richg101

if low light is your main shooting scenario I'm certain the bmpcc and speed booster 0.58x has the edge - particularly if you want deeper dof.  a native iso of 800, increasing to 'quasi 2500iso' when used with the speed booster is only matched by the a7s - which IMO doesn't touch the bmpcc for out and out image quality.   The pixels are rather large on the bmpcc - almost as large as those found on the a7s as it happens.  add the incredible 275% gain in transmission from the speed booster and it's a no brainer.

zeiss 35mm/1.4 on pocket + speed booster will provide the same fov and double the dof as a 5dmk3 with a 50mm/1.4.  but the 5d will need to be running at 2500iso in order to match the bmpcc running at its native 800iso.   even pushed to 1600, the bmpcc holds up.  to match this a 5dmk2 will need to be running at 5000iso.  if a 5d user wants to match the dof of the bmpcc setup above he'll need to close the aperture down to around f2 meaning iso needs to be ragged to 10,000iso!  

when you start adding the sigma 18-35/1.8 into the equation, the bmpcc literally kills anything a 5D user would need to use in order to match the out and out usability of the bmpcc+sigma+speed booster in a real low budget shooting environment.    

The bigger the sensor, the longer the lenses, the shallower the dof, the higher you need to push iso, or the more light you need.  since this is not a forum full of guys with budgets to light for the 5dmk3 at f4-f5.6.  The BMPCC + SB0.58x is definitely the best low light camera at the moment  

hahahaha @Tito Ferradans  my thoughts exactly!  Looks like diopters specifically for the iscorama!  In my 7 year love affair with the iscorama I have never once seen these -  a +0.5, +1 and +2 matched set of what look like they may be doublets!

create a timeline of 2.75:1

so 2970x1080

drag your footage into the timeline, then stretch the footage on the horizontal by 2x.  the sides will be cropped off.  You might find you can get away with stretching less than 2x - sometimes 1.8x will be ok - particularly for closeups, since anamorphic squeeze ratio is at infinity, when focused closer the squeeze ratio reduces quite drastically.  Use your own judgement - by eye is better than by the numbers.

Personally I think 2.66:1 is the golden ratio.  any wider and things get a little too thin.  - Unless you;re Tarrantino / Bob Richardson and able to make it work for the film:) 

I so often see worries from people regarding AF capabilities on the A7 range.  Personally I think when you have a camera with the capability to punch in (auto punch in with sony FE native lenses) then AF is completely pointless.  Ask anyone who uses the loxia zeiss lenses (35mm, 50mm and now a stellar 21mm), completely manual focus, and someone who has invested time into learning how to do things properly, they'll take the loxia over any oversized, flawed canon lens - flawed and bigger than it needs to be due to needing to be designed to avoid the mirror box.  

I do believe the sony 55mm fe lens outdoes the sigma art in every respect when we're getting to the nitty gritty and actually using it on the stunning 42mpx sensor.

Conversely I often look at the price of the FE lenses and am amazed how well priced they are..  the 28/2 is a perfect example.  The A7R2 and that 28mm will smoke anything on offer for canon use on a canon camera.  

carefully upres the unsharpened images by 1.5x if they can take it and then overlay a very slight grain to mask the upres.  then do your sharpening, and then print at 300dpi.  this should get you up to the 8" width.  

In a world where we have so much horrible light in our environment (low quality led lights, nasty discharge bulbs, energy saving, neon etc), monochrome is a escape from it all.  I think with the way available light night time scenes look nowadays, I'd probably discard the colour vision from my eyes during night time all together.  it looks better in b+w imo

I've seen a steady interest in the 'soap bubble effect' growing on the vintage lens forums and on Flickr.  The regular suggestions I see to get this effect is a triplet design, and meyer seems to be mentioned before any other.  Leading to crazy prices being paid for rather poor lenses.  it should be considered that the effect is usually a result of the shooting techinque rather than the lens itself.  most of the subjects seem to be macro shots of bugs or toadstools with a dynamic background just after it has rained.  for example, the picture above wouldn't exhibit the bubble effect if the bug wasn;t infront of water.   I think even if someone were to buy the gold standard meyer bubble lens, they'd still only see this effect when shooting with lots of extension tubes at very high magnification.    

just about any medium tele lens from the 1960's will give this effect.  you want old lenses with coatings with little to no apparent colour to them.  my personal favourite for this effect is a late 1950's zeiss jena biotar 58mm - coatings are almost non existent so light source bokeh has a glow.

I have a feeling that the 1.25x anamorph used on these lenses is infact a prism based optical squeeze.    

Tarrantino couldn't be further from a hipster if he tried.  Hipsters are trend followers who think they're setting trends.  Tarrantino authentically goes againtst the trend doing exactly as he wishes.

personally being in the UK and not in a major city, I doubt I'll see the 70mm print:(.  However I'd only bother seeing it in 70mm if I were seeing the first projection.  I imagine after a few runs those poor reels will have been wrecked by unskilled hands operating the projectors.  - unless a load of real projectionists are brought out of retirement for the duration of the films screening.

