Anamorphic for high speed photography (Sankor vs Schneider)

[Hubert Napierała]

Hello everyone, 

i'm very happy to finally join you

As the title says, I want to experiment with anamorphic converters in high speed shots. Dual focusing is not my concern at all, so projection lenses are more than adequate. What I care about are lens sharpness and close focal distance (I'm prepared to get diopters anyway). If possible, I'd like to go cheaper than Slr magic Anamorphot, which seems easiest to handle. At local auctions there's a golden Sankor Ultra HD and Schneider Cinelux WA 35, but there is very little video footage of these two on the web. I'm leaning towards Sankor since its close focus is at 1.5 meters. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. 

[Justin Bacle]

The Isco Ultra Star is equivalent to the Cinelux in terms of IQ and close up distance is 1.5 meters too.

I don't know a thing about the Sankor Ultra HD though :s

[webrunner5]

Doesn't look like it is too good for close up! http://www.vintagelensesforvideo.com/sankor-16f-review/

[Hans Punk]

7 hours ago, Hubert Napierała said:

Hello everyone, 

i'm very happy to finally join you

As the title says, I want to experiment with anamorphic converters in high speed shots. Dual focusing is not my concern at all, so projection lenses are more than adequate. What I care about are lens sharpness and close focal distance (I'm prepared to get diopters anyway). If possible, I'd like to go cheaper than Slr magic Anamorphot, which seems easiest to handle. At local auctions there's a golden Sankor Ultra HD and Schneider Cinelux WA 35, but there is very little video footage of these two on the web. I'm leaning towards Sankor since its close focus is at 1.5 meters. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. 

Sankor Ultra HD and Schneider Cinelux WA 35 are both decent choices for sharpness for composed shots with diopters for high speed photography. I can only really recommend the Cinelux (not owned Sankor Ultra) as being plenty sharp enough for your needs and budget requirement. If by 'high speed' you mean 500fps or higher, then the larger optics of these 35mm scope projection lenses will be of some benefit by minimising light loss to your taking lens - a big help when at higher shutter speeds. A thing to prioritise would be the diopter/ close up filter choice. A quality doublet such as a Tokina +0.4 and/or a high quality singlet close up lens from Redstan will give best results when wanting the optics to resolve optimum sharpness at minimum/closer focus....without edge fringing that you would get from most cheap and nasty close up lenses/filters. The taking lens is also a big consideration - ideally a lens that can be stopped down up to f/22 to control depth of field on closeup (how close are we talking exactly?) - yet can still maintain a somewhat circular aperture (if wanting to maintain clean oval defocus). Highspeed requires way more light - so if you want your closeups to have relatively deep field of focus - you will need lot's of it to maintain exposure whilst stopping the lens down at a higher shutter speed.

[ken]

I think Schneider Cinelux WA 35 is a big lens, even if I never own it.  Not suitable to use with focus unit.

[Hubert Napierała]

I'm going to get as close as possible. Macro is essential in high speed photography. My lens will be Pentax c-mount so it's pretty uncharted waters. Thank you for your replies, but I guess I will have to test, test and test

[Hans Punk]

2 hours ago, Hubert Napierała said:

I'm going to get as close as possible. Macro is essential in high speed photography. My lens will be Pentax c-mount so it's pretty uncharted waters. Thank you for your replies, but I guess I will have to test, test and test

Would be very interested to see results. If c-mount and smaller than s35 chip camera - you would still be ok with a larger Cinelux or Sankor IMHO. You will still be able to benefit from minimum light loss from the larger optics...as well as use 72mm (minimum size recommended) closeup diopters on the front, and still know that you will be shooting through just the centre portion of the lens. It would not matter if the diopter did not perfectly cover the optic front for macro work - as long as you lightproof the uncovered areas with felt or tape.

