There are plenty of reviews of entry level or so called ‘cheap’ cinema lenses all
over YouTube, which is great for people looking to invest in cinema glass.
However when it comes to looking for a summary of actual cinema lenses which are widely rented
throughout the film industry, on feature films and commercials, there’s a bit of a shortage
of accessible information.
It’s important to understand that these lens sets I’m going to mention are designed
to be rented out by companies and not bought by individuals.
Gear rental houses produce or acquire cinema glass with the knowledge that they’ll last
many decades, which is why these lenses are often prohibitively expensive.
In this video I’ll introduce you to a few of the most popular cinema prime lenses which
are currently used on professional sets.
These are all lenses I’ve worked with before, either as a DP or Camera Assistant but I’m
not a lens technician by any means so if anyone in the comments has more information to add
that would be fantastic.
I’ll break down each lens set on two criteria, their ergonomics, how easy they are to practically
work with, and their look.
The two most important considerations (if you ignore rental price) when it comes to
choosing which lens is right for the job.
Super Speed was the unofficial name given to the T1.3 spherical prime lenses made by
German manufacturer Zeiss in the 70s, 80s and 90s.
A standard set includes an 18mm, 25mm, 35mm, 50mm and 85mm.
There are different versions of Super Speeds depending on when they were manufactured.
Today the MKII and MKIII versions are most popular and available.
Ergonomics-wise they are small, fast, light weight, well designed lenses, popular for
handheld, gimbal and drone work, yet they are not without certain flaws.
They all have a front diameter of 80mm which makes it easy to use a single back for a clip
on mattebox.
One drawback is that the barrel of the lens extends when focusing.
Clipping on a mattebox too tightly can prevent the barrel from turning properly, making it
stiff, something modern wireless focus motors sometimes struggle with.
As with many older lenses, there are fewer focus distance markings than on modern ones.
This means that in between distances, such as between 2 and 3 foot for example may have
no markings, making it difficult for the focus puller to know where 2’3” or 2’9”
is.
They’re favoured for their sharp, lower contrast and slightly milky characteristics
when shot wide open, which is now used by many DPs to compliment sharp, modern digital
sensors.
The lenses have a neutral to cool colour rendition with soft, circular flares that fog up the
lens with light.
Films with pastel, lower contrast visuals, such as Her and Lost In Translation used Super
Speeds as the base for creating their look.
Overall these little lenses are quick to work with, great for lightweight work, with sharp
yet subtle vintage characteristics and are partially responsible for setting the standard
of modern cinema lens construction.
Probably the most iconic anamorphic lens set out there is the C-series set from Panavision,
released in 1968.
Considering anamorphic lenses require housing many glass elements, C-series lenses are incredibly
compact and lightweight, which makes them great for anamorphic work which requires a
small camera build such as for steadicam or handheld work.
As they were designed in a time before the mainstream use of clip on matteboxes, the
front diameter of these lenses wasn’t standardised across the range.
This means that using a clip on mattebox requires custom rings manufactured in house by Panavision
to fit each lens and means changing out mattebox backs to different sizes for different focal
lengths which slows down lens changes.
In my experience, due to the irregular size of the front diameters, some rings don’t
always fit snugly.
Meaning that you have to handle the camera gently to ensure the mattebox doesn’t slip
off the front of the lens and the filters come crashing down.
The close focus on these lenses isn’t amazing, meaning diopters are required to achieve focus
on tight shots.
The aperture on each lens is not standardised and varies slightly, from T2.3 to T3.5.
Focus breathing is noticeable, which is when the focal lengths or size of the shot shifts
when the focus distance is adjusted.
Despite these mechanical difficulties in working with the lenses, their look is legendary.
The C-series range established in the 70s and 80s what is now seen as the classic, Hollywood
anamorphic look on films such as Star Wars for example.
They are not overly sharp, warm, have a graduated depth of field, beautiful oval bokeh, and
famous, pronounced blue streak horizontal flares.
Although not the quickest or easiest for camera teams to work with, shooting on the C’s
gives films that iconic, vintage Panavision look which is impossible to otherwise replicate
with modern lenses.
Moving on to modern lenses, the spherical S4s were created by Cooke in the late 90s.
Unlike the C’s they are incredibly well designed and easy to work with.
They have the same T stop of T2-T22 across the range, good close focusing abilities,
the same 110mm front diameter, many distance markings for focus, are colour matched across
the set and are durable with a smooth focus motion.
The newer S4/i’s implemented in 2005, have the ability to store and display all kinds
of metadata such as the focus distance and aperture reading, which can be useful in facilitating
VFX post production work.
There is also a large range of prime lens focal lengths to choose from in the set.
The S4s have been used extensively on films in the 2000s and are popular for their warm
look, with increased contrast, minimal aberrations, and healthy reproduction of skin tones.
This glass is therefore popular amongst cinematographers for its easy workability, consistency and
sharp, warm look without any vintage lens aberrations.
Finally, in the world of modern anamorphic lenses, there are the Hawk V-Lite’s from
Germany’s Vantage.
These high performance anamorphic lenses were introduced in 2001 with the goal being to
produce lightweight, consistent lenses with increased definition and contrast across the
image of the 8 focal lengths.
They are precisely designed to have no shift in T stop while focusing and an accurately
calibrated focus scale with nicely spaced out distance markings, making it easier for
assistants to pull focus.
Their range is fairly standardised, featuring the same T2.2 to T16 stop range from the 28mm
to 80mm primes, which is then stepped up to T3.5 for longer focal lengths.
From 40mm to 140mm the front diameter of the lenses remains the same, although it gets
larger for the wider focal lengths which have more glass.
Despite efforts to minimise distortion, straight lines still bend significantly when using
wider focal lengths.
They are fairly sharp anamorphic lenses, with increased contrast and milky, rainbow flares.
This makes the V-Lites a good choice for DPs looking for light, easy to work with glass
that is sharp and modern, yet which still has the clear trademarks of anamorphic lenses.
These are just a few of the most popular lenses in circulation in the film industry today.
If you find this more technical information useful and would like to see a part two, which
introduces a few more lenses, please let me know in the comments and I’d be happy to
make another video in the future.
As always liking, subscribing or supporting the channel on Patreon is a big help.
Till next time, thanks for watching and goodbye.