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  What he said. Don't bother

My money is on the lens being a 3 element - from what Andrew said just a bit up.  And the fact that they have a close focus setting - which will work by bringing the two front optics back and fourth from the rear element.  Also the fact that this thing is happy at different focal lengths also suggests the 3 element design since the 2 element designs have their sweet spot for focal lengths (they work better on wider lenses and dont really work well with tele's).   This, if correct will be very good news for the guys used to the normal 2 element la7200 and century designs who are hoping to upgrade.  And at the proposed price this could be great value for money  Though a 1.33x squeeze, the addition of a 3rd optic will boost the ovals quite drasitcally over the ovals acheived from 2 element designs.  I dont know why, but it just does.  And I know that the 3 element design is sharp down to as big aperture as you can show it.  f2 aint a problem on full frame.      @Andrew.  Please can you get confirmation from SLR Magic on if this is a 2 or 3 element design because this is a deal breaker IMO.  - if its the 3 element design, with the choice of single coating, DSO will start researching into a nice fast taking lens for dirty looks and boosted ovals on this thing:)

I don't know why people still have faith in Canon, the 7D users are going to experience what the 5D2 owners experienced.. An underwhelming "upgrade" with only minor improvements and a few features that should have been implemented on the original versions of the cameras.   If you want a 7D2 for designed for video buy a C100 LOL.

Panasonic 14mm f2.4 lens is very good and NO vignetting and NO corner distortion on my gh2 or G6 I use this lens alot , yes its 14mm not 12mm but it has aspheric elements and is RAZOR Canon L series sharp.

  It was actually SLR Magic who told me it is a 3 element design. I don't doubt them!

  I'd say Andrews coverage of the project on his very popular blog, as well as his test shoot and his hard work in creating a space where SLR magic can gain opinions from us nerds is worth a lot more than the £1300 any old mug can pay to get one of these lenses. He could be whoring himself out to Canon, Sony, etc etc and getting paid backhanders to give good reviews,  posting pictures of himself using said gear for financial gain etc.   I don't see Andrew doing a hard sell, but is just making a point that the price seems fair.  Even if he were doing the hard sell, it wouldn't be half as bad as some of the blatant sellers on here of those huge and useless projection lenses coming on and cluttering up the place!.

Will be good to see some of the new anamorphics used with some older taking lenses to see if they can be given some character.   Andrew i'd still like to know if you are paying the 1300 to participate in the prototype round, it's fair disclosure since you are suggesting we do.   Thanks!

Received wisdom is that Canon accidentally created DSLR video. They added simple 30p recording to the 5D MKii for journalists, and as more people used it and bought the camera for video they started expanding the features. Then we get the 7D. The 550D was a big milestone, bringing all this to a cheap plastic body. without that camera god knows what I'd be working as...   But shortly afterwards it all stalled a bit, they realised it was a big market, and created EOS C to capitalise on the professionals using their lower-end products.   Now they will protect that line at most costs. Magic Lantern can hack what they like as long as it's not a C camera, because C is worth too much to Canon. It's a big part of their future. Though the C500 is a big mis-step and shows their lack of experience at the top end: you can't take the piss out up there. Give us everything now please, or we'll hire an Alexa ;)   This year, the majority of jobs I've been involved with one way or another were shot on C300. That is expert business really. To completely steal the market previously occupied by Sony camcorders in a few years, out of the blue, Canon cemented themselves even more firmly in the professional consciousness than they ever had.   It does give the bare minimum but it's just so easy to use and works wonderfully. It's mostly hired, hence that silly price, though I know one owner operator.   One little feature in the 5D MKii kicked it off, now they own corporate, internal, and small scale advertising. They dominate the low end. That's a great success story for them. Our market though, is still a niche. they want consumers and pros, and they're happy to mop up the bit in the middle with the help of the unpaid Magic Lantern crew.

Regardless of how Canon cameras are lagging behind, let's not forget it was all the other makers who have been disappointing time after time since the video DSLR thing began. Canon had the 1st DSLR hit and they still have the best video DSLR around all these years later, we gotta give them that. How many cameras have Sony released in the meantime that seemed so promising and never failed to disappoint? Way too many... all of them actually. Up until Blackmagic Design cameras, Canon didn't really have to improve that much due to the poor competition, and even with Blackmagic Design, I'm not sure the numbers will be enough to be a threat. Remember that tourists and parents with babies still buy way more cameras than us indie filmmakers do, and they don't bitch about moire, they would bitch about having huge raw files that only work on a few memory cards though, that's for sure!

Perhaps I should be optimistic about 7D MKii, since even an iPhone now has 120fps... but I'm not... once bitten, twice shy and all that... :S If their 15,000 pound video camera doesn't have it, why would an SLR?   Yes if Sony take the five-axis stabilisation and put it in an amazing NEX-9 or something, with more than 24/28mbps we could be talking.   If I see 24mbps AVCHD written on another new camera I'll punt it into the nearest lake.   The trouble is it's a "standard", but it happens to be a shit and outdated one, like PAL SD for example.    Canon at least ignore these standards and implement their own codec forms. The AVCHD nearly ruins the FS700, for example. Shit just falls apart after a bit...

no bullshit here andrew what am i sayin. i said it will not be based on the focus century as complexity would mean cost would be at letus levels. both lens will be good but they will not be cemented corrected doublets. they are simple single element optics with an airgap. try a moller at f1.4 try these new lens and tell us about state of the art optics. user friendly with a good price yes but nothing nasa here. since nasa is dead it is up to china to take us to the stars but not for a few more years methinks. but what a price not many can beat it. "We are the slr Borg.  letus Lower your shields and surrender your ships.

It's all down to what you want to do really.   As I've said on here, I personally went for 5D MKiii because I can see raw improving and the cards, processing and storage getting cheaper, so it's kinda futureproofed but I can shoot with it now!   Also because my low-light portraiture with 600D I was finding was a little noisy for 300DPI prints, and I wanted more resolving power. Here sensor size does a lot. I don't like using flash.   Some of that 5D MKiii raw is f***ing stunning, as is the BMD stuff, but the 5D has quite the low-light and noise advantage.   I don't need 4K for my own stuff usually and couldn't store or handle it. Where I do need it (for comping heavy jobs) they're always company based or budgeted so I'd hire. In fact I'm soon to get a crash course in F55 for a comping-heavy job that is so complex in cinematographic terms I shall have to blog about it! The camera is the only global-shutter 4K raw camera for a reasonable hire price so it shall be picked.   Were it an option in pro-sumer cameras I'd use 4K selectively.   So in the 5D MKiii there's the best balance I could find  the best of photography video and future raw in a balance. Other tools do each individual thing better, but nothing else has a finger jammed in every pie quite so deeply. Mmmm, pie.   Had Magic Lantern not existed, I never would have bought this or the 600D though.   It's a weird market, competition is not just on features but availability, support, so on.   I'm all for a shakeup, but though I want Sony to make a full-frame or APSC mirrorless with five-axis stabilisation and a decent codec, I can see them saying PROFESSIONAL 24mbit AVCHD!!!! on the box again, which is sad.

