New XEEN cinema lenses from Rokinon/Samyang

[sudopera]

Announcement is scheduled for August 10th. The price should be around 2500$.
http://cinescopophilia.com/xeen-cinema-lenses-from-samyang/

Frank Glencairn has them for testing and says that it is a brand new optical design not just rehoused old optics.
http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?134751-New-line-of-pro-cine-lenses-by-Samyang

http://www.personal-view.com/talks/uploads/FileUpload/65/e486e45341e036bcbc5a202df2a759.jpg
http://www.personal-view.com/talks/uploads/FileUpload/2a/edc6aaabaeb3ba0e4b6c4231fd6618.jpg

[Cinegain]

Yeah, I saw it mentioned on mirrorlessrumors. With SLR Magic and their CINE APO and the Veydra Mini Primes, this could be another interesting addition worth keeping an eye on.

I think the only one who could pull of rehousing is Sigma (and that's already being done by others, which is also happening for some Tokina and Nikon lenses for example). I do feel like Rokinon would really have to up it when asking 2499 for a lens. Frank appears rather impressed, so that sounds promising. I appreciate these kind of developments, it makes the market an interesting playground.

Actually does sound quite similar to what Tokina is doing with zooms: http://www.tokinacinema.com/lenses.html .

[..] not just a simple rehousing of the critically-acclaimed still lens version, rather the lens designers re-engineered it to provide cinematographers the control and performance they have come to expect in lenses that cost 10 times as much. Engineered to offer superb optical 4K performance [..] delivers sharp, consistent images throughout its zoom range by reducing breathing and maintaining focus throughout the zoom range (Parfocal) [..]

Though, mind you: 'using the successful optical formula'. So, claiming it's not just rehoused (like so) doesn't neccesarily mean they aren't using old optical formulas.

[AaronChicago]

Interesting.

[Guest Ebrahim Saadawi]

I see these are real FF cinema lenses with a long flange distance, 52mm PL and EF to M43s, which makes them an entirely different market vs the Veydra primes and all the little Cine SLR Magics. This is a rival to the SLR Magic 50mm T2.1 PL, and a rival to PL glass, real Arri/Panavision/CN-E/Zeiss CP.2. Keep that in mind when looking at the price. 

They're also not slightly tweaked bodies like their current Cine lenses or Tokina with focus gears and a clickless iris. These look like Proper PL glass, huge, robust and fits into high end productions. 

Their closest rivals are the CP.2s, 4000$ a piece. Canon CN-2, 5000$ a piece (and no PL) and the sole SLR magic 50mm, at 2500$-ish price. 

IF Samyang delivers the optical performance of CP.2s/CN-Es, meaning a 100% calibrated focus ring, all metal construction, good ergonomics, sharp edge to edge on s35, colour matched, size matches, focus rings/iris rings matched, no breathing, great Bokeh, good sharpness wide open, these could be the first real cinema glass for the budget-conscience like us. That 2500$ bracket has been empty for a long time. 

The Optical performance of their current 85mm is very high, they just need to remove breathing, lose fringing, sharper wide open, and excellent built. All I think doable with the almost 2000$ premium over the nomal photographic lens. But then again, I not that knowledgable on lens production, but calibrating and building cinema glass of this league takes a ridiculous amount of effort, staff, work, and technology. 

I am intrigued. 

 

 

[AaronChicago]

I was hoping they'd come out with 2 Cine Zoom lenses like 15-50 T2.0 and 50-105 T2.0

[BrooklynDan]

I'm totally on board with this. While the previous Rokinon cine primes were great owner-operator lenses, these can make a great inexpensive rental option for when you need true cinema glass. If the optical and mechanic quality is there, they'll fly off the shelves.

Here's hoping that they release a set of anamorphic glass next. Just like there's been a huge price gap between DSLR glass and cinema glass, there's an even bigger gap between the under-$1000 lens adapters and the over-$20000 prime lenses that nobody besides SLR magic has really addressed.

[pablogrollan]

 

IF Samyang delivers the optical performance of CP.2s/CN-Es, meaning a 100% calibrated focus ring, all metal construction, good ergonomics, sharp edge to edge on s35, colour matched, size matches, focus rings/iris rings matched, no breathing, great Bokeh, good sharpness wide open, these could be the first real cinema glass for the budget-conscience like us. That 2500$ bracket has been empty for a long time. 

