C100: Under $5k 35mm Cinema Lens Test - Canon C100 Mark I

Chris Langer

Chris Langer

Well-known member
Hey everyone, been working on this recently to show the differences between some very expensive lenses and not so very expensive lenses. I always have had an itch for more expensive glass but I really needed to conduct a test to truly see the potential of each lens I was considering.

I did this test using the C100 Mark I since it is my most used camera at the moment. For my current 1080p cameras, I wanted to see if it was worth buying more expensive glass or just buying some cheaper lenses to get through my usual jobs. If my need for 4K arises, I will do this test again but for right now, whenever I need 4k - I rent everything I need.

I tested these lenses below.
Canon CN-E 35mm T1.5 Cinema Prime Lens - $4950
Schneider Xenon FF 35mm T2.1 Cinema Primes Lens - $3995
Rokinon 35mm T1.5 Cine DS Prime Lens - $479
Zeiss Distagon T* 35mm f/2 ZF.2 Prime Lens - $1100
Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art Prime Lens - $899


Go easy on me, it is my first test! :D

Thanks,
Chris
 
I'm sure a lot of people will thank you for taking your time to do this. Even simple comparisons can eat up a lot of time.

I guess we need to take it all with a grain of salt since we're watching on Vimeo on a computer screen… But… The Canon and Schneider were similar(and they both DO breath, you can easily see it). The Zeiss had a slight, almost purple tint at times. To me, the Canon had the best skin tones, but I DO like the way Canon cameras and lenses render skin tones(I have a C300 and Cine primes). Something I did notice, almost all of the scenes from the Canon and Schneider appeared overexposed.
 
Run&Gun said:
I guess we need to take it all with a grain of salt since we're watching on Vimeo on a computer screen…
Click to expand...

You make a good point, but the way I always look at it is... most of my work (and I best most of the work of the majority of board members) is going to be viewed in a similar manner anyway, so if vimeo on a computer screen leads to not very noticeable differences in glass, that's a factor to consider, even if the original video is better. Why pay an extra $4k if most of the people watching aren't going to notice anyway?

If the distribution process calls for something more precise, a more precise test would be needed anyway.
 
With your first test you shot some of the tests under bright sunlight, while the sun was becoming very diffuse by the time you shot the last test, so I would automatically throw out that test. ( contrast, sharpness, and color could all be affected by the lighting )

I also wish you had shot your tests at full aperture and 1 F-stop down, as you should see what you're paying for in an expensive cine lens when shooting at full aperture. At f/4.0 almost any lens can look good.

I would also have loved to have seen some high-contrast night shots at full aperture to see how each lens handles such a difficult shooting situation.

Sorry if I sound like I'm ragging on your tests, it just that I think you have to really push these lenses to separate the good lenses from the great lenses.
 
You can download the original file from Vimeo, so view it however you want. I deliver in both ways and I always appreciated when people allowed the video to be able to download.

Regarding exposure and the whole setup... since it was winter (shot in magical 60 degree day in Ohio in late December) and I had all of this gear rented, I shot what I could. Most of my work though is in these situations, so I didn't want to deviate from what I shot in this test. Originally I wasn't going to post the review but a few people said I should since the lenses at 1080p were very similar.

As for night shooting, I really don't do any night shooting or shoot wide open, so that is why I didn't do it. I usually only shoot at T/2 - T/2.8 selectively, beyond that it gets too shallow for my liking.

So for my situation, there really is no point of getting the nicer cinema lenses since I don't need certain things that make it worth the price. This is why I shared it, because other people might be in the same shoes as me so I wanted to help out! :D

It isn't meant to be super scientific or the end all - just an observation by myself for myself to share with others who might shoot in similar situations.
 
The description of your "normal" shooting style really helps explain your reasoning for the test design. I have a client who has asked about getting lense for a test that is much different. He wants to test lenses for 4k work where the potential is to do up to a 200% crop for some very tight close up from a wide shot. I would expect this type of test to return a completely different set of results. What looks pretty well the same at 1080p may change completely with that type of zoom/crop.
 
Excellent Canon C100 skin tones demo video

Excellent Canon C100 skin tones demo video

Chris Langer said:
I did this test using the C100 Mark I since it is my most used camera at the moment. For my current 1080p cameras, I wanted to see if it was worth buying more expensive glass or just buying some cheaper lenses to get through my usual jobs. I tested these lenses below.

Click to expand...
Absolutely brilliant, Chris! A great demo of Canon skin tones. I love them all, they look very similar to my A5100. Thank you so much!
 
Chris Langer said:
As for night shooting, I really don't do any night shooting or shoot wide open, so that is why I didn't do it. I usually only shoot at T/2 - T/2.8 selectively, beyond that it gets too shallow for my liking.
Click to expand...

I totally understand for actual shooting conditions, but when trying to test the differences between regular glass and high priced cine glass you're not going to see much difference when shooting at f/4.0. To me this is like testing high performance sports cars against regular economy cars by driving them in a 30 mph speed zone, you're not going to see much difference when testing like this.
 
Yeah I understand Dingo, but that was the whole point of the test.... To see which lens would work the best in my shooting situations at the best price point. I needed to do the test myself to see the difference or lack of difference in what I mostly shoot. I got tired of looking at other tests and just reading stuff online. I actually needed to rent these lenses for myself.

If I never really shoot wide open, then why test for it? If I never take my cars out for speed racing, why drive on a track? There is more to a sports car than driving fast. There is more to a nice cinema prime lens than just image quality - operation, colors, rendition of backgrounds, construction, and so on. I think this test would have been different on a 4K setup.
 
I'd say the main benefits of cine lenses will almost always be mechanical rather than optical. There are optical differences—like TheDingo mentions above, they'll be most evident wide open—but the main advantages of the cine housing are 300 degree focus rotation, equidistantly placed gears between focal lengths, common outer lens diameter and day-in-day-out robustness.

You only have to be a one-man-band one time, juggling EF glass on a tight shoot, to appreciate a lens set where you don't have to move follow focus and/or matte box for every focal length change.

That said stills lenses are easier to do large hands-on focus pulls with and they offer auto focus (most of them).
 
I very much appreciate the test, thank you for posting.

I did a comparison a while ago (don't have saved video to show unfortunately) with rentals of a Canon 50 Cine, Schneider 50, Zeiss 50 CP.2, and a Zeiss Otus on a 4K camera (Canon 1DC).

I ended up buying the Otus -- in my view it outpeformed all the others optically by a pretty large margin, particularly wide open. It's not as easy to use as a cine lens (although manual focus is quite nice), but I just couldn't ignore the beautiful images it made. Given that the costs are pretty similar (and that I can use the Otus easily as a stills lens too on my A7s with iris control on the camera body), I am very happy with the choice.

Anyway, I post this because I haven't really seen the Otus thrown in with the cine lenses.
 
Thanks skimmel - I never considered the Otus because of that amount, I would prefer the operation of cinema primes BUT if the image is really that magical, nothing can change that! Zeiss should make a Otus CP.2 Cinema Set! Which is probably similar to Ultra or Master Primes.
 
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