FINALLY!!! Got my Canon mounts and just tested the hell out of it!

[Yusuf Thakur]

Hi Ketch,

Thanks for the reply, came down to India on urgent personal family issue and could not post earlier as I was not able to access the net properly.

Please do get in touch when you are next time in Dubai, would be glad to catch up.

Yusuf Thakur
VFX,Dubai.

Hi Yusuf,

sorry we didn't get to meet in any of my Dubai trips, but I promise we will next time... ;)

Indeed, this is the market, and this are the times in which we are today, and He/She whom does not adapt, then remains left behind.

One must always take advantages of new technologies, and new ways of expressing one self artistically, and also in conducting business.

Of course when talking about business, that depends what the business is, and most importantly whom the clients are, and what are their specific demands.


But, again to each is own, and this goes not only for the individual professional but also for the individual piece of gear.

I have been using Canon glass for as fa as I can remember and have used some that most of you guys never even seen come to market,
yet I have a place for Canon 35mm STILL glass, as I have a place for 645 STILL glass, and of course a place for the various Cinema glass... ;)

Even so there is the exception, and the few which like many of us here, experiment with one and the other, none will replace each other, NONE!!

[Steve Gibby]

To be honest... I doubt I'd use these lenses much in the world I work in, Big crews, with big gear, big shots, cranes, heads, Mo Con etc... forget it.
But for simple arty jobs, were you want to travel around the world with a back pack shooting art, Yes please.

Thanks for all the real world tests and posts Mark. Me and my associates findings with Canon lenses on Epic roughly parallel what you've posted. I have a huge kit of Canon L series lenses I use on my Epic cameras and my 5D MKII. With Red One I used my kit of good Nikon lenses almost exclusively (28 of them), with the exception of my stock Canon FD 150-600 (Century PL mount only conversion). I can't wait to test all those Nikon lenses out on Epic when the new Red Nikon smart mount is available.

Your comment I've quoted above points out the diversity of the motion media industry. There's a huge percentage of Epic, Scarlet, and Red One owners and users whose work involves exactly the opposite of "Big crews, with big gear, big shots, cranes, heads, Mo Con". That would be the aggregate mobile EFP style, mobile hybrid style, and small indie cine style industries. I'm one of those. For our corners of the industry, the camera/lens/accessory (or lack of accessory) setups you've been testing are basically very close to the streamlined mobile setups we've been using on Epic for our normal work for slightly over a year now - high profile work, but not a lot of publicity about how its been done. As we all know "Horses for courses"...

Thanks again for taking the time to test out these Canon lenses, and then give straightforward feedback on your findings. Very much appreciated by many of us here! In days past I would have stepped up to do the same thing here, but work life has been incredibly busy and complicated this past year.

Cheers Mate ;)

[Mark Toia]

Thanks for all the real world tests and posts Mark. Me and my associates findings with Canon lenses on Epic roughly parallel what you've posted. I have a huge kit of Canon L series lenses I use on my Epic cameras and my 5D MKII. With Red One I used my kit of good Nikon lenses almost exclusively (28 of them), with the exception of my stock Canon FD 150-600 (Century PL mount only conversion). I can't wait to test all those Nikon lenses out on Epic when the new Red Nikon smart mount is available.

Your comment I've quoted above points out the diversity of the motion media industry. There's a huge percentage of Epic, Scarlet, and Red One owners and users whose work involves exactly the opposite of "Big crews, with big gear, big shots, cranes, heads, Mo Con". That would be the aggregate mobile EFP style, mobile hybrid style, and small indie cine style industries. I'm one of those. For our corners of the industry, the camera/lens/accessory (or lack of accessory) setups you've been testing are basically the streamlined mobile setups we've been using on Epic for our normal work for slightly over a year now - high profile work, but not a lot of publicity about how its been done. As we all know "Horses for courses"...

Thanks again for taking the time to test out these Canon lenses, and then give straightforward feedback on your findings. Very much appreciated by many of us here! In days past I would have stepped up to do the same thing here, but work life has been incredible busy and complicated this past year.

Cheers Mate ;)

I just had a couple of days off... So I had a chance.

Better to be working than not mate.... :) Go hard

[Nick Wernham]

This is so exciting. I just got my allocation for both the Modular Assault Plate and Ti Canon mount for our Scarlet today. I'm not sure if I'm more excited for this mount or our Red Pro Primes.

[Mark Toia]

The Red pro primes are great!! But to bloody big and heavy! Like the master primes. But still great glass!
You cannot beat PL glass but canon glass certainly did impress me.

[Paul Russell]

Have you tried to pull focus with Redmote's little wheel? I remember Jarred saying that you will be able to do that even on a regular Redmote.

You can, but not to any fine degree, so in the real world it's not really workable.

[Will Keir]

I know what you mean. Is it me or does the lens seem to have a bit of a curve/bend downward to it?

Zoikes! That looks like an awful lot of stress on the mounts at the lens/extender! Is that a 2x AND a 1x on there? Is your Red mount Ti?

[Andrae Palmer]

The Red pro primes are great!! But to bloody big and heavy! Like the master primes. But still great glass!
You cannot beat PL glass but canon glass certainly did impress me.

You can definitely beat PL glass... after seeing Canon lens footage... my clients that normally wanted RED Pro Primes before don't give a damn about it anymore. The RED Pro Primes maybe sharp... but they look videoish. Thank God I don't own them anymore. Even more they rent for too low on the market. I can rent five Canon L Primes for the same money as RED Pro Primes.

Thank you for posting this thread Mark. Very informative.

[Mark Toia]

I just shot a huge epic job and majority of it was shot on the canon glass for full cinema release...

All I can say it WOW! Used PL glass as well on a second camera. Cannot see any difference between the the shots.

Here is a sneaky couple of shots...

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Thanks Mark for some nice tests. In terms of image quality the canon lenses stand up well. There are many situations, such as wildlife, where the master primes are too short or too heavy to be carried in the field. Canon glass works great.

I am particularly impressed with the new Canon 70-200 f2.8 L IS II USM lens. It works great handheld as well as with TCs. The Image Stabilisation is great for filming as well. My views: http://www.indiawilds.com/diary/cano...ii-usm-review/

Last week I was in Sundarbans in India and was in the midst of a storm. I had some amazing footage but yet to edit. For big studio guys, it may be too much of a problem handling the canon lenses and missing focus marks etc. But for us small three member crew shooting and filming wildlife, canon lenses and a zeiss here and there, is the way to go.