The Optical performance of their current 85mm is very high, they just need to remove breathing, lose fringing, sharper wide open, and excellent built. All I think doable with the almost 2000$ premium over the nomal photographic lens. But then again, I not that knowledgable on lens production, but calibrating and building cinema glass of this league takes a ridiculous amount of effort, staff, work, and technology. 

I am intrigued. 

 

 

In terms of sharpness, contrast and fringing, there is no problem with the current Samyang lineup. In fact, I've seen tests showing there's little difference with the Canon and Zeiss (which are not as fast). Keep the Samyang at 2.9 and you'll see they are quite sharp and hard to tell apart from the more expensive lenses. The problem with them is the plasticky housing (good plastic, well finished but plastic after all) with a more or less inaccurate scale and the breathing, which makes sense since they are re-housed stills lenses and stills shooters don't rack focus. I agree the 85mm is outstanding, and so is the 35mm. The 24mm not so much but it is not uncommon to see the 24mm underperform vs a 50mm or an 85mm.

What's really missing from Samyang is an affordable cine zoom, even if it is with the current plastic housings. S35 sensor cameras don't have that many zooms with full manual controls and proper focus and iris rings. A 16-105mm with a fast constant aperture would be in really high demand. If the alternative is a Fujinon Cabrio, they could make a lens of the sort (hard to do, I know) at 5,000$ and sell it like cupcakes...

[Ak Ns]

Samyang cine 24mm f/1.4 is an awful lens.  It won't focus below f/2.8. Tried 2 lenses results are same. they better have a good thought about releasing dedicated cine lenses. 

[sam]

Their closest rivals are the CP.2s, 4000$ a piece. Canon CN-2, 5000$ a piece (and no PL) and the sole SLR magic 50mm, at 2500$-ish price. 

 

 

 

Don't forget the Schneider Xenon FF line. Covers full frame. I Tested (somewhat casually) on a 1Dc with 4k log and Fs7007q 4k raw with adapter and I'm very impressed with both the mechanics and optical performance.  To my eye, these lenses render skin tones somewhere between Cooke and Leica. Canon L glass has much warmer/pinkish/reddish tones in comparison. Edge to edge sharpness  was on par or slightly sharper than L glass. (at least with my copies) Also compared side by side with 85mm Rokinon at various Tstops and although I own the Cine Rokinons, which are great for the price (very slight greenish cast, more distortion,and overall just not quite as pleasing ) , I think the step up would be worth the price.

I did notice some aberrations in a severe contrast scene wide open with the Xenon's but stopped down they were better.   Bokeh is super smooth and buttery.  Nice looking flares.  Solid lenses for the $$$.   Can't wait to try the Xeen set of lenses...

[sudopera]

Hands on review

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/explora/video/hands-review/hands-review-rokinon-xeen-true-cinema-lenses-full-frame-production/bi/19115/kbid/10779

[jonpais]

more info at https://matthewduclos.wordpress.com/2015/08/07/rokinon-takes-aim-with-new-xeen-cinema-prime-lenses/

[Guest Ebrahim Saadawi]

So any information about if the optical designs and glass elements are the exact same as the Samyang stills and and Cine and Cine DS lenses? 

[Nick Hughes]

So any information about if the optical designs and glass elements are the exact same as the Samyang stills and and Cine and Cine DS lenses? 

The reduser thread linked in the first post says they are a new optical design, not just rehoused.

[jonpais]

and the Matthew Duclos article claims they are rehoused but with new coatings

[Guest Ebrahim Saadawi]

I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. They are based on the optical design of the previous stills lenses (which are great) yet are modified (by whatever various means, optical, coatings, glass type selections, tolerances, mechanical also)

Which at the end of the day doesn't matter what they're based on, what matters is how they perform vs other cine lenses. 

 

[sudopera]

Most people are worried about 24mm performance if the optical design is the same as previous lenses(they were very soft and muddy apparently), but Illya Friedman says that when stopped down to T1.8 the image quality is about the same as 85mm at T1.5... also apparently the breathing is minimal on these new lenses.

Quote from Illya Friedman on Reduser:
To answer your question- the 24mm lens does flare in a not insignificant way at T1.5. 

And so does the Vantage T1.0 wide open, that a $40,000 lens. 

I would say a wide open Xeen 24mm flares in a not dissimilar way to a Vantage T1 wide open. Does that make either lens unusable? Hell no. You just need to know what you get when you are shooting in that area. I think most professionals understand what happens with a lot of lenses wide open. 

