Let's talk glass: Lenses for the AF100!

mirco4/3 software correction of distortion???

mirco4/3 software correction of distortion???

While researching lenses I stumbled upon the fact that micro four thirds system cameras have an ability to correct for geometric distortion via software (scroll halfway down the page where you can see uncorrected (+2.6%) VS corrected (0 distortion)

This is a real bonus when shooting very wide angel lenses. Anyone know if the AF100 can do this as well?
 
What about the Panasonic Lumix H-H020 Lens - 20 mm - F/1.7?

Does this geometric distortion correction work for all Panasonic micro four thirds lenses? What about four thirds?
 
I don't know what lenses it may or may not be enabled for, but the way DP Review discovered it was (IIRC) they put the Panasonic 14-140 on an Olympus body, and found out that there was all sorts of barrel distortion that they didn't observe when the lens was on a panasonic body. From that they deduced that the GH1 must be performing correction.

It is not, however, mentioned anywhere in their literature, is it? I don't think it's something they talk about or brag about -- but then again, I don't know that I've ever looked for it, so maybe it is listed as a feature?

Unless they make it known, I guess the only way to find out would be to try the lens on a non-Panasonic body.

Panasonic's been doing correction for chromatic aberration ever since the HPX500 came out (they call it CAC for Chromatic Aberration Compensation) and apparently they've added barrel/pincushion distortion correction starting with the GH1. I'm pretty certain the AF100 will definitely support that too, because on the 14-140 I used on it I didn't notice any distortion when on the wide end of the lens.
 
No, but it will work with the RED Scarlet with an adapter if you can wait another year. :smile:

Thomas Kist said:
Does anybody know if a Cooke 10.4-52mm Varokinetal (S16mm) could cover the AF 100 image sensor? I still have one in my cupboard and it used to be my alltime favorite zoom on S16.
Soft yet sharp!
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the S16 format is very good for "cinema direct" documentary style.
Being able to use a good digital camera with that perspective would have been nice.
Cinema 35 is just to much of a focus hassle if you are playing "Fly on the Wall" without an AC.
and fast 35 zooms are Big.
 
Maybe the GH2 with it's weirdo 1920x1080 digital zoom feature from a cropped sensor will allow you to use your cooke on a digital body. Horrible balance and form function though. I have tons of 16mm glass lying around, in cupboards, squirreled away in boxes and n storage which I plan to try with the GH2 if that feature offers good image quality.

I'll probably use my nikons/canons/minoltas with the AF100 though. And I have a set of BNCR K-35's that I will probably use and may sell for an upgrade to red prime pros or zeiss CP's or panchros or schneider/IBE tele xenars or uniq optics signature primes... so many good choices.
 
JesterJJZ said:
Those look just like the RED zooms...hmm...
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From that web photo and from what I remember, the 18-50 looks to me exactly like the older/discontinued Red 18-50, and the 50-150 looks exactly like the current Red 50-150.

Keep in mind Red discontinued the 18-50 and replaced it with the Red Pro 17-50 for some pretty good reasons. By all reports I remember, the glass was fine, but the mechanicals were substandard.

With that said ... as long as you don't need to focus by reference mark, that two-lens set is pretty screamingly cheap for PL glass! Red charges $8500 for their 50-150 alone, and with the B&H deal you're getting both that and the 18-50 for $6500 combined.

Also, even though they look exactly the same, haven't Red said "those aren't the same lenses as ours"? Has anybody tested 'em out to see if they're the same?
 
Barry_Green said:
I don't know what lenses it may or may not be enabled for, but the way DP Review discovered it was (IIRC) they put the Panasonic 14-140 on an Olympus body, and found out that there was all sorts of barrel distortion that they didn't observe when the lens was on a panasonic body. From that they deduced that the GH1 must be performing correction.

It is not, however, mentioned anywhere in their literature, is it? I don't think it's something they talk about or brag about -- but then again, I don't know that I've ever looked for it, so maybe it is listed as a feature?

Unless they make it known, I guess the only way to find out would be to try the lens on a non-Panasonic body.

Panasonic's been doing correction for chromatic aberration ever since the HPX500 came out (they call it CAC for Chromatic Aberration Compensation) and apparently they've added barrel/pincushion distortion correction starting with the GH1. I'm pretty certain the AF100 will definitely support that too, because on the 14-140 I used on it I didn't notice any distortion when on the wide end of the lens.
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If you buy better lenses, you don't have to worry about barrel distortion, vingetting (the type caused by the laws of reflection), or aberration.

I am curious to see what the AF100 is all about. Do they allow you to turn these corrections off for some lenses that don't need them? Over correction on abberation might not be a bad thing, or noticeable, but I wonder about barrel distortion. Surely I assume this correction is only when the camera notices (through lens-camera communication) that the lens on the camera needs it... which would have to be only the 4/3m lenses, yes?

Tough luck if you're using cheap lenses of any other color.
 
Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
If you buy better lenses, you don't have to worry about barrel distortion, vingetting (the type caused by the laws of reflection), or aberration.
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Didn't know that about barrel distortion but then again the lenses I've used haven't been all that great. I was under the impression that all super wide lenses created some fish eye look.

As for aberration, I know this only to be true for the extremely expensive Panavision PL mounts. It's funny because we are so infatuated about shallow DOF but many dp's try not to shoot wider than F5.6 to eliminate lens edge aberrations.

Still, if the u4/3 and even 4/3 lenses can be corrected somehow, by some software magic in the AF100 then that is a real selling point for the 20mm F1.7 and other super-wides.
 
