To Steven Williams Elite lenses any good?

[Tim Lüdin]

To our lens chief of staff

Hi Steven, I was wondering if you know, if these Elite 35mm lenses are any good and in what pricerange they are. I'm mainly interested in the wide angles like the a 12mm. That's where RED is kinda short right now.

The lenses are mostly around 1.9 so that's pretty nice.

Here's a link to the lenses:

http://www.slowmotioninc.com/sales/35_lenses.htm

Unfortunatly Daniel and I missed you at the IBC but we will certainly meet again, when Daniel gets his baby.

Thanks
Tim

[Matt Uhry]

OK, I'm not Swiss, but I used to have a Bolex and I got food poisoning in Montreux once.

The Elite's are very nice. I projected them and tested for breathing, flare and bokeh at Slo Motion in Burbank. They are on a Par with S4's and Ultraprimes at T2 and still hold up very well WFO. There have been some gripes from Elite owners about the mechanics of the lenses. These problems may have been taken care of - I don't know. Nobody has anything bad to say about the optics.

I did not look at the 12mm, but the 9.6mm was great.

You should test them and see how they work for you.

The Red Primes look like they will be quite good from what I've seen... It's tempting to hold out for them, but I'm not happy about the missing 18mm and the 15mm being a 2.8

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com

[Stephen Williams]

Hi Tim,

Matt knows them better than I do! As you know they are not available in Switzerland.

I was already home when Daniel got to the exhibition, but sure wee will meet up soon.

Stephen

[Tim Lüdin]

Thanks Matt for your infos.

I hope the elites are not to expensive either?!
I would love to stay with the RED lenses only but their range is to limited at the moment. If you want to shoot in the next 3 months then you have no other options than to buy some other brands as well.

You wont get a hold of single primes from RED till mid 08. Also the 50-150mm wont be here in big volumes till end 07.
Its gonna be kinda hard to put a decent range together with only RED lenses in the next 3 month.

I can get my hands on a early RED (around 550) and would like to shoot 2 projekts at the end 07. That's why I'm stressing.

So do you now about the elite's pricerange? In what ballpark are they?

Cheers
Tim

[Tim Lüdin]

Hi Stephen

I see you converted to a RED "Fan". That's good. One more crazy swiss redhead. The IBC was great. The 4K presentation was an eyeopener.
Daniel and I already got our RED tripod from panther. Its the 15k. Very nice but blue and not red :angry01:

I have a lot of questions for you at our next redswiss meeting.
It's gonna be fun to play with number 222.

See ya

Tim

[Matt Uhry]

Thanks Matt for your infos.

So do you now about the elite's pricerange? In what ballpark are they?

Cheers
Tim

List Prices here:

http://optica-elite.com/price/pages/Price.aspx

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com

[Tim Lüdin]

Thanks Matt

A 12mm is around 8000 dollars then. I hope I can find that one used.

Greets

Tim

[Evin Grant]

Well a Elite prime set that matched the Red prime set (Except swaping an 18mm for the 15mm would only be about $10,000 more and you'd be getting an extra stop on all lenses, plus the choice of more focal lengths.For instance you could go:
16, 22, 28, 40, 75. or 18,24,35,50,100. Tempting.

[Tim Lüdin]

Well an other good option. Thanks Evin for the tip.
For me the cam is allready out of my mind. It's a killer. The movs and still images show that.
Im spinning lenses like crazy at the moment. I like zooms. I know they are only T3 but I don't want to change lenses all the time. It's gonna be an interesting decision process.

Tim

[Evin Grant]

Right now I'm going to give my Nikkors a shot, if those don't work out I'll look into either the Red Primes or the Elites or maybe a set of used super speeds if I can find one. I'm definately a prime guy, I like to light minimally and T1.3really helps with that.

[Paul Hazlett]

with the camera being as fast as it is, do you think we still need 1.3?

[Roberto B]

hey tim.. shame on you.. :-) ask it to stephen first than matt.. didn't you know what it is the stephen's fav glass?.. elite?!.. russian ones? :)

matt is the russian expert guy here.. he's the man! change the thread's title, dude..

[Matt Uhry]

hey tim.. shame on you.. :-) ask it to stephen first than matt.. didn't you know what it is the stephen's fav glass?.. elite?!.. russian ones? :)

matt is the russian expert guy here.. he's the man! change the thread's title, dude..

You flatter me, I was just looking into the elites as an option. I own and sometimes use the older russian lenses of the 80's and 90's.

The Elites at T1.3 are very apealing and it's potentially a really complete set. ( no gaps unless you run short on cash )

I hope Red lets us preview the primes before too long. I'm guessing that they will be good, they would be undeniable if they were T1.3 and filled in the 25mm -15mm gap.

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com

[Evin Grant]

with the camera being as fast as it is, do you think we still need 1.3?

Depends on your shooting style. I know I'll use the extra stop.
http://www.reduser.net/evin/glory.jpg
Red One #19 ISO 640 with a Zeiss 25mm T1.3 Super Speed.

[Tim Lüdin]

Hey filmaker gang. In switzerland stephen is like the maaaaaan.
If you have a question about cams oder specialy lenses you ask stephen.

It's nice that matt and evin jumped in and gave some good infos.
That's what I was hoping for.:biggrin:

To make it clear. I also love the prime superspeeds. I also like to shoot wide open. The red will be my first 35mm cam that I own. So budget plays a big role. All superspeeds cost a fortune, to bad.
That's why I'm looking in to other options like elite etc.

It would be nice if we could just stay with the RED lenses but in the next couple of month RED won't be able to provide us with all the lenses we need.
That's why a have to go with zooms and maybe one prime.

[Roberto B]

Hey filmaker gang. In switzerland stephen is like the maaaaaan.
If you have a question about cams oder specialy lenses you ask stephen.alright.. it's explained.. it's a national matter then.. so, i should change it and be swiss.. or should i be canadian?.. hey, wait, stephen is brit.. :huh: