Leaderboard

My Takumar 50mm F1.4 arrived and I took it out to compare it with the Voigt 42.5mm F0.95 with Sirui 1.25x adapter setup. The Voigt+Sirui is equivalent to 68mm F1.5 and the Takumar+Speedbooster is equivalent to 71mm F2.0, so a bit longer and a bit slower. In order to avoid changing lenses all the time, I did a little lap with the Voigt+Sirui, then did another lap with the Takumar and re-created the compositions from the first lap (as well as grabbing other shots too). These images have had a film-emulation applied, and have had exposures matched, but no other changes, so things like contrast and WB etc should be the same. My impressions: Voigtlander is softer at F0.95 than the Takumar at F1.4 I haven't compared them with the Voigt stopped down, but I'd probably rather get a bit more subject separation than sharper images. The extra sharpness of the Takumar makes the focus peaking a lot easier to use when using the screen (using the EVF you can see what is in focus but the monitor you need peaking on) The focus ring on the Takumar is a lot looser (not that damped but not too loose either), but of course it's backwards The extra width of the Voigt is apparent. It makes me wonder if the Speedbooster is a little less boosting than I claimed. The Sirui has a lot of coma on the edges (stretching light sources horizontally) so the bokeh seems more horizontal than vertical on lights, whereas the Tak seems to have a zoom-blur sort of effect which is a bit odd The Tak has slightly lower contrast (hard to see but I noticed it when trying to match exposures) In addition to those, I also grabbed these with the Takumar: Swirly bokeh! and it's not a Helios!! It has a nice halation/glow but the ghosts from the light sources are real. This is something I am thinking a lot about because I find them to be very distracting. Seems sharp at the edges at closest focus. The bokeh is confusing - sometimes with bubbles and sometimes not. I actually find that the response to light sources in this lens is very complicated - sometimes it stretches along the spokes of a wheel and other times along the rim of the wheel. Also something I noticed but isn't really visible in stills is that light sources pointed straight at the camera have a flare that's like a loop, like this, which can look pretty distracting too. My conclusions are: The focus being lighter and peaking being more obvious makes it a bit easier and faster to use, so much so that I changed my process to where I'd adjust the vND, then hit record and then focus in the 2s it takes the GH7 to begin recording The size and weight difference is significant and I found I was able to shoot people from a lot closer with it than the Sirui The small size and weight mean it's a no-brainer to pack on trips where I'm reluctant to pack the Voig/Sirui combo Next is to test it with an oval insert to get some stretched bokeh. As a proof of concept it certainly looks promising.

For now as a Nikon shooter, I am more inclined to shoot NRAW and do the renaming trick to R3D, than to shoot R3D as I am finding that the Nraw has more DR than the R3D and you can shoot the normal version that takes only about 370 mbs for 24 fps in 4k and 700 mbs for 6k. This is a little test of conversion of Nev to R3D. You have NEV (Nikon RAw), NEV but using the RED lut, Then the Nev to R3D renaming and finally the REDraw file. then So I need to make a little bit more test, with skin tones etc, but they are quite close to me, even more so that even between the different red cameras like the Raptor and Komodo, their is some color difference. The yellow are a little bit more saturated and the image is a little more toward yellow in the Nikon ZR redraw R3D files. On side by side test the ZR was the more yellowish of the red camera. So it might balance out in the end.

Looks fantastic. Any interviews with the cinematographer / crew out there? They used Panasonic GH7 + Lumix 12mm F1.4 for most part https://www.eoshd.com/news/in-ny-and-la-theatres-january-major-new-movie-magellan-is-shot-on-the-panasonic-gh7/

Even mushy 1080p from the t2i looks better than 8K/12k except for DR. The best tech from the past 5-10 years is IBIS. Any new full frame cameras have good 1080p raw without a crop?

I love 1080p footage. To make 4K look good, you have to throw all kinds of filters at it. I can’t even imagine 8K, let alone 12K — that’s just crazy territory. Even 4K already shows every skin pore, sucking all the magic out of the image. 1080p still hits that sweet spot where the detail supports the story. Hyper-sharp 4K, 8K, and 12K just end up turning the story into “look how ugly that person is.” The narrative goes in one ear and out the other. I can’t help wondering if there’s some level of collusion between computer manufacturers and camera companies. What if 1080p was always “good enough”? That would be a huge let-down. Why buy a new computer if a 10-year-old one can do just as well — aside from saving ten minutes on an export? Granted, with a 12K sensor, I imagine moiré would disappear for good, giving you an incredibly clean 1080p file if the downsampling is done properly.

People fight over who has closer DR and latitude to Alexa 35, then apply a LUT that drops the DR to 6 stops to look like Heat 1995.

Here's my dumb-ass-getting-older-by-the-second-opinion: In an era where some people are starting to look back at 80's and 90's films while saying, "Why don't movies look as good as that anymore"? I'm not eager to jump into the high-resolution-hyper-DR-fray. The best looking film I ever made was in 1080p on consumer cameras before I really was trying to do a hell of a lot with color grading. There's GOT to be a push back at intense IQ realism in cinema sooner or later, right? Right? Ah, wtf do I know?

I just think it's a form of culture rot and US cinema will go down with the ship. The west is in decline and it's time for China to take over at the top of the world order, and that includes cinema. Better start learning Mandarin.

One thing this test shows is that the Nraw seems to have better DR and secondly the ZR has great DR/latitude. It is scoring 5 stop above and 3 to 4 stop below. So you are at 8+ to 9 stop of latitude which is very good. Very close to the Panasonic S1ii, Red raptor and for reference the Alexa LF is at 10 stops. I put the link to the video below, he has an English version sub, that is his own voice and not AI.

Thanks John for the app suggestion. I use PhotoMechanic for pics and have done for probably at least a decade and it’s my culling software. I do think it was having identical named files 🫣 in both S1RII’s that was causing me the issues because at first I thought it was the latest stoopid Premiere update, but seems the stoopid one was the user…

I wish someone in Nikon or RED explain what they did and what these codes actually do. NRAW show less purple noise at extreme underexposure but colors are all over the place. R3D NE is in a pool of purple noise, but colors are intact.