You are correct that all super wide lenses, like a 10mm lens on a 35mm format, will exhibit some form of barrel distortion. At very wide focal lengths it is impossible to curb the effects but it does vary. With wide angle lenses on the edge of that line, most commonly 25mm, 24mm, and 18mm... the make of the lens does have an effect on how badly the lens will have distortion. It's all about bending light.

I own many Nikon still lenses, and my Manual Nikkor NC F/2.8 24mm lens has mild yet sometimes very noticeable distortion. It really appears when panning across architecture or large vertical lines which appear in the foreground... However, I also own a Cooke Panchro/i 25mm lens. Sure it's 1mm less wide, but it has considerably less of the barrel distortion my Nikon has. Practically zero when discussing noticeable distortion. This is most probably the result in buying a +/- $300 Nikon lens versus a +/- $7,000 lens.

Suffice to say, the Cooke T/2.8 Panchro/i lens has almost the exact FoV and F/stop (The nikon is an F/2.8 while the Cooke is a T/2.8... so to compare apples to apples, it's more like the Nikon is a T/3) but a world of difference on the distortion. I used to work at Panavision and I remember on my lunch breaks testing the excellent anamorphic lenses they have... Despite having barrel distortion, I was using the Primo anamorphic 40mm lens and it had surprisingly less distortion than one would think or assume it would have (for an anamorphic!). Anamorphic lenses are squeezed horizontally by a factor of 2x, so the FoV of a 40mm is actually equivalent to a 20mm lens. Of course the complexity of an anamorphic surely would make a more difficult lens to design and manufacture without distortion... Despite complications, for the lens it was, they sure made it really something~! I assure you, you would never find this in a lens of less excellent design.

I'm getting off topic.

Before I owned my Cooke set, I used to rent the ZF (Nikon Zeiss) 24mm lens whenever I could, because it too had less ugly barrel distortion in the same scenario as my Nikkor.

Yes, you are correct, at some point and time even the most expensive professional lenses will distort. But it's not the same... It's all about how the lens takes light incoming from a wide angle of view and bends those light rays back to form a proper image. It's about the design of the lens elements to recreate a correct perspective.

Primes will almost always do a better job at this because they only have to focus (no pun intended) on one focal length. Being designed and optimized to receive light from that FoV and bend it back into correct perspective.

Zooms on the other hand have to shift elements around inside to compensate for many many variables in focal length and FoV. I'm not a lens technician, but I can tell you the designing of a lens does not get simpler when needing to account for these issues. :)


When the RedMX comes back, I'll throw up my Cooke 25mm T/2.8 against my Nikkor 24mm F/2.8 and post some results.

Steve Kahn said:
As for aberration, I know this only to be true for the extremely expensive Panavision PL mounts.
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Panavision is PV mount, not PL. In addition, aberration is not an effect of a mount, but of the optical quality, design and build of a lens and it's elements inside. Perhaps the confusion stems from my occasional reference to high quality glass as simply 'PL' lenses... as PL lenses are, for the most part, usually on the professional level of quality. There are however older PL lenses and lenses of lesser quality which go by the PL system and do not pass my quality expectations I associate with PL lenses. My point being, PL doesn't always = great quality lenses, but mainly this association holds true.
 
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crop factor should also be taken into consideration during my comparison. S35mm and full 35mm photography are different formats thus the crop factors would take play.
 
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Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
If you buy better lenses, you don't have to worry about barrel distortion, vingetting (the type caused by the laws of reflection), or aberration.

I am curious to see what the AF100 is all about. Do they allow you to turn these corrections off for some lenses that don't need them? Over correction on abberation might not be a bad thing, or noticeable, but I wonder about barrel distortion. Surely I assume this correction is only when the camera notices (through lens-camera communication) that the lens on the camera needs it... which would have to be only the 4/3m lenses, yes?

Tough luck if you're using cheap lenses of any other color.
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You are correct. The Panasonic cameras (GH1, GF1, etc.) only do the chromatic aberration and distortion correction when they detect electronically that a Panasonic micro 4/3 lens is attached. I think they also do the distortion, but not the CA correction, when using Olympus micro 4/3 lenses. The camera needs to know exactly which lens is attached and what focal length it is set at to do the proper correction. The information needed to do the correction is passed from the lens to the camera via the electronic contacts.

If you put other lenses on the camera, then you get no corrections and you get the native chromatic aberration and distortion of the lens. There is no way for the camera to know how to correct for a lens that does not include the required correction information in its electronics.
 
NPrincen said:
You are correct. The Panasonic cameras (GH1, GF1, etc.) only do the chromatic aberration and distortion correction when they detect electronically that a Panasonic micro 4/3 lens is attached. I think they also do the distortion, but not the CA correction, when using Olympus micro 4/3 lenses. The camera needs to know exactly which lens is attached and what focal length it is set at to do the proper correction. The information needed to do the correction is passed from the lens to the camera via the electronic contacts.

If you put other lenses on the camera, then you get no corrections and you get the native chromatic aberration and distortion of the lens. There is no way for the camera to know how to correct for a lens that does not include the required correction information in its electronics.
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Makes sense considering I think where the focus is set changes the amount of correction needed... something that makes doing it in post easy for photographs but very hard to do correctly for some video needs.
 
Can we talk Anamorphics for a moment? I was wondering if anyone had been using russian Anamorphic lenses on Micro 4/3 cameras with success. What I didn't look up is the chip size, is the 4/3 chip going to be in a 4/3 or 16:9 shape, if 16:9 that will make Anamorphics a pain with all the cropping.

Info?
 
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