C200: Who uses the Canon CN-E18-80?

Spartacus

Spartacus

Veteran
I guess some will consider getting this lens with the C200, but I couldn't find that many examples footage shot with this lens online.
I'm not even sure I would use it to zoom a lot while recording, I'm more interested in general picture quality, if it's sharp and clean or not, how it handles contrast and bokeh, in short: Does it live up to be a cinema lens and is it a step up from EF photo zooms.
So, if you can share sth (preferable shot with a C300II) I'd appreciate!
 
Spartacus said:
I guess some will consider getting this lens with the C200, but I couldn't find that many examples footage shot with this lens online.
I'm not even sure I would use it to zoom a lot while recording, I'm more interested in general picture quality, if it's sharp and clean or not, how it handles contrast and bokeh, in short: Does it live up to be a cinema lens and is it a step up from EF photo zooms.
So, if you can share sth (preferable shot with a C300II) I'd appreciate!
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I have the lens and like it a lot. I have used it on C300 Mark II as well as a C300.

It is very sharp and very clean. It has better local/micro contrast than EF lenses. It has color which matches Canon's cinema glass, which is a touch warmer than Canon's EF glass.

The Bokeh is very pleasing but it's an T4.4 / F/4 lens. So, there's no getting around that. Because of that I find the out of focus more pleasing from mid-range through telephoto. So, ~40mm - 80mm.

Versus EF lenses a huge difference is that the 18-80mm has virtually no breathing. I have tested it against the 16-35 f/4 IS, 24-70mm f/2.8 II, 24-105mm f/4 IS, and the 70-200 f/2.8 IS II lenses. They all have significant breathing. The 18-80 CN-E only has a tiny bit at the wide end.

The 18-80mm also has some barrel distortion at 18mm but it disappears very quickly as one zooms in.

I don't have a ton of samples as most of the work was for clients who have not published the footage yet but here are a few.

C300 Mark II + 18-80mm, C-log 3, BT.709 color space, 10-bit 1080 capture.


C300 Mark II + 18-80mm, C-log 3, BT.709 color space, for the bulk of the footage. There are a few clips with a C300 with a 24-105 f/4 IS lens as well.


Test - handheld, C300 Mark II + 18-80mm. 4:4:4 12 bit capture. C-log 3. IS Mode 2.


This video was shot as a live feed for a conference. C300 Mark II + 18-80:

http://hopeglobalforums.org/channel/remarks-by-arianna-huffington-2017/

I have blog posts with more info:

http://blog.jonroemer.com/2017/02/canon-c300-mark-ii/

http://blog.jonroemer.com/2017/05/celebrating-service-at-princeton/

http://blog.jonroemer.com/2017/06/mid-2017-video-smackdown/
 
For pure IQ, any L quality prime lens will have it beat. Not by much, since I find the lens nearly flawless for what it is. I also don't think it is noticeably better than any of the current f/2.8 L zooms for pure IQ. The strength of the lens is how it handles in run and gun situations.
 
cpreston said:
For pure IQ, any L quality prime lens will have it beat. Not by much, since I find the lens nearly flawless for what it is. I also don't think it is noticeably better than any of the current f/2.8 L zooms for pure IQ. The strength of the lens is how it handles in run and gun situations.
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I shot a job with two C300's in early February. A Cam had the 18-80 and B Cam had either a 50 f/1.2 L or a 85 f/1.2 L. The 18-80 had better color and contrast from the start on every setup. The primes were being shot wider open, ~f/2 - f/2.5, so that may be part of the contrast difference. But the color difference before grading was noticeable.

I agree on the current f/2.8 L zooms. They are all pretty great in terms of IQ. The 18-80mm is still better when it comes to focus breathing and color.

Twice since I got the lens I have had clients ask on location if I can do a zoom in/zoom out. So, was happy to accommodate them.
 
Jon Roemer said:
I shot a job with two C300's in early February. A Cam had the 18-80 and B Cam had either a 50 f/1.2 L or a 85 f/1.2 L. The 18-80 had better color and contrast from the start on every setup. The primes were being shot wider open, ~f/2 - f/2.5, so that may be part of the contrast difference. But the color difference before grading was noticeable.

I agree on the current f/2.8 L zooms. They are all pretty great in terms of IQ. The 18-80mm is still better when it comes to focus breathing and color.

Twice since I got the lens I have had clients ask on location if I can do a zoom in/zoom out. So, was happy to accommodate them.
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Yeah, the 1.2L are technically pretty flawed lenses, but I still love their IQ. I've never tried their CN-E counterparts so I don't know if they fix the CA and resolving power wide open.
 
Jon Roemer said:
Twice since I got the lens I have had clients ask on location if I can do a zoom in/zoom out. So, was happy to accommodate them.
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I am in the same boat except I don't have the lens and it's killing me. Have been on two doc shoots and one event shoot where producer or director asked me for a "slow push in or slow creep out to reveal..." and it's not fun to show them I cannot do that with the still lenses. I will be getting the 18-80 as soon as the C200 pays for itself. FWIW, I wrote the HD Video Pro article/review on the 18-80 back in January, I really liked the lens, it's excellent. It's not to the $30k CNe lens level of quality but in my mind, it's about equal to my L lenses but as you and others stated, it's all about the operational features that make this lens the one to get. I wish it was faster but I can probably cope with it for most situations. I don't need a zoom for sit down interviews, I need it for documentary and event shoots. Most are outdoors, not all but the gain up on the C200 should be as good as the C300 MKII, which is good.
 
Thanks folks!
I'll definitely keep the lens on my radar. Anyone using it with DPAF?
Face and object tracking share's the top with RAWlite on my "Why the C200" list.
 
