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80Mbit MJPEG 4:3 for 2x anamorphic shooting
  • 100 Replies sorted by
  • ah, you got me hooked EOSHD! (bought the Shooter's guide). :-) (Mr. V. Smile).
  • RE: Lomo's
    But the hard thing now is to find one in decent condition...
  • yes, they are looking somewhat shabby on the 'bay right now. what about the oct18 lenses? those take the anamorphics direct to the front without dual focus rigamaroll, correct? (this plus oct18 to m43 adaptor is good setup?)
  • @B3Guy
    Irregardless of its mount, it's still tough to find one in good optical condition.
    For best mechanical function - on m4/3 camera - is to get the OCT19 adapter and an OCT19 lens. Then you can use it normally like any lens, without any support.
    The OCT18 version breathes heavily, requires lens support and overall is not as convenient to use. But still, I've seen it flare very crazily. Ask EOSHD!
  • I recently purchased a Singer 16d 2x lens in really nice condition. I've been looking around for a lens clamp to mount it on a 50mm lens f/1.4 taking lens, but the clamps on E-bay look cheap. The Redstan clamps look like quality pieces but also seem too pricey. These two seem to be the only options. Anyone know of any alternatives?
  • @Roy_Batty I have the Redstan clamp, it's good. The cheap eBay ones are actually extension tubes with holes drilled. I have one of those as well. Think about what it does. It may be simple but if your £1000 lens drops on the floor as a result of saving £30 on a clamp, it wouldn't make much sense!!

    @ed_lee83 The OCT18 certainly breathes. Heavier than Rupert Murdoch at a select committee. Bulkier than John Prescott. Picking one up on eBay is a complete crap shoot. You don't quite know what you've got until you've tried it out. Some are even soft until F5.6, when you do finally find a way to mount it. (Sounds vaguely sexual!!). Ed found a support that is perfect but I still had to take some further steps to get it working probably, like drilling a hole in the bottom of the LOMO support bracket so it could screw to the platform of the support. LOMOs give a beautiful image with great flare, but since they're now much more expensive it doesn't make sense to go through the same pain to get an OCT18 one to work. I recommend selling household furniture and getting an Iscorama 36 1.5x instead. The only other option right now seems to be the LA7200 or Kowa anamorphic. If you can deal with focussing two lenses and being unable to rack during a shot, the Kowa is a bargain. The only bargain left really! It is such a shame the good stuff is so rare. If there were more Iscoramas outstripping demand, the price would have never got into such an inflated state. But it's high for a reason - they're amazing.

    @B3Guy Welcome to the priory!! :)
  • @EOSHD Thanks :-)

    I've been basically trying to figure out between a Century and an LA7200. Do you know off hand what the rear thread on those is? Also, I've heard the Panasonic is very difficult to find diopters for. Does the Century have the same problem or is the front smaller?
  • The LA7200 is so difficult to find diopters for because of it's large front element, and most diopters are small and round like filters, not square. There are the LOMO diopters but these are rarer than unicorns and about as expensive. Century and Optex smaller front elements. These represent the best bargains at the moment along with the Kowa. The rest you have to pay a lot more for.

    Could we begin research into better 4:3 MJPEG? Currently it seems upscaled from 480 lines. What is going on here exactly, anyone with better knowledge than myself tell me what the current theory is and how we can go in direction toward improving resolution.
  • Anyone else done any samples with this hack? EOSHD, you have a step-by-step workflow yet for proper 2.35?
    So, my sequence setting on FCP was 1280x960 with anamorphic checked. Put the footage in and ended up setting the aspect ratio to -25, which seems about right? But now it doesn't look like 2.35? urgh


  • @EOSHD +1 if I ever have that much cash and time I for one am going after a unicorn, not some worthless diopter :-)
  • @ed_lee83
    I think you've patched the wrong mode for this...
    You should patch the 480p mode not the 720p,
    and use the VGA mode in your GH2 when shooting.
    Your vimeo video looks alright when its stretched like a anamorphic lens on 16:9 source.
  • @ed_lee83 It is not de-stretched properly. Definitely needs to be wider than it is. -25 is not enough.
  • Nice video anyway! @exhardy and @qwerty123 are right, use the 480p MJPEG mode patch, because that's the only mode that is in 4:3, the other MJPEG mode is always 16:9 and scaling it just stretches it.

    I've gone back to using AVCHD until the resolution of MJPEG 4:3 improves, because it looks like upscaled VGA to me!
  • @ed_lee83
    beautiful short, entropy in the city. Anamorphic looks a bit stretched(ratio) but filming/editing was very nice.
  • Thanks everybody for the tips.
    If I had a dollar every time someone told me something is too stretched...
  • I believe these are the correct resolutions for anamorphic...

    2.35:1 (1920x820)
    2.66:1 (1920x720)
    3.55:1 (1920x540)

    It's a good idea to make some blank JPEGs that size and import them into FCP or Premiere just to make sure the percentage squash, stretch or aspect ratio adjustments are right. Overlay the JPEG on the video and resize the video until it matches.
  • May be it is incorrect to post my question here, but it is not so important to make a new topic. I bought one thing like this one http://cgi.ebay.com/LOMO-BIG-ANAMORPHIC-LENS-56-2-f-80-110-Camera-Projector-/120755282860?pt=Camera_Lenses&hash=item1c1d9363ac#ht_4009wt_906 for just 10$. It is in great condition, but it is heavy. As i understand, it is not for shooting, but for projection. I tried to put it at front of my lens and made some frames with @EOSHD settings, and it seems that i got real anamorphic look. May be someone already tried to use it? Is it usable for real anamorphic shooting? Thank you.
  • Wow worth a try for $10. Can you post some samples from it?

