This is my review of the Go35 Beta Unit. For one, I have shot on film, both 35mm & Super35mm & 16mm. I have used and owned several 35mm lens adapters including the infamous Mini35 to homemade solutions. I must say that my first impression after taking it out of the box was it's not so Beta looking exterior. I very much like the black finish as it matches the rest of my gear. First thing, it is plug & play & light though I wouldn't recommend using any lens larger than a 50mm without rails. After adjusting the manual focus & zoom, I was ready to do some simple tests.
I really found the settings for the DVX100a for me was best set at MF31 &Z65. After a few 'round the house tests, I took it for a spin outside around some urban areas and the infamous inanimate object test that plagues us 35mm adapter owners (blades of grass, gates, tree's, etc.....). As far as sharpness & color goes, I didn't find any problems, basically it's as sharp as you set it and the way it handles colors are as vibrant or as mute as you set them. I prefer to always shoot mute & bring out whatever color's I need in post, and also it just works better with Magic Bullet in my opinion.
Now, what everyone wants to hear about and has been the new standard in how an adapter is judged nowadays. GRAIN & BOKEH. As far as grain, it really depends on how your scene is lit. My biggest issue was dust rather than grain, which is easy to control with simple cleaning (compressed air) before shooting. I'm not gonna say the adapter is grainless but I found that during the couple shoots I've used it in so far, it's nearly invisible during inside shots, with proper lighting you really have to look for it. In all I would say it loses about 1.5-2 stops. I was able to shoot indoors with NO extra lights than natural light coming through the shades & could shoot 1/250 shutter and still have a decent image (nothing serious shooting).
With outside shots, it sometimes shows up in white areas, but only in certain weather situations. The difference between an overcast day & a sunny day were "grainy" to "what's grain??" I also noticed just like with a few other adapters, the lens could also affect the grain?? I'm no expert but my 300mm lens grain was more noticable than my 50mm lens. As far as grain, it's a static adapter so don't expect a miracle, but it also is up to your lighting & framing skills. Even the Guerilla35 has grain.
BOKEH. Bokeh has become my new found love as far as adapters go. This adapter renders bokeh excellently. When the lens is wide open, the bokeh makes out of focus lights small circles. I even did a side by side comparison to Batman Begin's & they both render out of focus lights the same way. Stopping down the iris even once on any of my lens turned the out of focus lights from small circles to small or large polygon shaped lights, which was beautiful. Plus, I don't notice any more CA than the DVX100a has by itself.
I was skeptical about the bokeh at first, but when I used the adapter myself, all I can say is the GG renders it properly. Also, the best thing I liked is some adapters are notorious for giving you DOF outside, but inside it still looks like flat video. Not this adapter, not even close, my inside shots were just as shallow as my outside shots.
I would like to say that these images are very crisp and sharp, the only reason any of them look the way they do is due to my crappy compressor on my extremely weak laptop. All of these shots are grainless, anything you see is due to compression. The dust is actually a dirty spot on my car and anything else I can't explain but these shots had a very clean GG. The vignetting is due to my lack of zoom, nothing to do with the adapter. There is no hotspot, anything that looks like one is simply a shadow, this adapter surprisingly has no hotspot.
This was done with nothing but natural light coming through the shades. Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/250th Shutter.
This is inside my garage. Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/250th Shutter ND 1/8th.
Another garage shot. Same setting as above.
Her again with only light coming through the shades, of course, there's a window about 10 feet in front of her too. Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/250th Shutter.
You can see the reflection of the light on the gate is clearly a polygon, good bokeh rendering. I wasn't trying to have anything in focus, just showing the bokeh rendering. Nikkor 105mm @2.5 1/48th Shutter ND 1/64th.
The crap mobile. Around 6-7pm on a very overcast day. The dirt spots are actually on the car. I know I need it washed.
Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/48th ND 1/8th.
Shot in the car about 5 minutes later. Same setting as above.
CONCLUSION. Right now this is my favorite piece of gear, using it with a dolly is a pain in the ass at first but I finally got the hang of it. This adapter gives you the long sought shallow depth of field (extremely shallow) and bokeh you could ever want without stepping up to a moving GG. I will be using this adapter for a very long time & it has replaced my previous adapters (including 2 moving ones). I've had shoots with 3 different clients in the last week and have used the adapter and it blew them away as it has also done me.
