Which 35mm adapter would you buy?

Geez, Canon FD 1.4 50mm's for $20-50? I FINALLY won mine for $68 + $10 shipping. Mint condition (nearly) and it came with the hood/shade, but they've otherwise been fairly slim pickings from what I could tell at the time. Nikon's go for even a little more, it seems (Letus35 has a switchable Canon FD / Nikon AI mount). I've even got a 100-300 Canon zoom lens I'm looking forward to testing out, but it's a 5.6 so it'll only be useful for bright outdoor shots. I've got a beach wedding in May that I'll hopefully have some use out of it with.
 
I've won two 1.4 FD mounts on Ebay (in prep of buying one of these badboys). One I paid $21 and it's nice and clean, the other I paid $36. I guess I did pretty well.
 
everyone in the G35 community is excited but also very cautious right now.

they recently announced that the focusing screen on the production models is not static, but a vibrating one. Everyone's kinda like, WTF?

So now we're waiting on more test shots with the production models. I thought the preproduction models were awesome, so hopefully the updated production models kick ass. So far the owner, Jonathan, has been really careful about his business and he seems to believe in releasing the best possible product. I don't think he's out to screw anybody, and I believe him when he says that the production model will be much better than the preproduction units.
 
these look sexy.

01.jpg



i'll see if i can find some more pics of the G35 for ya.
 
That looks nice. I'm becoming more curious about this unit now, but I stil think I'm going to take the advice of this thread and just wait until I see Norm's test footage.
 
One nice thing about the G35, at least if you own a DVX/HVX is the bayonet mount. Should be really solid, shouldn't need rails unless you start using really heavy lenses.

As far as Canon -vs- Nikon goes, I will admit that I shoot Canon, and I have a lot of nice Canon glass, but for manual lenses, I think Nikon is probably the way to go. I'm going to order an EOS and F mount, but I already picked up a Nikon 50 1.4 and a 24 2.8, and they were both fairly cheap.

I'm not entirely sure how the EOS or FD mounts will handle the little lever that has to be moved to make the aperture work on FD lenses. Anyway I wanted to use these manual lenses on my Canon EOS bodies, and as it turns out Nikon manual lenses seem to work better than most FD lenses work on EOS bodies. Who knew.

Those Zeiss lenses look cool, but I really think it would be a huge waste of bucks to get them to use on a 35mm adapter on a DVX or HVX. I would imagine that 85 1.4 is around $1500.

Get yourself a 50mm 1.4, a 24mm 2.8 and maybe a 85mm 1.8 and that will be a really nice set of primes. I will definately be posting footage with my full assortment of lenses if they ever ship the g35. I can't wait to see what the 300 f4 L can do attached to my DVX. I expect it will be like carrying a shoulder mount rocket.
 
I'm in line for the G35 as well, but the longer they take to getting it out, the more I start thinking about other options. The sudden last minute total redesign has me a little skeptical. Bkindy's adapter looks real promising. It's static and the pro version is gonna be about $550. Hmm, $1300 for a G35, or $550 for a nice DIY style adapter. The money saved could buy me new jib. Dammit, the equipment lust will never end!
 
All I can say is that I had some important projects some time ago and I bought the letus35 instead of waiting for the G35. The image was way too soft and it totaly killed the FX1 HD footage...not to mention distortion around the edges. I heard that the new version (letus35A) is suposed to be much better, but I decided to put my money on a sure bet...and for me it's the G35. Their footage is absolutely amazing! I visit redrocks' site often and their footage REALLY improoved in the last year and a half. They also allow you to buy 2 different types of glasses for different types fo lighting, which is really amazing. The real problem for me is that I absolutely need to be able to shoot hand held. But if that is not a problem for, Redrock is kicking ass right now.
 
The g35 looks great but nothing seems to be as crisp, grainless and compact as dan's MPIC.

Very expensive though. But if you have the cash the footage speaks for it's self.

-rook
 
While I appreciate everyone's feedback so far in this thread, it has simply just confused me more than I already was. In general what I am finding confusing is the fact that you have all these options available, from the Letus, the G35, the SG35, the Micro, and there is no sure fire answer to what is the ideal product. The Letus is the least expensive but people say that the image is way too soft, even with the Letus 35a. The SG35 takes 6-8 weeks to receive, but comes with a rail system, but it is almost an unproven commodity, although the footage looks relatively sharp. Including shipping the SG35 seems to be almost as expensive as the Letus 35 flip. Then there is the redrockmikro which looks great, the footage looks sharp, but people have said that the system in general is a pain in the ass to get set up properly (open the unit, adjust, close the unit, adjust, rinse, repeat). Then there is this G35, where the footage looks good, but who knows what the deal with this product is really going to be.

On top of that we get EDWeirdo's DIY which looks great, the footage is nice, but I wonder what the weight will do to the mount as well as how realistic it is to recreate this setup.

I know we have a shoot out coming, and I'm hoping that it will include some rez charts along with some low light tests, but in general I am finding this entire situation to be migraine inducing.
 
Shoot-out is this Saturday, but unfortunately the only ones participating are the SG35 (spinning GG) and Letus35a/Flip (vibrating GG).

None of the static GG guys could commit to having commercially viable units available for purchase by the time the article's published; a requirement to participate for two reasons: 1.) Don't want to have potential design changes after the testing, which would in effect make the testing moot as the member wouldn't be getting the same unit that was tested. 2.) Don't want to have members excited about something that could possibly be months or even further down the road before it's actually available.

Since the G35 (not ready yet anyway) and Redrock's M2 are both over $1K, we're simply focusing on the products that are ready RIGHT now, as well as are well below the $1K mark. We're also hoping to feature use of the geared Indie Focus, for our rack focusing, as well as Dakotapod's low cost mattebox in use with the 35 adapters.

We'll have the res. charts posted, in addition the low light testing, ext. day shots, models/subjects under dramatic lighting, etc.
 
I've been shooting without a 35 adaptor (until my G35 is ready)...it's not a must have.
you can still get nice DOF if you pull some tricks.

...and it will save your brain from future migraines.
 
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