nikon lens adapter

Steve Laramie

Steve Laramie

Veteran
is there just an adapter that you can put on the HVX to fit nikon lenses or do you have to buy a 35mm adapter? Also if I did have to get an adapter to do this what would I need. Im thinking I like letus because its only .5 stops of light loss but I dont know allot about adapters can someone help me out? Do I just need the mounting bracket or do I need rails as well?
 
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is there just an adapter that you can put on the HVX to fit nikon lenses
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no.
well technically yes - thats what 35mm adapters do. they allow you to fit still camera (35mm) lenses onto a fixed lens camera

if I did have to get an adapter to do this what would I need
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well, when i got my adapter a year or so ago i chose the brevis because it was the only one that didnt absolutely REQUIRE rails to use, and i figured that would be handy for run and gun shooting. well, i learned soon that adapter setups arent nearly as simple as id expected. and even though it didnt require rails - they damn sure are HELPFUL.

in my experience, at the very least you need rails and a follow focus to successfully use an adapter setup.

in addition to not being super simple, an adapter setup isnt exactly cheap. for my basic kit: brevis adapter, rails, rails mount, follow focus and 4 lenses i paid about $3200
 
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my lenses average about $250 each. so you can shave off about a grand there.

lair, id advise you to do a LOT of research (i wish id done more when i jumped in) not just here, but on the sites of the various adapter manufacturers.
dennis, the guy behind the curtain at cinevate gave me a pretty comprehensive education into the hows and whys of adapters before i purchased. and though a bit of it went above (or at least around) my head, it was SUPER to have a bit more of an idea of whats what before purchasing. and to be dead honest, it was dennis' enthusiasm - and availability, that put brevis over the top for me...

just having a nikon lens isnt the end of the conversation. you dont want DIGITAL SLR lenses - you want old school film lenses. and primes as well as manual focus lenses are preferable to zooms and AF (though they both can be used)

seems the current trend is for adapters to have the "flip" feature, which turns the image back to right side up (ALL adapters prior to about 6 months ago resulted in an upside down image that had to be righted in post). this feature adds a sort of anti-periscope device behind the adapter and forces the camera up on a block above the rails by about 2 inches. that freaks me out! just on a center of gravity basis... i havent yet upgraded to a flip model, simply because FCP rotates in real time and its simply not a deal breaker for me to have to do it.
 
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I've got an LEX and it works great. I just don't use it that much. As WZGN said, there are a lot more expenses invovled and other considerations with a 35mm adapter. The biggest is all the added gear and weight. You'll need things like a heavier tripod, head, matte box, filters, etc...

And then, if you want to go handheld, a shoulder mount set-up with all it's paraphenalia. Oh, and don't forget the external monitor, another $1500 plus batteries if you expect to be able to focus all that great footage.

Looking at your site and the type of work you do, the 35mm adapter could be a decent investment, but your rates would have to jump to cover all the new equipment. If were to do it again, I'd buy a set of shorty rails with a simple matte box and a bunch of filters; plus a lightweight tripod with a good head and spend my time shooting as much as possible and experimenting with those tools and camera settings.

With that, take a look at my list of stuff on my site under "Capabilities>Equipment list." Very scary how much stuff you can accumulate. And this is from a guy that just bought an HPX. Wait until you spend $2k just for batteries!

Good Luck!

Mark G
www.newmediadevcorp.com
 
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