I agree with you JG and having worked intensively with RAW for a bit I can give more reasons why what you say is the case.   1. Line skipping.  The sensor is reading data one line at a time partly to maintain expected frame size, but also because recent chips can't read AND process a full frame 24 times a second.  The 5D3 obviously can (as Zach pointed out).  But I bet those electronics are expensive and power-hungry (and cost Canon considerable R&D).  Eventually they'll make it to other cameras, but I see no economic incentive for Canon to give people other options to the 5D3 this soon.  The camera seems on track, with non-moire video to be another classic like the 2 Canons before it.  Good for them!  The 7D, IMHO, is still a sports camera or high-end/rugged Rebel.   It was just 11 years ago that Star Wars, Attack of the Clones, was shot on 1080p, on a Sony something-or-other.  My guess is the 5D3 is either as good, or better.  Think of that, a $3,300 camera!   There's a lot of competition in digital film "cinema" cameras now.  Hard to be generous without profits!   When I first start doing this, I too, wanted something between H.264 and RAW.  What I didn't see then, and hopefully this will help others, is that Photo processing/compression is about DATA and video processing is about PERCEPTION, similar differences between WAV and MP3, in audio.   In photo processing, you'll looking to keep as much image data as possible because photographers/viewers have a low tolerance for pixelation, blotchy colors, etc.  The bar is actually pretty high now!  So I don't know how you'd reduce the image information half-way?  Cut down the number of red or blue pixels?  In any case, such a strategy would have little or no use for photography.   Video processing is about throwing out as much image data as you can and compressing the rest to create as pleasing a MOVING picture as you can, psychologically.  There is no real connection between RAW bayer data to JPG, and image data converted to a video 4:2:2 color space.  That whole #:#:# quality idea is centered on psychological compression methods for moving pictures--that is, that we're not as sensitive to low-color and dynamic range as we are to sharpness, etc.     A simple way of saying what I'm saying, is, to use audio as an example, low-bit-rate WAV is probably worse than high-bit-rate MP3 (psychologically).  They are NOT the same approaches!  You can't meet in the middle.  They are parallel approaches to image recording and display that don't meet.   There is no middle in video.  That's what my journey is leading to.  You either have full 14-bit color, or you have color-reduction and motion-base compression.     If one insisted on a middle ground, it would be 14bit 720x480 upscaled.  

  Tony my friend...   Enough of the bullshit now.   You don't know if the SLR Magic lens is like the rare focussing century as you've never had your hands on it.   Stop making blind assumptions just because they are Asian.

  Don't touch it with a barge pole.  This is the type that wont be sharp.   The best types are the gold projection lenses.  

Pricing is very good. Still have to see what the new flares look like though.   Any 50mm full frame footage coming?

if you are talking about the rare focus century it will not be like that. that was 3 times the price of the non focus century.   i have 3 of those very nice full focus helicoid quality product perfect fo m/43 still not an iscorama but better than panasonic big chunk of glass.

  I think you hit this exactly on the head. This is for people unhappy with the LA7200, and it hits that market well. Personally I can't believe the prices that LA7200s go for considering that bulkier or wider 2x lenses with sharpness that I consider usable are much cheaper, and this SLR at $800, it'll eat the LA7200 alive.   But for people like me who moved to 2x after losing patience with smudgy LA7200 and Century, it doesn't really do anything for us unfortunately. 1.33x just doesn't do it for me anymore, I'll just crop. I haven't been impressed whatsoever with any of the demos from SLR or Letus.

I have a 3 element, focusable century 1.33x here on my desk.  if it is indeed based in any way on this type of design they're onto a winner.   Please please please give me some samples on aps-c or full frame at f2 and f2.8 in daylight with an ND.  This will truly give an accurate idea of what we can expect with minimal and/or battery powered lighting setups.   re. the 77mm diopter set...  This sounds like a great set.  I'd buy the pair straight away. - since the tokina +0.4 being only 72mm vignettes ever so slightly on iscorama and 35mm taking lens.

Anamorphic selling on eBay is beyond disgusting now. I've watched items get bought one day, and go up with the same set of pictures on a big lens shop's store two days later for three times the price buy it now. Doesn't it just make your skin crawl?   To top that every giant dual-focus anamorphic projector lens is advertised with the word "Iscorama", which is very dishonest, and the wording appears designed to fool buyers, since there are no returns.

for 1700 each i will stick with my 50 dollars lens ad with 1700 goon a vacation

So volunteers are basically early bird buyers who cannnot return items, cannot select which ones they want (forcing to buy the 35mm is quite absurd) and have to make a short video for free giving SLR commercial rights on it. In return? 20% discount on the whole package, plus probably shipping and taxes which bring the price at starting point, if not higher. Forgive me if I cannot be so enthusiastic about it as others..