most troublesome post. Baltic's fanboy comment was out of line and I don't agree with telling someone what kind of videos they should make, but is that single post ban worthy? As for Nog, unless you removed all of his troublesome posts so I was not able to find them he absolutely didn't deserve getting banned for that statement. Do you really feel that is trouble making? I am a huge fan of your site and the work that you do, I check in here almost daily since it is one of the best sources for information on anamorphics which is a large interest of mine. But I have to say that banning these individuals, especially Nog in this way is more damaging for the community than anything they did. Am I missing something here?

I've been out in Dubai for commercial work, and in my spare time I used the 5dmkIII + raw to shoot a travelogue. Tried to capture some of the lesser-known parts of Dubai and the surrounding region. Enjoy!

I am in talks with some professional musicians and film scorers here in Berlin and have discovered some real talent... The average quality of their work far exceeds the current music licensing libraries and it is more original, more interesting.   I am thinking therefore some kind of music licensing service might be useful to offer on EOSHD especially with the Vimeo copyright problem filmmakers are facing. I don't want to see people sued for copyright infringement when they are just trying to express themselves and their art.   Some of the pros I know here are doing really high end audio - we're talking Hans Zimmer & feature film standard. However these are professionals and we need to pay them. It is simply not going to wash using a track for free that took them 6 months of recording time in studios that charge $400 per day.   I'm wondering what a fair and acceptable rate would be for licensing? I want it to start low to be accessible to artists but scale up to commercial work in the right way. Typical prices at the Music Bed range from a minimum of $50 for non-profit to $399 for commercial work and for larger scale commercial work custom quotes are required.   EOSHD music licensing would be different.   For personal work or zero budget short films on Vimeo / YouTube (non-commercial) $19 - 1 track $50 - 5 tracks $99 - 10 tracks   For commercial work - small clients (<10 employees) and non-profit organisations $50 - 1 track $99 - 5 tracks $199 - 10 tracks   For commercial work - large clients (>10 employees) and advertisements $199 - 1 track $399 - 5 tracks Custom quote - 10 tracks   For features, documentaries and short films with a crew $199 - 1 track $499 - 5 tracks Custom quote - 10 tracks   Of course before you buy you can play all tracks in full on EOSHD to see if they are what you need.   I'd like some feedback on this first before I decide to go ahead with it or not as the amount of work involved here is very significant.   In particular what do you need from such a service? What projects do you need music for... And what do you think of the pricing?   Cheers!

I think the big secret is a Metabones Speed Booster that gives the GH4 hybrid tea/coffee making features.

I will be making extensive posts on lenses.... new... old, vintage... cheap and expensive and what their main good points are and how to get the best out of them. And also some useful articles on general lens use that will help improve your shooting and make things more dare I say more 'cinematic' and less 'video' which seems to be what alot are asking for. so say tuned folks and watch this space......

I don't understand this post. DSLRs are for photographers. They are made for stills and not video. It's just so happens that we have adopted it as a filmmaking tool. If you are a serious filmmaker, Canon want you to buy the Cinema EOS Line. Nikon aren't interested. Fuji, erm... No need to bother. Panasonic...they have plans and want you to buy into their M43 system. They get punters in with the GH line, to then offer video based models later. ;) So what if Nikon haven't bothered with a video feature in this camera, who cares? Technically, hobbyists don't need professional features. Professionals need professional features and therefore buy professional cameras. Blackmagic cameras are for pros and lack many pro features. Canon etc, I expect, don't care. It's very niche. I'm not sure why ML RAW comes into this in any way at all. The effect this has on the market is literally nothing. It's a hack. It's not a feature of the camera. ML RAW is a discovery, it's not a market leading feature. The annoying fact for most is that if you want a camera with better features, you need to get shooting and earn some money. If it's just a hobby, then why would the camera manufacturers screw their business models by giving top features to people who just want to point and shoot? It doesn't make any sense. There is a feeling that manufacturers (Canon especially) are not putting in the juice they could even into their pro cameras. This is true, and it happens because they are a business who want to make a profit. I don't think the camera companies are out of touch. This forum is out of touch. The camera companies believe they are catering for you, and as we are all buying their cameras, they are. ;)

Firstly there is a multitude of problems that were allowed to happen, that has had this announcement made and uncharacteristically these comments are made by the two people often associated with destroying Hollywood in the first place, whilst both Lucas and Spielberg created moments in cinema that yielded the terminology 'blockbuster', they are not to blame entirely.   The studios having let the dreamers of the 70s have their way, in order to stop their film industry falling apart, an industry that no longer knew what to do with the fast changing cultural landscape of the era, decided to play observer. In observing they saw a formula and took the reigns back, what they didn't observe is the 'why' and focused only on the '$' these films made. Having run much of the Hollywood gauntlet under this ideology worked until the era of todays audience kicked in, or more importantly speaking the age of the internet. Today audiences are in charge and the film industry is having to fight back against many other forms of entertainment on many different portals out there, what is making it worse in this 'tailored to my own choice' era, is that again the industry isn't wanting to understand or learn from, so they keep upping the event tentpoles and not the culture of what cinema has been for a 100 years.   Originality costs today, that is the fundamental reasoning behind remake culture, the last studio original fable was Inception and Nolan had to earn that, and did so with the ROI of TDK and the promise that he would also do TDKR. The same goes for Spielberg, just because he has made a lot of hits doesn't mean they will bow to him, the business is about the business of film, so for Schindlers List to be green lit, he had to sign for JP:Lost World and when you watch that film, you can tell right away his heart is not in it, in any of it, because he had to make it and not wanted to make it.   As for Lucas and his Red Tails nightmare, the business told him 'no one would be interested in that particular story, it was the business talking and he didn't want to listen, this was both right and wrong. Lucas accused the industry of being racist and this was a huge error on his side of reasoning, a little blind sided and more in line with a trouble maker, than as a bonafide reason. He should have understood what the industry was saying or just financed it himself, which he ended up doing.   At the Berlinale this year, I spoke with a lot of buyers at the EFM (European Film Market) as I have a UK thriller script set in the Afro Carribean UK community and even though it's not about the culture of these people, the first thing more than half of them told me was, we don't buy black stories, when I probed why, rather than assuming the worst, they said we cannot sell them, it was that simple, they were being truthful about sales which is what they do and they know what they are talking about, they were not being racist.   What is clearly missing and has been for a long time is what the culture of cinema used to be about that led to an industry being fruitful and now that there are signs of it becoming fruitless, no one wants to understand the hierarchy of the failure that has led to that.   If anything, the people, as in the audience, well they are in charge now right, not the studios, and are dictating what is being made by them. Good you might say on one hand, well actually it is bad on the other, because for every $1b, an empty and void of content Iron Man type movie makes, this only guarantees to Hollywood that that is what the people want, hence why they will only give their energies and resources to keep making them. However, if only those type of movies are shown, what choice do we have? It's a vicous circle, and until once more the industry collapes, and again they ask the creatives to give them back an industry again, it will be too late.   We cannot have the 70s again, and Hollywood cannot rely and hope the same can be repeated again, because those that can have gone on to other portals now to deliver them, furthermore, watching cinema and that magical artful experience of having a voice shared by many at the same time, a voice that matters first, is truly if not already lost right now.   A New Hope is more than needed, both culturally, creatively and most importantly, in alignment with an industry willing to listen and apply.  

Raw for under $1,000. This is actually what you call a "game changer" in the real world Laforet. Lmfao