Spartacus said:
Thanks folks!
I'll definitely keep the lens on my radar. Anyone using it with DPAF?
Face and object tracking share's the top with RAWlite on my "Why the C200" list.
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DPAF works extremely well with the lens. Think of it as a gateway to the real Cinema lenses, it's a hybrid of an L zoom mixed with some higher end cinema characteristics. That's what is so genius about it, nobody else really has made a lens like this for a digital cinema camera before. The fact that it retains IS and DPAF is really nice. The downside is no hard stops. It's much more for simngle person operators than narrative filmmakers. Other than it's not fast enough, it's about the perfect documentary lens.
 
Spartacus said:
Thanks folks!
I'll definitely keep the lens on my radar. Anyone using it with DPAF?
Face and object tracking share's the top with RAWlite on my "Why the C200" list.
Click to expand...

All of the videos I linked to above used DPAF. It's so good I don't find myself manually focusing much at all.

I have custom set a button on the back of the C300 Mark II so that I can switch DPAF on and off.

One of the videos linked above, this link below jumps to 01:25 - DPAF is extremely helpful shooting quickly wide open.


I have not done a lot of DPAF tracking yet on the C300 Mark II. It's more set focus via DPAF and lock it in. But I have done a lot of tracking on the 1DX Mark II and the DPAF works great.
 
I Rented 2 18-80 lenses for a shoot where I was covering a cycling race from the back of motorcycles so we had A moto and B moto with C300 Mk2's and 18-80 lenses. I leaned on the DPAF pretty hard that day and was AMAZED at how well it could snap to and follow a face shot against a moving background that was whizzing by 10 feet behind the face at 27 mph> So picture a profile shot of a cyclist tearing down a. Country road with trees and vegetation as back drop just a few feet off the side of the road. THe DPAF with face detection was shockingly good. I was ready to turn it off figuring it would fail, but ended up totally comfortable relying on it. Of course with was outside, plenty of sunshine so I wasn't wishing for another stop of exposure at any point . I know as a doc lens I would like it to be a 2.8 but that would probably double the price. The len is sharp , has excellent contrast, I would def use one again.
 
Mark Smith said:
I Rented 2 18-80 lenses for a shoot where I was covering a cycling race from the back of motorcycles so we had A moto and B moto with C300 Mk2's and 18-80 lenses. I leaned on the DPAF pretty hard that day and was AMAZED at how well it could snap to and follow a face shot against a moving background that was whizzing by 10 feet behind the face at 27 mph> So picture a profile shot of a cyclist tearing down a. Country road with trees and vegetation as back drop just a few feet off the side of the road. THe DPAF with face detection was shockingly good. I was ready to turn it off figuring it would fail, but ended up totally comfortable relying on it. Of course with was outside, plenty of sunshine so I wasn't wishing for another stop of exposure at any point . I know as a doc lens I would like it to be a 2.8 but that would probably double the price. The len is sharp , has excellent contrast, I would def use one again.
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Good to hear about your experience with it under challenging circumstances. Sounds like it worked really well for you. Post samples if and when you can.
 
This may be apropos of nothing but Canon would need higher AF spec lenses for C700. The 18-80 T 4.4 is almost perfect for C300 MKII in terms of price and quality but a $28,000 camera is a huge step up from C300 MKII.
 
DLD said:
This may be apropos of nothing but Canon would need higher AF spec lenses for C700. The 18-80 T 4.4 is almost perfect for C300 MKII in terms of price and quality but a $28,000 camera is a huge step up from C300 MKII.
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I'm in no position to pass judgement but it seems that the C700 is not achieving success. I write for several and read all of the trades, I talk to a lot of DPs and Ops and nobody seems to shooting the C700. F55 is still hot, Varicam LT and 35 have really heated up over the past year. REDs are on a high again with the Weapon w the Helium sensor. Now that Canon and Panasonic will have viable contenders to the FS7, I think you'll see FS-7 sales go back down to just traditional Sony buyers, rather than almost everyone like it's been. I think a LOT of people bought FS-7s because everyone else in the market bascially ignored the $7k to $10k space and Sony didn't. Now that Canon and Panasonic have woken up, they both want to reclaim that bread and butter sub $10k market back from Sony. Good times for us all!
 
puredrifting said:
I'm in no position to pass judgement but it seems that the C700 is not achieving success...
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It can only do Raw with the Codex recorder, right? And then it's ~ $50,000, the range where one might go for the top Red, Sony, Panasonic or Alexa.

optitek said:
How about this setup for quick pulls?
You can also control the zoom with the phone app..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9i1Hv7ABa70
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It's been brought up recently on the C200 thread and the verdict was that it's a lens good enough for 80D. Now, if this zoom was available for a 24-105, it'd be a step up. And, if there was a 24-105 F.2.8, it'd be good enough for C200/300 too.
 
DLD said:
It's been brought up recently on the C200 thread and the verdict was that it's a lens good enough for 80D. Now, if this zoom was available for a 24-105, it'd be a step up. And, if there was a 24-105 F.2.8, it'd be good enough for C200/300 too.
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Yes it seems pretty limited.
Why 24-105 if you can have 18-135?
On the other hand 18-135 is pretty much a full range needed for general motion work.
To make it F2.8 at 135 the lens would need to double in size- not very practical.
I'm going to look into controlling zoom from an app with other cameras- maybe Sony F5/55 with our adapter, ARRI and RED .The ironic thing is that we can control Canon lenses quite precisely on Sony, ARRI, RED cameras but not on Canon bodies.
 
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