Some manufacturers limit all their lenses to prevent this from happening to give a unified T-stop, even on lens sets where one or more lenses is capable of great exposure. There's a certain amount of hacking that can be done to get more out of some lenses, if you've got the time, money and inclination. Some manufacturers give their customer the ability to go to an extremely wide open aperture, even though a lens might not perform the same as the other in a set. I would include the pre-production Xeen 24mm I had in this same place. 

At T1.8 the Xeen 24mm tightens up- a lot, and is a match for the 85mm at T1.5. I think that any shooter worth their salt knows how to deal with difference in exposure of a 3rd of a stop. 

At T2.0 the 24mm Xeen looks pretty darn good, and I split hairs. The Xeen lenses look a lot better than one might think considering the price. I projected the Xeen 24mm and 85mm on a Gecko projector and the lenses are totally respectable from an image quality stand point, including the 24mm from T1.8 on. Unless your whole movie is based around a 24mm shot wider that T1.8, the flares from the 24mm are a non-issue.

[richg101]

the samyangs in a different housing with PL mount. The ones with a T1.5 rating, but with optical quality unusable at that setting. direct competitiors to the CP.2's but with poorer optical quality and less refined mechanics and most important they lack the zeiss brand name.  It's an awful lot of money for lenses that offer little to no advantage over the standard samyangs and will likely not last in the rental /daily use sector.  The reason CP2.s are expensive is because they're designed for day in day out use.  They're no different to the ZE/ZF zeisses yet cost 4times the price because they leave the factory ready for a lifetime of daily bread work.    The name 'Zeiss' on the cp2's is important since creative directors and dop's dealing with budgets which limit lens choice to cp2's, xenons, canon primes etc (instead of cooke s4's and speciality lenses) know and trust the name.  

[Guest Ebrahim Saadawi]

I don't think we know that yet, that they have ''poorer optical quality and less refined mechanics compared to CP.2s'' and that they ''offer little to no advantage over the standard Samyangs''. 

I highly suspect this is the case. 

Even if they have sufficiently less optical and mechanical quality vs CP.2s, of course it's normal an expected, they are 1500$ less for a piece. Completely different price league vs the CP.2s and CN-Es. 

I am hopeful they would even have similar performance and quality to the CP2s and CN-Es as SLR Magic 50mm T2.1 PL has that and is 2000-2500$, so it seems doable. That lonely SLR Magic is the Xeens only rival, I would love if SM made a 24 and an 85 with the same standards. 

 

[DBounce]

I see these are real FF cinema lenses with a long flange distance, 52mm PL and EF to M43s, which makes them an entirely different market vs the Veydra primes and all the little Cine SLR Magics. This is a rival to the SLR Magic 50mm T2.1 PL, and a rival to PL glass, real Arri/Panavision/CN-E/Zeiss CP.2. Keep that in mind when looking at the price. 

They're also not slightly tweaked bodies like their current Cine lenses or Tokina with focus gears and a clickless iris. These look like Proper PL glass, huge, robust and fits into high end productions. 

Their closest rivals are the CP.2s, 4000$ a piece. Canon CN-2, 5000$ a piece (and no PL) and the sole SLR magic 50mm, at 2500$-ish price. 

IF Samyang delivers the optical performance of CP.2s/CN-Es, meaning a 100% calibrated focus ring, all metal construction, good ergonomics, sharp edge to edge on s35, colour matched, size matches, focus rings/iris rings matched, no breathing, great Bokeh, good sharpness wide open, these could be the first real cinema glass for the budget-conscience like us. That 2500$ bracket has been empty for a long time. 

The Optical performance of their current 85mm is very high, they just need to remove breathing, lose fringing, sharper wide open, and excellent built. All I think doable with the almost 2000$ premium over the nomal photographic lens. But then again, I not that knowledgable on lens production, but calibrating and building cinema glass of this league takes a ridiculous amount of effort, staff, work, and technology. 

I am intrigued. 

 

 

I thought their closest rival was the Rokinon Cine Lenses.

[Guest Ebrahim Saadawi]

Rokinon is Samyang is Vivitar is Falcon is Optika is Bower, just different names for samyang for different countries. Do you mean the Samyang (Rokinon) older rehoused Cine DS lens set? 

I thought their closest rival was the Rokinon Cine Lenses.