300mm RED Lens (an apology to Jim)

Jarred Land

Jarred Land

President/Founder
Staff member
I gotta admit.. for the last couple months I thought Jim was nuts when he announced the 300mm lens... its a piece of glass i thought i would only use a very limited amount of time.. and a lens i thought he would never sell.

Well my opinion changed last week, when I was fortunate enough to be onset for a couple of the 300mm RED lens tests... The lens is pretty incredible.

Picking people off at 150 feet of course was cool, but we did CU's at 10 feet of people and the results where amazing.. nice close focus range and the breathing was great. Its hard to see lens characteristics at this point.. but it looked damn good.

Im not gonna say its gonna beet a Cooke, but I will say it could take on an Agenieux in a heartbeat. Jims comments about focus from yesterday sure apply though, as the Depth of field is insanely thin.

So i have a little egg in my face on this one.. and owe Jim an apology for all those nasty emails about the 300mm.. But in this instance its one of those "glad to be wrong" kinda things.
 
I've always posted positive things about the 300mm lens since it was announced. I think someone's reaction to the 300mm lens will depend on what type of productions they shoot. I was stoked from the beginning about the 300mm lens, because it will be used daily by me in many of the genres I shoot: sports, nature, stock footage, etc. Your good report on the lens increases my stoke for it.

The 300mm, the RED wide zoom, a good wide angle prime, and a 2/3" HD ENG zoom will be my basic RED lens kit. My Nikkor lenses will round it out. All other lenses I'll rent on a per-project basis.

Gibby
RED #8
www.cut4.tv
www.4umat.com
 
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Hey Jim,

How about inviting some of us who haven't been critical of the lens to a private on set test? ;-)
 
Yeah Gibby I know the lens was perfect for you.. I just dont shoot alot of nature stuff so i thought the usability for me would be limited... but i witnessed some pretty cool uses for dramatic scripted content...
 
Dang. This camera is something. I hop into this section every once in awhile, and I'm always amazed at the new stuff coming up... this is really a breakthrough.
 
Sorry if this is a dumb question but with such a "thin" focal range how on earth could you ever shoot something like a football game, a car race, or a cheetah chasing after a gazelle? Is it possible to open the aperture, increase the speed and make for a deeper depth of field? Of course RED is far from release but there are other digital cinema cameras available and is this possible with those?

I noticed on some of the Silicon Imaging footage they zoom in to get close ups and the DOF is so shallow that the subject will move a few inches and go slightly out of focus.
 
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The only dumb question is one that isn't asked. RED hasn't published the finalized soecs for the 300mm f2.8 lens, but the short answer to your question is that most sports and nature are shot in natural light, and quite often in bright light. The brighter the light, the more you can stop down the lens, unless you're using ND filters and intentionally seeking to keep the aperture more open (smaller f-stop numbers). The more you stop down the lens (bigger f-stop numbers) the deeper the depth of field. Most outdoor daylight sports and nature work is shot in the f8 to f11 range, thus DOF is commensurately deep. If its a nature shot at sunset or early morning the light level is obviously lower, thus you'll need to open up the aperture, thus creating shallower DOF.

Hope this helps...

Gibby
RED #8
www.cut4.tv
www.4umat.com
 
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