I have never come away from a film projected in 4k digital at a high end theatre feeling cheated.  it always feels like a proper theatre experience - particularly when the movie was shot on proper equipment.  for example I know that my Interstellar viewing experience (4k digital) was a more accurate representation of what Nolan envisaged than what people who saw the 70mm projections on their 5th, 6th, 7th pressings saw!  i bet the 20th screening wouldnt be worth a 720p scan! .  My viewing of Interstellar felt more epic than when I saw Jurassic Park projected on film for my 10th birthday in 1993! - a movie made by the best film makers, during a time when production and projection using celluloid was at its peak. 

  i expect for most, the digital screenings will show more of the quality of the 65mm acquisition of this movie too- since the iq wont have degraded each time the film is projected.

you can theoretically acquire 8k from 35mm negative photographic format (with modern film, low iso, perfect optics).    so theoretical acquisition resolution of 65mm negative film would be around 12k.  In practice, no lens exists that will have optical resolution capabilities to full take advantage of this.  neither is there any way of transfering this onto projection film or into digital format without losing some of this resolution 

the projection (positive) film allows even greater resolution capabilities.

i agree, I'd love a speed booster with colour correction allowing the full res from high end mf lenses to be acquired with the a7rii.  

lovely!  

unfortunately you're not going to find anything within budget that fulfils your requirements.   The iscoramas are not very heavy at all.  pretty much everything else of a single focus nature will be heavier.  unfortunately an iscorama is around 3x your budget.  maybe a slr magic 1.33x?  it's not 100% single focus but preowned should come in on budget.  

there are plenty of dual focus options that will fulfil the aesthetic and optical quality requirements.  maybe look there (kowa, sankor, etc) then plan a purchase of one of the multiple focus units that are currently on offer.  slr magic rangefinder, FM lens and Rectilux.  get a good dual focus setup and then its just a case of saving for a focus unit.

I wouldn't take any artistic advice from anyone on this thread, or from any forum in general if i were you.  I think you;re on the right track as you are.  Clearly you've done your work creating a style, a look.  The whole thing captures that b-movie vibe.  It feels like you made an effort to make it look as if it's not meant to be funny, but is - the reason old b-movies are entertaining.  watching films of this style you put yourself into a different mindset and absorb the film how it's meant to be absorbed.  The critique I see above is kind of like a random guy with no film making experience going up to Tarrantino and Rodriquez and telling them that the cut is shabby and the image quality looks bad on Death Proof / Planet Terror.  Missing the whole point.  

my take on the politics of the thread... It was nice to see a piece shot completely on an iscorama.  It illustrates to those worrying about lack of wide angle anamorphic solutions that with a relatively low investment of lenses ( for the price you paid for your iscorama and the taking lenses you'd only be able to rent a single panavision c series lens for half a week) and a bit of hard work and creativity you can shoot something that looks like it was shot in the late 1970's and cost 500k.  and the bonus for you is that it has driven traffic to your film.   I'm looking forward to seeing the entire film

I'd pay to see this at the theatre.  looks superb.  well done man

It sounds like some here don;t quite 'get' the movie.  It's not meant to be serious.  I see a lot of great humor here - the characters are great - memorable looks to the main guy.   The selection of an isocrama and the old russian lenses definitely adds to the authenticity of the piece.  the fact that you worked around the limitations of anamorphic is probably why it looks so good.   the cut and the offset audio sync is a great touch.

Granted I wouldn't have watched if it had not stated that it was shot on a 'rama, but that's the whole point.  People shoot anaorphic to separate themselves from the guys shooting on L series and grading to try and make it look like what you;ve achieved.  Thanks for sharing this!

wow.  that little setup will be killer with the 0.54x sb!  pretty much an ikonoskop with the advantage of a speed booster!  I'm hoping the global shutter mode doesnt affect iso sensitivity too much.  but even if it's one stop, you'll be running an effective 1250base iso:)  I'd better get the damn trump24/2 attachment sorted asap! 

I find even if not using s-log on the a7 cameras I always have my wb dialled away from green on the 4 way adjustment.  I used to only do it for a particular led I used, but now I use the '2-3 points away from green' wb offset without fail.  even then i see an over green look.  but the wb offset trick seems to help a lot

it's unfortunate no one has made a focal reducer for the nx1 yet!  vintage olympus pen F lenses would be a very good match if you can ut together some type of cannibalised adaptor.

use the evf?  It's a cracking viewfinder and adds a valuable additional point of contact to steady up shots.  Learn to view with your left eye and with a battery grip the camera rests perfectly on your shoulder.  

Superb video.  starts to become a bit of a goldmine for concise information about s-log/cine/rec709 - and backing up already known information.

You'll always have some confetti from that sensor but the firmware 1.1 pretty much completely removes it.  I can't imagine you have more than 20-30 coloured marks around the edges of the frame? Just clone them out.  that 15mm lens is gonna need a centre filter anyway me thinks!    And it's a black and white only lens isn't it? 

unfortunately for a speed booster to work you need to get nice and close to the sensor - canon's mirror gets in the way.

s-log and a proper LUT from Adobe.  I agree, it looks lovely.  

It looks like the shooter chose a beautiful day, at magic hour, selected the right WB, exposed correctly and avoided s-log and overtly messing around in post all together. 

Provide these cameras with good light and a bit of an understanding of how to correctly expose and set wb and they never fail.  Shoot in 'low light' in urban settings with a mix of horrible sodium bulbs, led's, neon, and tungsten car headlamps and every digital camera will struggle in some way or another.

12mpx is not enough for a landscape or architectural photographer any more.  I've taken many nice photographs with my a7s, but more nice photographs with my a7r and now my a7r2.  I'm not a resolution obsessive, but processing detailed images at 36 or 42mpx is a lot more enjoyable than 12mpx ones and almost certainly provides nicer end results even when viewed at 25%.  Stick modern lenses on the front of both cameras, blow them up bigger than a4 at 300dpi and the difference is big.  It's like the difference between a photographer shooting 35mm film and a photographer shooting medium format.