Owen Davies wrote:... we decided that given the announcement of additional cameras from BMD, feedback from users (you guys) and other manufacturers releasing cameras based on S35mm (or thereabouts) sensors...
These lenses will still be very high quality for their price, will still work for BMCC, BMPC and BMPCC, plus the Sonys, REDs, Arris, Canons etc.
Most interested in your price point but I can understand that will likely vary with the lenses and is certainly proprietary information for now.
I assume you are talking manual prime lenses only that will work with S35 sensors and of course smaller sensors. As you are aware, BMD has made this more difficult given they will have cameras for three different sensor sizes only one of which is pretty much an industry standard, the Academy cinema 35mm format being virtually identical to the sensor on the BMPC4K (which is a little smaller than most S35 sensors). Building S35 lenses would be welcome to most people I think. The difficulty will be in making a set of matched primes that will work across three (from BMD) or more sensor sizes.
Originally when you were designing lenses for the BMCC, you could pick three to six focal lengths that would cover most uses on one sensor and be able to carve out a market quickly given the high appeal for matched primes at more affordable price points. Yes the potential market was indeed smaller, but you might dominate it in a year due to your concentrated efforts and the astounding disarray of lenses from the traditional vendors that are vying for relatively mass appeal. If only you could produce something akin to the Schneider Cine-Xenar III set of primes at a fraction of the cost. Of course you couldn't match those lenses in every respect but you understand best what could be done to approach them. And it would give you a foot solidly in the door.
Going to a business plan to cover larger and smaller sensors means that even six prime lenses may be insufficient to realize your vision unless you also plan to augment the standard six lenses with integrated focal reducers tuned to the smaller sensors. And the issue of mounts is also a factor for you. Best of luck with what you can do. My free advice is to have a plan to support multiple sensor sizes in any way you feel can be economically achieved but don't hold your breath until you have a great solution for every sensor before you release your first three primes that target the largest sensor you plan to support, presumably the S35. You may need to release three primes initially to get people to be able to buy into your approach. Or risk doing it one lens at a time over a year which will likely keep you on the fringe if you don't market your overall strategy and vision better than others have done.
The SLR Magic and Rokinon/Samyang efforts are commendable but the truth is most of us will be dead before they ever release a matched set of primes or even a haphazard group of primes that have some sense of consistency.
Rick Lang
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