Follow Focus, gear rings

J

joshdstanton

Member
I've noticed that most people here using a follow focus on their rigs are putting gear rings on their lenses (eg, the Genus Gear Ring). But in the case of Lumix and other stills lenses, why not use the built in gear ring? I have a chrosziel FF with .6 pitch gear drive which is really close, but not quite right. Does anyone know what the gear pitch is on lumix lenses (14-140, etc.)? Not seeing this info on 16x9's website, so maybe they don't exist.
Thanks for your help!
 
I don't know what the pitch is, but the ribs on the Lumix lenses are "soft grip" and a gear is going to eat them up
over time. A gear ring would be advised.

jeff
 
I also wouldn't even bother with putting a follow focus on the Lumix lenses anyhow as they are "focus by wire"
 
Good point. Movement of the focus ring on the 14-140 does not produce repeatable results. Follow focus is not useful.

If you want repeatable results, use a 3rd party remote focus unit that plugs into the back of the camera. Even with this, while the results are repeatable (with limitations), this is only true at a given focal length. If the focal length is changed, the focus changes.
 
Beat me to it. the Lumix lenses are NOT made for follow focus (not that I didn't try just for the heck of it). As far as the pitch, I think .8 is what most follow focus wheels and attachable plastic lens gears are, at least the one like shoot35, redrock, etc...
 
Any fully manual lens works well with a follow focus. IE - Pretty much any Nikon prime, all the Zeiss lenses, all cinema lenses. Basically any lens that has hard stops in their follow focus.

Lenses that will not work as well are lenses where the focus barrel will just keep rotating without hard stops. Some of these can benefit from a follow focus because you can repeat your focus if you stay within certain parameters. The Canon L series zooms are a perfect example, if you rotate your follow focus too far it will just keep spinning, making your previously attained marks worthless, but if you don't reach those limits you can set marks.

As far as gear pitch goes, .8 is the cinema standard, all cinema lenses use this pitch. .6 and .5 pitch are used by ENG lens manufacturers Fujinon and Canon. (I forget which is which, I think Fujinon is .6 and Canon is .5, normally you just ask for them by manufacturer: IE I need a Fujinon gear or Canon gear)
 
boo said:
what lenses work well w/ a follow focus?
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Any fully manual lens works well with a follow focus. IE - Pretty much any Nikon prime, all the Zeiss lenses, all cinema lenses. Basically any lens that has hard stops in their follow focus.
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Not quite. You need to see how far the focus gear moves length wise on a lens when it turns. Some lenses such as macros, travel a long way and that drives the ring off the gear.
 
Shooter said:
Not quite. You need to see how far the focus gear moves length wise on a lens when it turns. Some lenses such as macros, travel a long way and that drives the ring off the gear.
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Most Zeiss ZF lenses are the same way as well. You have to put on cine-modded type gear or a a snap gear otherwise the tightening screw will hit the FF.
 
The zoom on my 14-140 is really stiff and I thought it might loosen up with use, but that doesn't seem to be happening. Would there be any advantage of adapting a follow focus to the zoom ring? The wrist angle when zooming seems like it would be better with the FF. Anyone tried it?
 
"Good point. Movement of the focus ring on the 14-140 does not produce repeatable results. Follow focus is not useful.
If you want repeatable results, use a 3rd party remote focus unit that plugs into the back of the camera. Even with this, while the results are repeatable (with limitations), this is only true at a given focal length. If the focal length is changed, the focus changes."

Yeah, I understand the lumix lenses can't repeat focus. But I like to use a FF to get my hands off the lens (especially tiny lumix lenses). So I wouldn't say it's not useful. Was hoping for an easy fix without putting gear rings on my lumix lenses, and just use the "gear" built into the lens. This probably isn't gonna happen, unfortunately. The pitch appears to be .8, but the depth is too shallow to work with my Chrosziel FF. Oh well.
 
BerkeleyBob said:
The zoom on my 14-140 is really stiff and I thought it might loosen up with use, but that doesn't seem to be happening. Would there be any advantage of adapting a follow focus to the zoom ring? The wrist angle when zooming seems like it would be better with the FF. Anyone tried it?
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Yes. I am using the D focus V3 with a JAG 35 D gear ring on the zoom ring.

Works great for zooming...
 
For Lumix and Follow by Wired focus lenses i use a friction follow focus as Ikan and Indisystem minifocuszoom.
 
ortofilm said:
The consumer video cameras have digital zoom also. Why not for AF100?
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Because it is not a consumer camera. The AF100 is meant to make as best an image as possible, not distort it. If you want digital zoom, you can always do that in post.
 
GH2 has! EX Tele Conversion extends the zoom by 2.6x beyond its original limit to get the subject even closer. In movie mode it does this by only using the central 2 megapixels of the GH2's 18.3 megapixel sensor, which is roughly equivalent to a 1920x1080 pixels movie, and subsequently there is less reduction of quality in comparison to the standard full HD mode.
 
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