Leica R lenses on RED

[Sanjin Jukic]

Leica R lenses on RED

It was discussed before but should be repeated again:

Leica R lenses on RED

Bruce Allen, a member of this forum wrote at HD4Indies.com the following:
"Dalsa...They also had a beautiful set of non-anamorphic PL mount primes - mostly Leica glass, plus Canons for the extreme zooms. They feel that the Leica glass is superior to Zeiss and Cooke for 4k acquisition...


dalsa_leica_primes, photo by bruce allen

How you could attach Leica R lenses on RED?

Very simple. Just attach Leica R lens adapter to Canon EOS on upcoming Birger EOS mount to RED.


Leica R lens adapter to Canon EOS on the right side.

Then you could use "Leica R high-performance lenses that are meticulously handcrafted of exclusive high-grade materials, and are designed for long life. The extensive range of R system lenses covers focal lengths from 15 mm to 800 mm, and, with the LEICA APO-EXTENDER-R 2x even up to 1,600 mm."
http://www.leica-camera.us/photography/r_system/lenses/

Also you could buy each lens separately. You don't have to buy set. Just choose what you need.
And they are all manual, primes and zooms/vario lenses.

[luis bustamante]

Thanks for the info. Do you know anything about using Leica M lenses on the Red?

[Bruce Allen]

Sanjin, we'll do some detective work to find out if those are actually re-housed Leica Rs... I think you are right though. They are available for rent and I know a guy who owns half a Red and will be renting through Dalsa, so I'll see if I can rent 'em and then we'll try to do some comparisons between your Birger-ized Canon mount Leicas and the Dalsa Leicas. I must admit they looked really, really nice sitting next to the Master Primes and Cookes. Also kinda compact.

I'll put the full res JPG up on my server in a few hours' time so you can scrutinize if you want. I am going on a component-buying expedition for my monitor now.

You would have appreciated their anamorphic 50mm 1.4 too. Nice bokeh. Little breathing. Just the ticket for a 2.35 feature.

Cheers

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

[number6]

Oooooooh! Makes me lusty!

[Matt Uhry]

Maximum speed on some of those wide and medium wide leica's was 2.8 which is not especially inspiring in a prime. Dalsa does have a set of Master Primes and a set of S4's so you can still be friends and buy them beers.

The reason they made these converted Leica R lens sets is because the origin sensor is BIG, active area 34x17.2mm lots of the cine primes did not cover or did not perform all that well at the extreme edges.

I'm sure we'll hear from Illya about this before too long.

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com

[Evin Grant]

Sanjin, I know you're excited about the Eos-Leica R/Nikon F adapters but I's still a bit concerned about thier sturdyness and stability. You are introducing a completely new set of connection points and possible manufacturing tollerance differences that may impact performace both mechanically and optically. We will have to test of course but I'm relatively sure that Red would make a Leica R mount for you if you asked. Also the flange focal distance of the R mount is 47mm, nikon F is 46.5mm, it should be fairly easy to adapt any Leica R lens to Nikon F mount thus giving you the benefit of both lens systems without adapters or switching mounts.

[Bruce Allen]

Okay, as promised, here are full res pics of the Dalsa Leicas:
http://www.boacinema.com/projects/mi..._fullres_2.jpg

And a wide shot including their Canon zooms (DigiPrimes are above, a piece of a Master Prime is in the top-left corner)
http://www.boacinema.com/projects/mi..._fullres_1.jpg

And a close-up of their Canon zooms (that's a Cooke next to them)
http://www.boacinema.com/projects/mi..._fullres_3.jpg

Again, I loved their anamorphic 1.4 and am very much looking forward to seeing how their 6-lens set turns out...

I seriously think Dalsa can be a friend to Red users. No reason why we can't shoot mostly on Red but rent their camera for a day or two if we hit a CMOS motion issue or some kind of latitude or sensitivity issue. Of course the Red may be superior in terms of latitude and sensitivity but who knows - it's nice having a backup right? I thought their footage looked really, really good. It's good having two 4K cameras, let's hope they don't go bankrupt.

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

[Sanjin Jukic]

Luis>>
As i know Leica M lenses only work with Leica M camera series analog or digital. Leica M lens flange focal distance is too short for any kind of adapter. Could be or could be not possible to make a special adapter for RED, I don't know. A lens engineer should be contacted.

Allen>>
Thanks for all Cinegear info and looking forward to your comparative tests. And a good luck with your monitor development.

Evin>>
Very good idea about Leica R to RED mount. Another good idea is that Jim could cooperate with Leica on a similar basis like Panasonic is doing. This cooperation could be named Leica on RED 4K cinematography lens division. Also I am not sure that anybody could make better 4K lenses than Leica did for 35mm still cameras. In general no Zeiss, Cooke, Panavision, Angeniux, Canon, Fuji, Nikon, Russians can compete with Leica picture quality.

[ZzzZZz...]

Maybe you are right... but then again maybe you aren´t.
The differences are hardly noticeable, and for most applications irrelevant. Watch out for the Brand Fetish boys.

[PaulClements]

Watch out for the Brand Fetish boys.

I've never heard of Fetish boys lenses. Are they any good? :)