Sankor/Kowa Anamorphic Lens Discussion and Footage

It's not 43mm?

There seems to be a lot of misinformation about these thread sizes out there:
http://www.efilmforum.com/showpost.p...69&postcount=2
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No. It's actually smaller than 42mm. From what happened with Akira and someone else on this forum, I'm not counting on it being a standard size at all. I think in their case one had 49mm that didn't fit (too small), the other had 50mm that didn't fit (too big)...RRRRRrrrrrrr

So I don't have many other choices with step down rings, 40.5mm is the only thing within 2mm going down a size....so I'll give that a shot.
 
I jsut bought a Sankor 16F on ebay so I'm joining the ranks of those looking for stepup rings or pressure-fit or rods-based solutions. while I wait for the lens to arrive. AFAICT the sankor 16F has a 43mm rear barrel but no threads cut at all.

One lens I would like to try, which I already own is the 55mm f2.8 Nikkor Micro, a macro lense with a very deep front element. Others have suggested trying enlarger lenses, which are often small. I'm also going to have to dig around to see what old cheap zoom lenses I have in AI MF nikkors to see if any of them might be worth trying.

heres a link to the 55mm f2.8 nikkor Micro

http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/companies/nikon/nikkoresources/micronikkor/55mmmicro.htm

While I wait, does anyone know how many lens elements these various anamorphics have?

thanks to all who are posting... with mutual support we'll all get nowhere much faster ;)
 
Less than a hundred US, with shipping.... the base price of these things does seem to be rising however. It just goes to show that yesterday's space junk is tomorrow's golden snitch. I'd suggest looking in the yellow pages in your town to find the old codger who still repairs 16mm film projectors in his garage, and seeing if he has any. These things aren't meant for 35mm. On the other hand, projector lenses ARE made for 35mm, but they are all set up for a LONG throw, which means you are not going to get one to focus very close unless you change out some of the optics somehow.

I also bought a cheap 35mm 4-inch projector lens to fool around with, with the crazy idea in my head that since it was made by ISCO it might have the same front elements as the ISCORAMA and that somehow I could put that to use in a frankenstein rig after removing the rear element. I figure that at the worst I'll have a cheap funhouse lens.
 
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I am so ashamed! (Redneck confession)

I used superglue to attach my stepdown ring to my Sankor. (I'm not proud of it. I know it's barbaric.) :(

BUT IT FREAKIN' WORKED LIKE A CHARM!!! (I will have to do it again with a new stepdown ring because the first time I stained the ring. It looks like someone blew their nose on it.) I'll clean it up (do over) and post pics. Obviously this is in light of the fact that the pitch is different than the standard ring threadings (.75 pitch)....so short of having one custom made you are out of luck. I figured that if this didn't work, it wouldn't be a big deal to remove some superglue. Obviously, I will be looking for another solution, but for now, it's better than holding it with my hand. Also...the step up ring creates a perfect slot for the glue to adhere to. Ugly, redneck, ....heck....it's INDIE!!!!
 
HHL said:
n)

I used superglue to attach my stepdown ring to my Sankor.
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Woohoo!

You rock man! That's totally the way to go! Forget about these crazy thread sizes and just get it on there!

BTW, when you get your Isco I predict you won't have much time for your Sankor anymore .....
 
HHL said:
I am so ashamed! (Redneck confession)

I used superglue to attach my stepdown ring to my Sankor. (I'm not proud of it. I know it's barbaric.) :(
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awesome!! check my solution, this was taken a couple nights ago, there's a thread connecting the tripod baseplate to my mount now so no more duct tape and works great for now.:beer:
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That's awesome, Akira!

Is that just rubber tubing? Do the couplers provide enough tension to keep the A-lens from slipping out if you tilt it down?
 
ProjX v2.0 said:
That's awesome, Akira!

Is that just rubber tubing? Do the couplers provide enough tension to keep the A-lens from slipping out if you tilt it down?
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yeah it's a rubber plumbing tube coupling that fit perfectly over both lens and A-Lens, once aligned an tightened that thing will not fall out. It can actually hold the camera+lens by gripping nothing but the A-lens so tilting down is not a problem, even though it still scares me a bit. The nice thing is I can focus both lenses independently from each other without screwing with the alignment.

ProjX v2.0 said:
Came across some telescope/microscope mounting accessories that may work:

http://telescopeadapters.com/digikits.htm
http://telescopeadapters.com/trings.htm
http://telescopeadapters.com
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Nice find! I'll have to give their stuff a closer look.
 
I had a quick test with my Kowa and a +1 diopter. It certainly helps with close focal distance, and seems to really decrease depth of field, which is interesting.

Without the diopter my 50mm at 1.8 is basically unusable as everything is blurred. With the diopter it becomes much better. At about 5.6 performance is very decent with the +1. There is a sliver of decently sharp in focus area with a hell of a lot of bokeh everywhere else!

This is with the adapter at the minimum focus distance and the lens moving in and around the 4 ft mark.

How are you guys faring with close focus at wide apertures on the Sankors?

BTW, the Kowa should mount no problem to a Vega 12b 90mm 2.8 with a 58-50 step down, no vignetting - bokeh everywhere!
 
Just tried the Kowa 16-H handheld with a 50 1.4 on a GH1 and it worked great. Easy to focus but could hardly get any flare.
Tried the Sankor 16-D too and couldn't get it to focus at all.
Maybe it's the 4/3 sensor but hopefully they will work better on a 7D.
 
Did you see the video I posted a few pages back? I got plenty of flares with my Kowa, but you do indeed need a strong, small light source.

When you say you found it easy to focus - could you get focus even at f1.4?
 
Figured out the flare problem. Was shooting with the wrong kind of light. Star Trek look is now in full effect and it's friggin awesome!

After looking at the footage on a bigger screen, the Kowa is not as easy to focus as I initially thought. Stopping down does help but I noticed you have to have a minimum distance of at least 7-10 feet before the image gets sharp.

No vignetting whatsoever on both Sankor or Kowa for me either.
 
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yeah I tried a new lens to use with it and I am able to go down to 80mm with hardly any vignetting now(just a tad). 100mm is zero. Must have been something wrong with the other old lens I was using. http://vimeo.com/6542148

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You're going to make the Albinar the hot new lens on this forum. Soon people will search up and down ebay for their own albinar+sankor combos.
 
Guys you know flare is nice and all but there is more to films than flares! ;)

On another note, I found a new anamorphic adapter. A generic one, made in Japan. Just got it today. It compresses by approx. 30% so you'll get 2.35:1 when shooting in 16:9 which is nice.
I just did a very quick test as I don't have much time now, but looks quite good so far.

The important point here is, the rear thread is standard 52mm, I just mounted it on a Nikon 35mm F2.8 (same thread size), use it on my 5D Mark II and get absolutely NO vignetting! That's pretty sweet. Looked a little soft on the LCD though, will have to do more comprehensive tests and check on big screen later. Will keep you posted.
 
Here is some footage with my adapter, (superglue rig job)....it's working great though! I had a concern about this Sankor 16C. I wasn't sure if I could get it to focus properly. Now that I have it attached it works just fine. You must focus on BOTH lenses though. (focal length only)

Here's some sample footage:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P27ctB8lc60
 
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