Primes

[Gregory Sheffer]

Any thoughts on Illumina Prime Lenses? Can't afford an expensive set and would love to have them with my RED package.

[Matt Uhry]

They are making a new set, no one knows anything about them for sure, but here's a quick recap of the rumors:

rumors

- T1.3
- 18, 25, 35, 50, 85
- Prices to be lower than Elite
- Deliver in 2008
- Size smallish, more like Zeiss SS T1.3 than S4's
- Maybe a Zoom

/rumors

The Super 16mm set that Optar-Illumina made were of pretty good quality, in terms of resolution they were at least on a par with the old zeiss 16mm speeds.

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com

[Michael Lindsay]

Hi Matt

Wish they were are little more forth-coming with details.. I noticed the exclusive world wide sales contract for Optar lenses is up for renewal. Maybe this is the reason for their S16 lenses drying up and the lack of details about the s35 versions..

I've been dealing with elite at the moment and it is more than a little tricky.. I've already spend about $350 dollars on a translator.. I might just give up and order a set of boring old ultra-primes.

I'd love the option of a T1.3 lens. I wish Zeiss considered creating a helical (not cam driven) version of the MP without LDS for an easier price..

regards

Michael Lindsay

[Peter Sensor]

Try talking with Abel Cine Tech in Burbank, they've been renting Illuminas.

[Fredrik Callinggard]

I think it's unlikely that you'll get any of those lenses until the third or last quarter of this year. I base that on that they most likely don't have any sets done (or very few of them) as soon as the announce them. These things are normally made on pre-order. Therefor it'll take some time to get your ordered set.
Now I could be wrong and I don't know their fabrication speed at their factory, but it's a calculated guess from experience.


fred

[Mitch Gross]

At Abel we have some sets of the Illumina Super-16 lenses. In fact at one point we were not only the US dealers but had a hand in the design and worked to improve the quality control in the assembly. Rich Abel (as in Abel Cine Tech) flew to St. Petersberg to work with the engineers in the factory.

The optics were very good and the only issue was consistency of build quality. The lenses worked out to be very nice and I personally owned a set with my Aaton camera package. At the time it was deemed more economically viable to develop the Super-16 glass rather than the 35mm format lenses they also prototyped.

I don't believe that any new Optar Illumina 35 lenses are currenly available anywhere to test. They may have produced prototypes or they may just exist on paper right now. Certainly we don't have them.

Mitch Gross
Technical Director of Rental
Abel Cine Tech