Some Anamorphic comparisons

Some Anamorphic Comparisons

I made this comparison principally to check the difference in the field of view between some of the different anamorphic lenses and camera combinations that I had, and also to compare the different looks of the resulting images. I used a Tiffen Black Pro Mist 1/4 filter on the lenses.

Certainly a great deal more tests could be done regarding DOF, bokeh, flares, and so on. So, this is a fairly narrow and arbitrary comparison rather than comprehensive.

All the shots, were in consistent light, at ISO- 400, WB- 4400, Shutter angle- 180, FPS- 23.98, all at f5.6. (However, the last shot was an afterthought, at ISO 3200, shot later in the evening just to see how it looked at 2.4:1)

The shots were assembled and exported in DaVinci Resolve, just as they came from the cameras, without any adjustments regarding colour, sharpness, contrast, etc., etc. I exported in 4k, but not at the highest quality I could have done, to keep the file size down to about 270 MB.

The settings in the Panasonic GH5 and GH5s cameras were: Vlog-L (S-0,NR-0), 4096x2160, 422/10bit/ALL-I, 400M/bps.

The settings in the Black Magic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K were: 4K DCI, Braw, Constant Quality, QO, Film.

The lenses and adapter used for each shot are listed in the video. The two old vintage lenses, Soligor 35mm & Sigma 28mm, were bought for $5 each at a thrift store, but were in excellent condition, and they were mounted to the MFT cameras with simple ‘dumb’ adapters.

In post I noticed that I had missed the focus on one shot, as noted. I found the overall resulting images to be quite interesting, comparing the different FOV of the different lens/camera combinations, and also to see the different colours and characteristics of the images, of those various combinations

I hope some people might find this helpful. Here is the Vimeo link:

https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/811786591

When I clicked on your posted link, I received an error that some ad webpage was not found. Not sure how you created that but you could provide a web link without the /manage/ in the URL.

All good when I typed the video identifier 811786591 into my Vimeo app. Thanks.

Thank you, Rick. Hmm, that is strange, when I click on the posted link it seemed to work OK. I tried it without the 'manage', but that didn't work at all. Cheers from your neighbour across the water!

Good news, I tried to click it just now and it worked perfectly, no missing ‘ad’ webpage stopping the show. Thanks for the video.

The way the optics in the SLR Magic Anamorphot function (at least on my 1.33x-65 Anamorphot) is they have a Near and Normal range. Squeeze in the Normal range is the advertised 1.33x but in the Near range the amount of squeeze varies as you get closer to about 4’ at a squeeze of roughly 1.21x.

I try to stay in the Normal range, but if you get closer, you can’t use Resolve’s Clip Attributes 1.33 setting. I don’t know if you have a different technique to desqueeze the image or just stay in the safe Normal focal range. I use the Clip Transform on the edit page, Unlink the Zoom X and Y, and define the Y setting at 0.7519x for Normal and about 0.82x or until things look good to your eye.

Hey Rick,

Yes, good points. True, I think the SLR-40 works in the same way. I did shoot with the setting at normal. BTW, I should have mentioned that the reason I included the plate in the centre of the shot was to check for distortion. If people want to check for that, assuming they are watching with a large screen, they can measure the vertical and horizontal axis to see if there is any distortion in any shot. I measured the plate before setting up the shot, and it is truly round, the same measurements for both vertical and horizontal. I've done other tests before, and as you say, it can change. But in this demo at least, it seems to be OK.

When I clicked on your posted link, I received an error that some ad webpage was not found.

Are you using Tapatalk? I often get this error from it. Long-press followed by open in Safari works around that.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I don’t know if you have a different technique to desqueeze the image or just stay in the safe Normal focal range. I use the Clip Transform on the edit page, Unlink the Zoom X and Y, and define the Y setting at 0.7519x for Normal and about 0.82x or until things look good to your eye.[/quote]

Good to know, Rick, thank you for sharing that. Yes, going from Normal to Near will change the stretch, and your information on how to deal with this is very helpful.

I don't see a lot of Anamorphic qualities that would justify the effort of using this Anamorphic adapter.

Might as well just shoot spherical really

That’s always an option if your goal is simply a 2.4:1 or 2.39:1 aspect ratio. Perfectly valid. One of the benefits of using the Anamorphot adapter with a spherical taking lens is that you increase the horizontal angle of view of the lens. That can be desirable in many situations. The spherical 32mm APO I often use becomes a 24mm horizontal field of view and 32mm vertically.

In the early development of the Anamorphot I believe there were versions which included those blue streaks. You could also get more distortion on the periphery, but by the time I received my 1.33x-65 Anamorphot, it became a much more conservative lens that suited my purposes.

If you’ve handled the big adapter, you’ll know it’s quite a hunk of glass that dwarfs the taking lens. I’ll still use it when I have my APO primes on the camera but having the PD Movie to synchronize the focus of the adapter and the taking lens is essential.

And shooting with true anamorphic lenses is going to be a superior experience that I’m not able to manage financially.

And shooting with true anamorphic lenses is going to be a superior experience that I’m not able to manage financially.

The new Sirui Venus 1.6x Anamorphics aren't too expensive and are much much nicer than their previous 1.33 range. of which I was very critical because of uncontrolled flaring.

Good to know.

Good to know.

Here's some stills from a recent shoot.

Broke In_1.4.1.jpg (897.16 KiB) Viewed 887 times

Broke In_1.2.1.jpg (777.24 KiB) Viewed 882 times

Clown 3.jpg (972.18 KiB) Viewed 882 times

Yes, I see the anamorphic look is more pronounced on your lenses compared to the SLR Magic Anamorphot. Thanks for the examples.

Here is another short comparison video, but this time with and without an anamorphic adapter:

https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/815437989

BMPCC4K, Soligor 35mm.jpeg (701.8 KiB) Viewed 259 times

BMPCC4K, Soligor 35mm, SLR Magic-40 anamorphot adapter.jpeg (674.05 KiB) Viewed 259 times