Affordable quality zoom lens for FS100

C

Carlos_E._Martinez

Well-known member
I'm considering buying an FS100, and I wonder what zoom to buy.

Is that zoom that B&H bundles the camera with any good? What brand is it? They specify as 18-200, but no manufacturer name.

My idea is to get a short zoom, like 18-100 or so, and to go for prime lenses later on.

What would you recommend that is not too expensive?
 
carlmart said:
I'm considering buying an FS100, and I wonder what zoom to buy.

Is that zoom that B&H bundles the camera with any good? What brand is it? They specify as 18-200, but no manufacturer name.

My idea is to get a short zoom, like 18-100 or so, and to go for prime lenses later on.

What would you recommend that is not too expensive?
Click to expand...

The kit lens is a sony lens. Its not a bad lens for a superzoom. It works better with the fs100/700 cameras than any other superzoom in that it will have smoother auto focus/iris. Issues with it include poor sealing from dust entering from surfaces during telescoping and servo-only focus which means you cant do repeatable focus and focus throw changes depending how fast you turn the focus ring. Also if you care about servo zooming you may want to wait a month or two for the servo zooming version of the lens which is about to be releases.

Personally I used the sigma 18-250 os in canon mount with metabones adapter and now I use the tamron 28-300 vc with speedbooster so it becomes a 20-200 f2.5-4.5 for a much needed extra stop but it seems to have backwards focus and zoom rings. I ptefer the look of sigma and lenses that have real manual focus rings. There are plenty of downsides to superzooms like speed and breathing toward the long end but you still get a ton of value for the price.
 
The stock lens is a funny one... and I don't mean "haha".
Great zooms cost money and since the 18-200 isn't that expensive I find it limiting for anything else than run & gun. I love to hate that you can't rack focus with it, since everytime you do it again, the amount you need to go from A to B changes ever so slightly depending on where you started and how fast you racked.
The AF is a bit dodgy. It might decide that the foliage behind the talent is more interesting especially if you let the talent get off center.

So for cases where I need to control focus, I go to one of my Canon still lenses and for things where I just can let the lens play within reason I will consider the 18-200.

The Speed Booster makes EF zooms interesting. Before it came about the 24-70 2.8 would have the equivalent FoV of a 35-105 2.8 but with a speedbooster it will be more like 24-70 2.0....... now that is useful!

Imagine the Rokinons / Samyangs now.... for an insanely low price you can now own a 24 / 35 / 85 1.0.

Who wouldn't want that :D
 
Last edited:
I hate that lens.. and love it.

Basically if your subject is in the centre moving towards you it will hold focus better than a top hollywood a/c
The range is big enough for no changes all day
The speed is enough for most situations
Its small light cheap (bundled with the body)
It has good stabilisation

But..

MF is horrid
Focus recompose is the only way to frame off centre and use AF

Its great in emergencies in other words

To me there are not really any other zooms to consider that are much better in the 18-long range

I have it, but mainly use cheap manual glass..

S
 
IMO for a 'one zoom' solution you want to start at 18mm

The nikkor is very similar (cheapish build)

Manual focus is I think mildly better but still medium horrid (I bought an 18-85 nikkor G - yuk)

You lose af, stabilistation and need a G adapter

Canon wise others can comment - $500 adapter

IMO the kit lens and some stills primes is a good value setup.

S
 
So the kit lens is worth as a starter?

What still primes would you advise?

Yes, 18mm is necessary for the zoom. Would the Sigma proposed above improve on the kit zoom?

What about using a Metabones with either?
 
From memory it is cheap bundled with the camera and worth it.

You should read the board on the canon alternatives - I really dont know them, some have IS some maybe not I dont know.

I dont think sigmas really improve on any lenses but the manual focus will probably be more positive (in the exchange for loss of AF?)

Other lenses,

Metabones speed booseter plus really any manual prime lenses nikon (wrong way focus) contax zeiss whatever

Im a nikon head and like..

18mm prime and 35-70 zoom (manual)

With the speed booster the manual 28-85 manual nikkor has hit my radar .. hard (IMO the best single lens for the camera)

but the nikon speedbooster is not on the market yet.

Actually with the speed booster.. you dont need 18mm - 24 or 28 is wide enough

Which brings 24-105 canon and 24-120 nikons on to the map too - also there is a 28-70 contax

Id buy the kit lens and then work out a strategy with the speed booster and quality vintage glass for more consiered work


S
 
It sounds like a good strategy.

I wasn't aware the Nikon speedbooster was not yet available, as on the release says it is.

The nikkor 24-85 sounds like a good bet too. It would be perfect for doc work, like the one I am starting now. Can it be adapted on the FS100?
 
Metabones' website doesn't seem to say whether the Nikon speedbooster will also stabilize lenses with VR. Hope so. 24-120 f4 VR would be great.
 
nyvz said:
Personally I used the sigma 18-250 os in canon mount with metabones adapter and now I use the tamron 28-300 vc with speedbooster so it becomes a 20-200 f2.5-4.5 for a much needed extra stop but it seems to have backwards focus and zoom rings. I ptefer the look of sigma and lenses that have real manual focus rings. There are plenty of downsides to superzooms like speed and breathing toward the long end but you still get a ton of value for the price.
Click to expand...

Hey Noah,
Can you tell me if the Metabones adaptor make any improvements on the way variable aperture zooms work for video? Do you still get those sudden aperture clicks as you zoom through the range or is it quite smooth with the lenses you mention? Am considering the new Sony power zoom for my FS700 but want to hear what solutions others have come up with themselves.
Cheers!
Ian
 
brotherian said:
Hey Noah,
Can you tell me if the Metabones adaptor make any improvements on the way variable aperture zooms work for video? Do you still get those sudden aperture clicks as you zoom through the range or is it quite smooth with the lenses you mention? Am considering the new Sony power zoom for my FS700 but want to hear what solutions others have come up with themselves.
Cheers!
Ian
Click to expand...

Ok so I just did a quick test. I have the metabones V1 EF-NEX adapter and the new EF-NEX Speedbooster. The V1 has an issue where when zooming out on both my lenses that have varying apertures through their range, there are many clicks of the aperture and sudden small changes in exposure from the changing aperture. When zooming in it is smooth and the aperture ramps down expected but the aperture clicks are not there. On the Metabones speedbooster, the aperture changes while zooming in and out are both smooth with no clicks as I zoom in and out. It's possible this is fixed also in the V2 non-speedbooster, but I don't have one to test.

The variable aperture lenses I tested were my sigma 18-250 and tamron 28-300, both behaved the same on each adapter so it is probably reasonable to assume it is the V1 adapter that causes the clicking aperture issue. Another reason I'm happy to have the speedbooster.
 
carlmart said:
So the kit lens is worth as a starter?

What still primes would you advise?

Yes, 18mm is necessary for the zoom. Would the Sigma proposed above improve on the kit zoom?

What about using a Metabones with either?
Click to expand...

What types of shoots are you planning to use the camera on? Mostly run and gun? Commercial? Primes are nice but I find them fairly impractical unless you are most frequently working on shoots that have lots of extra time in the day or you absolutely need the fastest f-stop, or maybe if you are shooting narrative films or commercials. And in that case you could probably just rent primes when you need them. There arent many affordable primes wider than 24mm that are faster than f2.8 anyway though so you'll often end up exposing for f2.8 anyway even if half your prime set is f1.2, so a lot that reduces some of the advantage of primes. Anything else and I'd want zooms, and they are a good value since you'd have to own at least 3 lenses to begin to compete with the range of a standard ~3x zoom. Zooms are especially crtitical if you are using a dolly or dont have 1st and 2nd ACs.

If you are doing run and gun mostly I wouldn't even think about primes... but then again if you are mostly shooting for yourself you may have the flexibility to use whatever lens you want or if you are starting out primes can be a great learning experience in really getting to know common focal lengths. Again, it depends a lot on what you want to do with your lenses.
 
nyvz said:
When zooming in it is smooth and the aperture ramps down expected but the aperture clicks are not there. On the Metabones speedbooster, the aperture changes while zooming in and out are both smooth with no clicks as I zoom in and out. It's possible this is fixed also in the V2 non-speedbooster, but I don't have one to test.
Click to expand...

Thanks Noah, this is an interesting discovery as I'm coming from a 550D/T2i and that used to handle variable aperture zooms with clicks and such so I've got quite a lot of constant aperture glass now. However, I would still love a long range lens for doing run-and-gun shoots as that is mostly my bread, my butter, and also my jam.

I can live with a variable aperture zoom as long as the transitions between f-stops are smooth. One more question, are either or both of those two lenses parfocal? If you can do the old trick of zooming in, focussing and when you pull out to a wide the image is still sharp then I think you've solved my search for a good all-rounder!
 
brotherian said:
Thanks Noah, this is an interesting discovery as I'm coming from a 550D/T2i and that used to handle variable aperture zooms with clicks and such so I've got quite a lot of constant aperture glass now. However, I would still love a long range lens for doing run-and-gun shoots as that is mostly my bread, my butter, and also my jam.

I can live with a variable aperture zoom as long as the transitions between f-stops are smooth. One more question, are either or both of those two lenses parfocal? If you can do the old trick of zooming in, focussing and when you pull out to a wide the image is still sharp then I think you've solved my search for a good all-rounder!
Click to expand...

The question I was answering was about aperture changes during zooming, not manual aperture changes. They definitely do not have smooth manual aperture adjustments on either lens (or any of the other ones in my kit) on either adapter. I suspect if you are looking for smooth aperture adjustments on an electronic iris, the closest you will get are e-mount lenses but anything adapted in a canon mount will have clicks.

Also I have not really found any still zoom lenses that are really parfocal, and I have on occasion tested zoom lenses that were rumored or reported to be parfocal but in my testing they were not. My rule of thumb is that if its not a video lens there is nearly no chance you should assume or expect it to actually be parfocal. Several of my lenses are somewhat-parfocal in the sense that when wide open I could zoom all the way in, focus, and then zoom all the way at and for normal subject distances it will tend to be acceptably in focus. But in general I never trust any still lens to be parfocal through its range and I always use expanded focus to check focus when changing focal lengths on all my lenses. Some are acceptably in focus when comparing the extremes of the focal range but drift quite a bit in the middle.
 
nyvz said:
The question I was answering was about aperture changes during zooming, not manual aperture changes. They definitely do not have smooth manual aperture adjustments on either lens (or any of the other ones in my kit) on either adapter. I suspect if you are looking for smooth aperture adjustments on an electronic iris, the closest you will get are e-mount lenses but anything adapted in a canon mount will have clicks.
Click to expand...

Yup I got that, apologies if I wasn't clear. I didn't mean 'are the lenses de-clicked', I did mean 'do they click/change aperture during zooming' so you've answered my Q thanks!

I came across this thread earlier today which is worth sharing again here:
http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?268682-Sony-NEX-FS100-parfocal-lens-shootout

It's a little out of date now being two years old, but it's interesting seeing the 18-200 Sony lens does pretty well (despite its variable aperture). With the Metabones Speedbooster, I do think the Canon 24-105 looks like a pretty decent proposition for R'n'G type stuff too. Some report it being parfocal, and others say it isn't. I suspect what you believe is true - it isn't parfocal by design - however due to variances some examples retain an element of consistent focus compared to others.

I can't wait for that adapter to hit UK shores.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top