I recently experimented with macro anamorphic, but not at high speed. Here are some pretty boring frame grabs from a quick initial test.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/129041403@N06/albums/72157677743824746

Camera: 5Dmk3 shooting 3.4k raw in crop mode - taking lens Helios 44-2 (16 blade) at around f5.6 to f/8

Anamorphic lens: Kowa Inflight 1.74x + Tokina +0.4 and RedStan Singlet closeup filters

[Justin Bacle]

19 hours ago, Hans Punk said:

I recently experimented with macro anamorphic, but not at high speed. Here are some pretty boring frame grabs from a quick initial test.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/129041403@N06/albums/72157677743824746

Camera: 5Dmk3 shooting 3.4k raw in crop mode - taking lens Helios 44-2 (16 blade) at around f5.6 to f/8

Anamorphic lens: Kowa Inflight 1.74x + Tokina +0.4 and RedStan Singlet closeup filters

Wah, these pictures are gorgious ! Can you explain the setup a bit ? DO you need macro rings or is the close-up ability only done with the diopters ?

[Tito Ferradans]

1 hour ago, Justin Bacle said:

Wah, these pictures are gorgious ! Can you explain the setup a bit ? DO you need macro rings or is the close-up ability only done with the diopters ?

I second that!

[Hans Punk]

Cheers. It was a quick test with Magic Lantern x5 crop mode with diopters on a regular anamorphic setup...I could have gone way closer, if I used a different taking lens (and will do in my next test).

So to answer the question, it was a bit of both - closeup ability, with an effective sensor crop of the full frame by using ML crop mode. The subject of these stills was a 3inch diameter glass ball with shower gel/glitter and other liquids poured over it - and let to run down the surface to diffract and sparkle at different depths. It was an experiment to see how easy it is to create ambient light / fluid effects.

Password: macro

Ive got lots of old enlarger lenses I've put into Chinese helicoids that work really great for macro work...extreamly sharp and extreamly cheap, so I'll probably dig those out soon for a better test.

[Tito Ferradans]

7 hours ago, Hans Punk said:

Cheers. It was a quick test with Magic Lantern x5 crop mode with diopters on a regular anamorphic setup...I could have gone way closer, if I used a different taking lens (and will do in my next test).

So to answer the question, it was a bit of both - closeup ability, with an effective sensor crop of the full frame by using ML crop mode. The subject of these stills was a 3inch diameter glass ball with shower gel/glitter and other liquids poured over it - and let to run down the surface to diffract and sparkle at different depths. It was an experiment to see how easy it is to create ambient light / fluid effects.

Password: macro

Ive got lots of old enlarger lenses I've put into Chinese helicoids that work really great for macro work...extreamly sharp and extreamly cheap, so I'll probably dig those out soon for a better test.

I'll come back when I find words to describe my reaction to this. For now, I'll stick with "mindblown and mesmerized".

How strong was the diopter you were using? Just triple checking, it was diopters AND macro rings?

How are you doing this crazy light that moves so smoothly with such beautiful hues and shapes? Damn, I need an episode on this.

[Hans Punk]

1 hour ago, Tito Ferradans said:

How strong was the diopter you were using? Just triple checking, it was diopters AND macro rings?

Cheers Tito. It was all very simple really.

To be honest, a way more painless way of achieving the anamorphic macro look is to simply use an oval modded spherical prime lens...and just use macro rings and/ or an extension macro helicoid and maybe a high quality diopter. Results will be sharper, less highlight distortion/CA etc.

But for anamorphic purists, it is a case of putting your taking lens on a +1 macro extension tube - attach scope lens at closest focus - add lots of diopters, preferably high quality singlets with at least one doublet achromat (tokina +0.4) in there somewhere to help clean up edges and minimise CA as the glass gets stacked. Depth of field quickly becomes crazy shallow, so taking lens will probably need to be stopped down a lot - if not a preset aperture with lots of blades to maintain circular aperture when closed down...bokeh will not be a nice uncut oval. 

