Nikon Glass

boghav said:
The 17-55 2.8 on the Opitek adapter is an excellent handheld choice. However. Operating the lens with a matte box reqires a bellows adapter as the extension is approx 1/2 inch. I simply use the supplis lens hood and an Arri follow focus as the lens' focus is too rough. The Duclos 11-16 also has a small extension and reqires a donut. I found a cheap rubber lens hood with a 70mm friction mount works better. Of course you give up the ability to add a filter in front of the lens, but it's a lightweight solution for handheld work,
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Nikon 17-55/2.8 is my "standard" lens on F3. I do use 4x4 filters with it via Genus wide angle matte box and "nun's knickers" donut like adapter that enables enought space between the lens and box for extending part to "breathe" and still keep the edges of the box safe from vignetting. Just an option...
 
i had a Red 17-50mm on a run-n-gun shoot last week, that's a very useful range for verité. but the damn thing is so heavy for hours (days) of shoulder work, and i know i'm not going to be buying cine lenses any time soon.

the nikon 17-55mm sounds very attractive, except for not being parfocal. i have never shot with a non-parfocal zoom, how the hell do you guys deal with that issue in fast shooting situations? i guess you aren't zooming in to check your focus....
 
The 17-35mm does not extend and works well with all filters and matteboxes. Its also smaller, lighter, and has an iris ring. It is a shorter zoom range than the other mentioned lenses, but its pretty much a matter of taking a step or two forward as its only 15mm difference. Hand held I usually want the widest I can get because that shows the least movement.

There has been a lot of debate on whether the Nikon 17-35mm F2.8 is truly parafocal. Let me say that if its not truly parafocal by specs, on mine its not visible in practical terms. (Even lenses designated true parafocals have minor focus aberrations, its a matter of degree.)
 
My copy of Nikon 17-35 /2.8 was worse as far as keeping focus thru zooming than 17-55 I use now. I am not sure if the copy I had was out of wack or what?... I loved that lens when I had it years ago for shooting stills, but again the copy I got used second time around was lousy on my 5D ( soft corners, ca, etc...). Having a shorter range ( sometimes you can not walk extra steps closer to fill in the frame...) and being a bad performer, I decided to keep 17-55 instead. Not having the aperture ring is a non issue for me, having the Optitek adapter. It actually works even better since it works great for changing the f stop during the shot...
All these still zoom lenses are basically "variable primes" and not great for zooming while recording. Which translates to the issue of not being parafocal. If you change focal setting, it takes no time to be in focus again. And after using particular still zoom lens for a while, you kinda know where the shortcomings with loosing focus are and you adjust your operating accordingly... Focusing from closest to infinity is a short travel anyways on 17-55...
 
thanks for the input. obviously focus isn't as critical in a wider lens, but it's also more difficult to be certain of it.
 
MPB said:
thanks for the input. obviously focus isn't as critical in a wider lens, but it's also more difficult to be certain of it.
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Very true. When shooting from the shoulder with my 17-55, my way of confirming focus when at 17mm and f4 is to rack to infinity and then focus back a inch on the ring and I know I'll be at the 5 ft. mark and that will give me about 7 ft. of DOF. If I come up short and wind up on the 6ft. mark I get 12' of DOF. There are lots of times I wish the focus throw was much longer but this is a instance where the short works for me.

The lens might not be 100% par-focal but while I dont make a habit of it, I wouldn't be to afraid of zooming in to focus and then zooming out to shoot. Another nice fact is the lens barely breathes when in the 50mm area.
 
Your best bet on getting a good lens is pay a little extra and buy them from a good lens house. When I was shooting betacam I purchase both a wide angle and normal zoom Canon lenses through Les Zellen, his lens tech at the time went through the lenses I purchased putting them on an optical bench. My latest set of lenses I purchased through Duclos all with his conversion, including a Nikon 17-35 which is absolutely a wonderful lens, I have a Zeiss 21mm which is the least used lens in my kit because of the Nikon zoom.
 
I found the 17 -35 to be considerably sharper than the fabled 21mm Zeiss.
Has anyone tried the Tamron 17-50 f2.8 Non VC.

I tried the VC and found it wasn't as sharp as the Canon but the non VC is supposed to better, and Tamron confirms that is Parfocal.

One issue with the Parfocal Nikons is that you need to get your backfocus correct for them and I've found that be quite painstaking. Also I remember testing 2 28-70's. Mine was on the money and friends was nowhere near it. I never tried changing my backfocus to see if is would work since all my ZNikon's worked at the same setting - presumably the correct one.

I haven't checked it with PL mounted zooms though to see if they also linen up at the same spot. I wish these adapter makers had back focus adjustments like the old B4 lenses had because they are simply not all the same. Its a very precise adjustment. I do understand the arguement against it as well because alot of people would do it wrong. and they would get bumped etc.
 
scocklin said:
Your best bet on getting a good lens is pay a little extra and buy them from a good lens house. When I was shooting betacam I purchase both a wide angle and normal zoom Canon lenses through Les Zellen, his lens tech at the time went through the lenses I purchased putting them on an optical bench. My latest set of lenses I purchased through Duclos all with his conversion, including a Nikon 17-35 which is absolutely a wonderful lens, I have a Zeiss 21mm which is the least used lens in my kit because of the Nikon zoom.
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+1
 
The Red 17-50 serves me well all-around. Great lens...I know we were talking about Nikon, so why didn't anyone mention 14-24? Stellar lens...loved it so much went to the Ruby lens for the gears, etc. WHAT A GEM!
 
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