This was the best investment I've made since purchasing my DVX100a and I can't imagine how much better the production model could be. Especially for the price.......
I really found the settings for the DVX100a for me was best set at MF31 &Z65. After a few 'round the house tests, I took it for a spin outside around some urban areas and the infamous inanimate object test that plagues us 35mm adapter owners (blades of grass, gates, tree's, etc.....). As far as sharpness & color goes, I didn't find any problems, basically it's as sharp as you set it and the way it handles colors are as vibrant or as mute as you set them. I prefer to always shoot mute & bring out whatever color's I need in post, and also it just works better with Magic Bullet in my opinion.
Now, what everyone wants to hear about and has been the new standard in how an adapter is judged nowadays. GRAIN & BOKEH. As far as grain, it really depends on how your scene is lit. My biggest issue was dust rather than grain, which is easy to control with simple cleaning (compressed air) before shooting. I'm not gonna say the adapter is grainless but I found that during the couple shoots I've used it in so far, it's nearly invisible during inside shots, with proper lighting you really have to look for it. In all I would say it loses about 1.5-2 stops. I was able to shoot indoors with NO extra lights than natural light coming through the shades & could shoot 1/250 shutter and still have a decent image (nothing serious shooting).
With outside shots, it sometimes shows up in white areas, but only in certain weather situations. The difference between an overcast day & a sunny day were "grainy" to "what's grain??" I also noticed just like with a few other adapters, the lens could also affect the grain?? I'm no expert but my 300mm lens grain was more noticable than my 50mm lens. As far as grain, it's a static adapter so don't expect a miracle, but it also is up to your lighting & framing skills. Even the Guerilla35 has grain.
BOKEH. Bokeh has become my new found love as far as adapters go. This adapter renders bokeh excellently. When the lens is wide open, the bokeh makes out of focus lights small circles. I even did a side by side comparison to Batman Begin's & they both render out of focus lights the same way. Stopping down the iris even once on any of my lens turned the out of focus lights from small circles to small or large polygon shaped lights, which was beautiful. Plus, I don't notice any more CA than the DVX100a has by itself.
I was skeptical about the bokeh at first, but when I used the adapter myself, all I can say is the GG renders it properly. Also, the best thing I liked is some adapters are notorious for giving you DOF outside, but inside it still looks like flat video. Not this adapter, not even close, my inside shots were just as shallow as my outside shots.
I would like to say that these images are very crisp and sharp, the only reason any of them look the way they do is due to my crappy compressor on my extremely weak laptop. All of these shots are grainless, anything you see is due to compression. The dust is actually a dirty spot on my car and anything else I can't explain but these shots had a very clean GG. The vignetting is due to my lack of zoom, nothing to do with the adapter. There is no hotspot, anything that looks like one is simply a shadow, this adapter surprisingly has no hotspot.
This was done with nothing but natural light coming through the shades. Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/250th Shutter.
This is inside my garage. Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/250th Shutter ND 1/8th.
Another garage shot. Same setting as above.
Her again with only light coming through the shades, of course, there's a window about 10 feet in front of her too. Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/250th Shutter.
You can see the reflection of the light on the gate is clearly a polygon, good bokeh rendering. I wasn't trying to have anything in focus, just showing the bokeh rendering. Nikkor 105mm @2.5 1/48th Shutter ND 1/64th.
The crap mobile. Around 6-7pm on a very overcast day. The dirt spots are actually on the car. I know I need it washed.
Nikon 50mm 1.8 @1.8 1/48th ND 1/8th.
Shot in the car about 5 minutes later. Same setting as above.
CONCLUSION. Right now this is my favorite piece of gear, using it with a dolly is a pain in the ass at first but I finally got the hang of it. This adapter gives you the long sought shallow depth of field (extremely shallow) and bokeh you could ever want without stepping up to a moving GG. I will be using this adapter for a very long time & it has replaced my previous adapters (including 2 moving ones). I've had shoots with 3 different clients in the last week and have used the adapter and it blew them away as it has also done me.
This was the best investment I've made since purchasing my DVX100a and I can't imagine how much better the production model could be. Especially for the price.......
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), or film level lighting.