So for 99 percent of macro 'super close' shots I'd go with a oval aperture modded prime + macro rings...since you are probably never going to see a hint of streak flare in the background anyway, and it is so much easier to setup. The benefit of real anamorphic macro is debatable but can be a very cool look. I actually like when you see all the added CA and distorted edges of an image from cheap diopters, but that low-fi distorted look will not suit every shot, sometimes it needs to look as clean as possible - in which case, I'd recommend oval modded prime lens +macro rings.

[Hans Punk]

To give a rough idea of the macro anamorphic setup I've configured - here are some stills from a video I shot late last night (hence the bloodshot eye). The actual moving image is terrible, as I was filming my own eye and looking at a monitor so is very shaky. The focus plane is crazy thin, so these are really not as sharp as is possible to get when setup is more controlled. 

Image 1 is result from full 16x9 ML raw capture with 1.75x anamorphic and diopters (16x9 desqueezed to show centred focus plane in context )

Image 2 is 5:3 ML raw + crop mode desqueezed (crop mode is 1:1 crop of sensor)

Image 3 is same as Image 2...(it's my top lip btw - not my 'front brush')

Images all lit with iphone torch - hence the horrible shadow green skin tones. Images 2 & 3 will make some wonderful profile pictures for my online dating application methinks.

ML crop mode is killer for macro work, as it effectively windows the sensor to 1:1 where higher resolution raw recording options can be selected as well as turning any lens into 3-5x it's rated focal length.

5DMKIII ML raw - 100mm taking lens on +1 macro ring - Kowa Inflight 1.75x - Tokina +0.4 - Various power singlet close up lenses (+4+2+0.5)

Focus distance was approx 12 inches.

 

 

 

[Hubert Napierała]

This is astounding footage  Thank you all for your replies. I will post test results when I assemble the camera and lens

[Flynn]

On 1/26/2017 at 3:50 PM, Hans Punk said:

Cheers. It was a quick test with Magic Lantern x5 crop mode with diopters on a regular anamorphic setup...I could have gone way closer, if I used a different taking lens (and will do in my next test).

So to answer the question, it was a bit of both - closeup ability, with an effective sensor crop of the full frame by using ML crop mode. The subject of these stills was a 3inch diameter glass ball with shower gel/glitter and other liquids poured over it - and let to run down the surface to diffract and sparkle at different depths. It was an experiment to see how easy it is to create ambient light / fluid effects.

Password: macro

Ive got lots of old enlarger lenses I've put into Chinese helicoids that work really great for macro work...extreamly sharp and extreamly cheap, so I'll probably dig those out soon for a better test.

This is so badass. Very creative and cool looking Hans.

On 1/27/2017 at 4:06 AM, Hans Punk said:

To give a rough idea of the macro anamorphic setup I've configured - here are some stills from a video I shot late last night (hence the bloodshot eye). The actual moving image is terrible, as I was filming my own eye and looking at a monitor so is very shaky. The focus plane is crazy thin, so these are really not as sharp as is possible to get when setup is more controlled. 

Image 1 is result from full 16x9 ML raw capture with 1.75x anamorphic and diopters (16x9 desqueezed to show centred focus plane in context )

Image 2 is 5:3 ML raw + crop mode desqueezed (crop mode is 1:1 crop of sensor)

Image 3 is same as Image 2...(it's my top lip btw - not my 'front brush')

Images all lit with iphone torch - hence the horrible shadow green skin tones. Images 2 & 3 will make some wonderful profile pictures for my online dating application methinks.

ML crop mode is killer for macro work, as it effectively windows the sensor to 1:1 where higher resolution raw recording options can be selected as well as turning any lens into 3-5x it's rated focal length.

5DMKIII ML raw - 100mm taking lens on +1 macro ring - Kowa Inflight 1.75x - Tokina +0.4 - Various power singlet close up lenses (+4+2+0.5)

Focus distance was approx 12 inches.

 

Reminds me of the start of Blade Runner.