    The practical realities of these lenses is quite poor, they are big and heavy, hard to mount, and the minimum focus distance is probably about 5m :) But let me know how you get on.
  • Now i am trying to make handmade rig for it, and after i will upload better frames than i got now. Yes, it is good price. Seller even did not know what he sold. He has another one for this price, but my has better quality.
  • How's it going @telkitachki?

  • Now i have no time to make a good footages, but here is a quick flares test. http://letitbit.net/download/15506.1be8fdc7f3be5a48e1ec6626abeb/flares.m2v.html
    This lens is focusing at minimal 8m distance and realy heavy, and i think - is it possible to rebuild it? I have a donor body from TC-DC58A canon tele converter, and i think to take off all lens from heavy body, than change they size and put it in new body. As i understand - architecture of this lens type make possible to put them closer. Am i wrong?

    Edit... f*ck, how it will be focusing? No, it is impossible.
  • Thanks for trying it. 8m focus, that's a shame but kinda expected. This is why I say to people not to use projection lenses even for $100 it's just not worth it. $10 makes an interesting experiment though.

    They're unusable in practical shooting, you cannot really focus them or attach them. You can't DIY rebuild them either. Not sure about the design but it takes special expertise, knowledge, materials, tools and precision i.e. an optics factory, to do anything, least of all fitting the glass in a different housing. It's just not worth it, for the time and money it would cost even IF it was possible, you could've bought five Iscoramas by the time it was done. The LA7200 mod is a special case since it's not really a lens as we know one. It is more like two bits of non-focussing bent glass. The regular anamorphic lenses are as complex as DSLR lenses and just as hard to modify or to take apart.

    Here is a price guide to current usable anamorphics

    Cheapest:
    Proskar 2x - $300
    Kowa 2x (older 16-C) - $300
    Sankor 16-D or similar - $400

    Mid-range:
    Kowa (8Z, 16-H) - $500
    Isco 2000 (similar to LA7200 but less flare) - $700
    Optex / Century 1.33x - $700
    LOMO OCT18 2x - $1200 and a large amount of luck
    LA7200 1.33x - $1000+

    Top-end
    LOMO OCT19 - $1500-$2000
    Isco Centavision 2x - $2000+
    Iscorama 36 1.5x - $2500-$3000

    There's a more detailed buyers guide with review of each lens and the pros / cons in my book http://www.eoshd.com/anamorphic-guide

    Good luck!
  • Ah yes, those gigantic anamorphic projection lenses take me back to my days with the Hypergonar. Still, as much as it was a pain in the ass to shoot with, it was a good learning experience into the world of anamorphic. Wouldn't touch them again though.
    @telkitachki seriously don't bother trying to rebuild it, not unless you're a reincarnated Henri Chretien. I used this support rail for the big Hypergonar and it also helped others using the same type of big lens: http://cgi.ebay.com/New-Velbon-SPT-1-Telephoto-Lens-Support-Splint-Plate-/280708893883?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item415b8dccbb
    My old kit with the Hypergonar:
    http://www.flickr.com/photos/edwinylee/5342021193/in/set-72157625790618742/
  • @EOS,

    This is what I found
    1.85:1 = 1920x1038 (35mm U.S and U.K widescreen standard for theatrical film)
    2.35:1 = 1920x817 (35mm prior to 1970)
    2.39:1 = 1920x803 (35mm anamorphic from 1970 on sometimes called "Panascope")
    2.66:1 = 1920x722 (full frame Super 16mm negative when anamorphic lens is used)
    2.93:1 = 1920x655 (MGM Camera 65, early version of Ultra Panavision used until 1962, with 1.30X anamorphic lenses ratio for used for "Ben-Hur" 1959

    No real difference from yours.
  • @bleach551 - Those are all analog film scan pixel dimensions from the early days of digital video. At this point in time, digital hardware manufacturers have settled on a 2.37:1 compromise that produces what they call a "21:9 Widescreen Cinema" extension of the 1920x1080 HDTV standard. The actual pixel dimensions are 2560x1080, which I think is a good choice for the future:

    http://www.philips.co.uk/c/cinema-21-9/30849/cat/

    While few people have access to a 21:9 widescreen monitor, it is possible to play back a 1920x1080 1.33X anamorphically-squeezed video from a PC and project it at full resolution on a 1080p projector with a corresponding anamorphic projection lens. For this purpose, editing at 2560x1080 resolution and rendering to a 1920x1080 anamorphic print makes sense.

    Blu-ray, to its discredit, does not support any anamorphic formats with a 1920-pixel horizontal resolution. The only way to render a widescreen video to Blu-ray format is to scale it to a non-anamorphic 1920-pixel width in a letterboxed frame. Scaling down a 2560x1080 video in this way produces a 1920x810 frame size, which is the effective resolution of a widescreen movie rendered on Blu-ray.