This is where we will post all the technical tidbits of knowledge we have been learning through hours of forum-searching and opinion-reading. We’ll tell you what we’ve learned about cameras, lenses, audio equipment, etc. as we try to make educated decisions about how to make this movie.
Camera = Canon 5d Mark II ($2,699 from Glazer’s Camera)
Why we took it: Best Image, especially in low light situations. Small and easy to hold, mount, set-up, and move (especially compared to a system that involves a camcorder, a 35mm adapter, and lenses). The fact that we can set it on a $90 car mount or a $150 gorilla pod and use any lens we want (try doing that with your adapter set-up). And last but not least: Best Image.
Concerns:
1. No Manual Control of Aperture, ISO, and Shutter Speed.
-Aperture: Use old manual lenses, see “lenses” below. Problem solved.
-ISO and Shutter Speed: You have to point the camera somewhere, either a darker spot or a lighter spot and use the exposure adjust dial to get desired and repeatable settings. Once you have the settings you want you can lock exposure, but after you end the recording session your exposure lock settings disappear, which means you have to re-point the camera somewhere else, re-lock exposure, and then re-frame. Annoying? Yes. Doable? Very.
2. Audio Auto-Levels.
– Nothing to do about this, it’s more or less useless to record audio into the camera. You’re just going to have to use double system sound like you used to…but now without timecode…so get a slate.
3. People won’t take us seriously.
– This is true.
Lenses = M42 Screw Mount Lenses
Why we took ‘em: Manual aperture control. Cheap. All quality levels available. In short, quality glass cheaper than Nikon makes it.
Our lenses, and what I’ve read about them online:
Soligor 28mm/1:2.8
Great lens, vignettes hard, has great linear, smooth adjustment of the iris (in addition to stops). Not the best 28 around, but definitely good and fast and a great price. We got ours for about $50 off of Ebay, great condition.
Zeiss Jena 35mm/1:2.4
Considered one of the best 35’s around, especially in the price range sharp, beautiful, and fast. Can be gotten for under $200 off of ebay.
Takumar Super-Multi-Coated 50mm/1:1.4
The Super-Multi-Coated is supposed to be better the the super-takumar for at least two reasons: 1. Passes more light 2. Sharper wide open . We got this lens for about $100 off of Ebay.
Jupiter-9 85mm/1:2
A fast 85 for $125, looks great, acts great, beautiful, and they still have loads of ‘em in the former Soviet Union. I read somewhere that the earlier models are better quality.
Vivitar 135mm/1:2.8
Gotta be careful with Vivitar because they don’t actually make lenses, they just steal them. Some are great, some suck. Look around online, I found some very intelligent man who wrote what serial numbers are good and what aren’t. Probably on a FlickR board, that’s where most of the good info I find is… ours is supposedly one of the “good” serial numbers…so far I find it beautiful.
Lens Adapter = CameraQuest
Why we took this one: Assurance of quality. $75 is the most expensive but the man behind the company, Stephen Gandy, has only been spoken well of on the world wide web. I found him to be curt in email correspondance but 100% on-par with his adapter manufacturing.
Concerns: With adapters you want to know a few things:
1. Will come off easily.
2. Allows focus to infinity.
3. Doesn’t sit crooked.
4. Doesn’t allow focus past infinity.
5. Doesn’t reflect light and wash out image (this seems speculative, but many people voice this concern so I decided to adopt it)
CameraQuest seems to score pretty high on all of these. To be honest I haven’t yet tested all our lenses (I actually don’t have them all yet) to make sure they don’t focus past infinity, but they all make it there, and the adapter is a solid hunk of a performer so far.