1.8x Anamorphic support?

[Josiah Duncan]

Shooting more and more anamorphic nowadays, and gearing up to do some tests in the next week or two. With different ratios coming out of Cooke's high end, when can we expect a 1.8x mode supported? I don't care as much about 1.5x but I imagine other people do so it wouldn't hurt, the more lenses we can use practically in cam the better. Is this coming with a new firmware update any time soon? 1.8x support at 4/3 is what it looks like I may be needing this year.

Edit: Would also really like 1.65 ratio - been working with some different optics recently and the more options the better, 1.6 is pretty difficult to deal with in cam right now.

[Michael Lindsay]

1.65x support would be good too.... I am assuming DXL2 has it already?

[Mathias Erichsen]

I’m hoping for 1.8x and 1.5x support too :)

[Zack Birlew]

I wish that anamorphic lens manufacturers would stick with 1.33x or 2x to keep things simple but admittedly with digital these days it's just a touchscreen flick on the menu screen to crop, stretch, and squeeze the image as needed so if the middle-range lens ratios can work then everybody should start programming those in at this point if anamorphic support is in the camera already. If not, then you're going to have to try looking around at the external monitors on the market and see if any of them have squeeze modes that work, there's remarkably a lot more anamorphic support than expected on my cheap Feelworld LCD.

[Tom Gleeson]

Josiah,

This request has been made to Red for a while now. I asked Red about it last year for a project and got a "Well maybe. We are looking at it but no timetable..." With other top line cameras supporting the 1.8x squeeze Red should step up. Make your feelings known to Red. It must be harder than it would seem but nothing will happen if Red doesn't get the feed back.

[Aaron Lochert]

I wish that anamorphic lens manufacturers would stick with 1.33x or 2x

It'd be nice, but I think the lens manufacturers are sort of always following the sensor designers. As the intended goal of anamorphic has always been to maximize the surface area of recording and increase captured detail versus grain. It seems with the 1.65x's and 1.8x's, that concept is still holding true.

I think as the world moves toward 8K and beyond with cleaner and cleaner sensors, they're going to care less about this sort of thing and we'll be able to choose anamorphic for purely aesthetic reasons because we can afford to throw so much resolution away at capture. And I think when that happens we'll just settle back at 2X anamorphic since it has all of the "look" we've been conditioned to love.

Makes me wonder, though, has any lens designer ever tested wider than 2X squeeze? I was thinking 1.33x always seemed like a cop out since you don't really bring along much of the anamorphic look and feel. What if we turned the camera bodies 90 degrees and shot on a 4X anamorphic? You'd get a 2.1:1 ratio on a red sensor, 2.25:1 on a 16:9 sensor or 2.6:1 on an Arri open gate. Would the anamorphic stretch effect be insane looking? Would the lenses be stupid hard to design?

[Josiah Duncan]

1.65x support would be good too.... I am assuming DXL2 has it already?

I agree. I've been working with some weird optics recently and would also love to add 1.65/1.66 to my list. It's right in between the supported squeeze ratios so there's no great way to monitor it in camera.

[Evin Grant]

I'll add my support for variable anamorphic desqeeze, I have a 1.5x Aviascope coming and would love to not have to have a 3rd part monitor.

[Joshua Nitschke]

I have the new 1.8x Vazen and would love to have 1.8x mode on my Scarlet-W

[Travis MacRitchie]

I will add my voice to this as well. 1.8x is going to be the new 2x. I'm super happy with our 1.8X Cooke's on Mini LF right now. Would love to use them on our Monstro.