FS7: favourite lenses?

R

ryaninoz

Well-known member
I'm looking to add a fast prime to my kit for interviews. I have an 18-110 as a general doco lens and its a nice lens but I need something faster for interviews. What primes do people here like for that? I can't afford cine but are these good stills lenses with iris control on the lens that are affordable ?
 
It doesn't have iris control but a Canon 70-200 with speed booster is a helluva good interview lens. Its sharp , with the speed booster its F2 and good wide open , and with an equivalent focal length of 50 - 150 it covers anything most people would need for an interview. You could also try an older Nikon 80-200 where you can set the iris ring manually with the adapter. I think maybe all Nikon's can be adjusted manually with an adapter to E mt but I'm not sure. The Zeiss and even the Rokinon 85 f1.4s are pretty good.
Other than that there are a number of good primes but it depends what you mean by affordable. The 50mm DSLR lenses by Sigma and Zeiss Milvus are both very good but neither have true manual iris control . An old Nikon f1.4 AI or AIS will but they're not great wide open though the Nikon AIS 50mm f1.8 might be a good deal and is supposedly very good.
That's a start. Inexpensive Cine lenses will still be fairly expensive if you need a true iris. I gave up on that one sadly.
 
Check out the new SLR magic microprimes for e-mount. Cost around 700€ each and are all balaced as a set, true manual iris and focus with marks- and very fast lenses. I think they could be winners, but have to try them out myself. Think they were just released.
 
Thanks for that, the SLR Magic's look very interesting, price is great. I'll hunt around to see if there is any hi res demos online of them shot with an f7.
 
You will get a canon FD 50 1.8 with an adapter for $100 a 135 2.5 for another $40

This could become your most used glass.

I dont see why people buy $700 lenses until they 'have to'

S
 
Morgan, a $700 prime cine lens is a bargain for what it is but it all depends on your budget.
Those SLR magic lenses are priced incredibly , but are they any good especially wide open? Any reviews out there?
 
I opted for pricey native Sony stills lenses - 16-35, 28, 55, 85 and 70-200 - to complement my 18-110. But only because I also need/want fast AF stills lenses for use on an A7Rii stills cam.

Otherwise, Sam's suggestion of older Canon FD lenses is a goodun - I can also highly recommend 1970s/80s Konica Hexanon lenses and have a set of those.

Ben.
 
'Shame on me' but I still use the Sony 18-105 lens. (In combination with distortion control in Davinci Resolve). And when I need a fast lens I use the old Zuiko 1.2 55mm
 
I've become impressed with image from the Sigma Art series lenses. Primes are awesome! Though for interviews I've found that I often need to vary the size a bit, so I've been using the Sigma 50-100 f/1.8. Very happy with it for interviews and green screen stuff -- don't use it much for run-around shooting because of the limited zoom range and the focus breathing.
 
LennyLevy said:
Morgan, a $700 prime cine lens is a bargain for what it is but it all depends on your budget.
Those SLR magic lenses are priced incredibly , but are they any good especially wide open? Any reviews out there?
Click to expand...

Indeed - but a $100 fifty is even more of a bargain

That’s $600 saved for something more costly like a fast wide prime or suchlike.

Also canon FD and nikkor are small which is super handy for packing.

Of course bigger lenses with consistent rings are good for shooting with an a/c
 
I have a Nikon "set" of lenses. It consists of 3 zooms that I use as Primes with any FOV of my choosing. They are the AF-S ED series f2.8 throughout the zoom range and speedboosted with the XL comes in around f1.6 to 1.7. I own the 18-35, 28-70 and 80-200. The build quality and optics are outstanding IMO. I also own a full set of FD Primes with the old style Chrome Lock rings and in my opinion the FD's do not touch the Nikons. I also own a set of SLR Magic Primes, the Sigma 18-35 and other various lenses....the Nikons are by far my favorite and the 28-70 would be a good starting point IMO
 
If you need autofocus I recommend the Zeiss Batis line as they are native E-mount and the Zeiss lenses for Sony have always had nicer colors and micro-contrast compared to sony's Brand of lenses in my opinion. The 85 Batis can be had for $700 used and It has excellent autofocus and is absurdly sharp. Works well on my FS7 / FS5.

Also I recommend any of the veydra mini primes (I own the 25 and 50 but have yet to try the 85). Not sure why more people don't like the lenses as they really are a true mini cinema lenses and my god are they sharp and punchy and a joy to focus manually with gears or FF. Very similar to some CP.2's I have used at a fraction of the size, weight, and cost.

Also yes the SLR magic are also nice and are VERY FAST. Haven't tried the new cinema primes yet but they look great. Even their older cineprimes (I own the 35/1.2) offered fast 14 blade apertures. The color rendering of those lenses is a bit intense though in my opinion just fyi as I like my base images in SLOG to come in more flat than what I was getting with the SLR magics and I always felt they were a bit over-saturated.

I now own the canon CN-E lenses (not in your price range) but can definitely say that Canon glass sure does look good on the FS7 / FS5. Maybe look at getting yourself the 50/1.4 and 85/1.4 OR 1.2 but autofocus with speedboosters sucks just keep that in mind.

Sigma art are nice but I would probably get canon before sigma.

Just my two cents
 
I,d go for the two Sigma cine zooms.. re housed Art series lenses basically... T2 .. like a set of primes in two lenses .. in a custom made box.. easy..and very cheap for the price.. using stills lenses has its draw backs focus travel wise.. and some shoots it hard to demand a decent day rate and then turn up with dinky $40 stills lenses.. how ever BS it is .. for a freelancer I think you do need your gear to look "expensive".. Mattbox etc.. Sigma cine lenses fo this in spades..even though they are very cheap !..if your going for a sort of standard freelance $2,400 a day two man crew target.. dir/producers know alot more about gear these days..
 
Thanks for all the replies, I like the price point of the SLR Magic micro primes but need to see some more footage from them. I'm in Australia and I don't think there's a dealer here so would have to buy from B&H. I'm not keen on stills lenses from an operating point of view it always seems like a compromise. Some of the older Nikon lenses look fantastic though.
 
My basic lens kit is a EF-mount set of: Sigma Art 24-105 f4, Sigma Art 24 f1.4, Sigma Art 50 f1.4.
With this I have the Metabones Speedbooster Ultra Cine and the Metabones E to EF Cine.
The two adapters gives me a lot of choices in a very compact package.
Its like having 6 lenses in 3 physical ones, giving me a prime set of 17mm, 24mm, 50mm and 75mm and a stabilized zoom for quicker work: 17-75mm f2.8

Stills lenses with a FF makes focusing a non issue for me. And I can live with electronic aperture for now. Use a Wooden camera zipbox to get a 4x4 Black pro-mist on the extending zoom.
 
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