Better for features: RPP 300, or converted Nikon 200/2

[Morgan Schmidt]

Greetings,

Curious to hear folks' thoughts. I'd like to acquire a longer lens to add to my package, partly to get those beautiful out of focus backgrounds. The two candidates that are in my price range (of course if you're aware of others...) are the Red 300/2.8 and the older converted Nikon 200/2. Do you have an opinion on which is more 1) useful in day to day feature production, and 2) beautiful? By beautiful I mean there's a 'vibe' to the shots made with it, it flares beautifully, particularly nice bokeh, etc...

Cheers,
Morgan

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http://www.morganschmidt.com
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[Mark K.]

I'd take the 200mm f/2 every time. There's just something magical about that lens.

[Matt Uhry]

200 f2 is the hotness. Love mine.

Matt Uhry
www.mattuhry.com

[Michael Hardwick]

Completely agree - the 200 T.2 Nikkor is a must. For me I find it be the longest useful focal length when shooting in the normal set environment. Trying to employ a 300mm for a close up would involve moving the camera too far away from the set. Don't get me wrong if you have the space a 300mm is great as you can really compress your backgrounds, layer foreground elements, crosses etc... But yeah, the Nikkor 200mm t2 ranks up there as one of my all time favorites. Very sharp, beautiful focus rolloff, matches well with most primes. There are many out there that have been converted to cinema mechanics by Century Precision, Optex and others, you should rent one on a shoot, and you'll quickly see what I mean. On a recent feature project, the director loved the look of that lens so much, we designed the coverage of entire scenes around it, and although sometimes tricky for our focus puller those scenes were my favorite from the film.

[Mike 'Fireman' Ross]

I'll give an alternative; the Canon FD 200mm f/1.8 is gorgeous, but as rare as rocking horse shit. Wish I had one... Optex did some PL conversions on them. I do have the FD 300mm f/2.8 and it's a lovely thing.

I've never tried the Nikon but if I can't find a Canon I'll probably buy a Nikon in PL; I've heard a lot of people rave about it.

Mike

[Jeremy Torrie]

I have the 300mm RPP. We used it on a number of shots on our feature and it was sweet. We added my doubler to get some 600mm action, which was even sweeter. Can't comment on the other glass but I can tell you we loved the results from the 300.

[Steven Veldkamp]

If you're up for a small adventure, i suggest taking a look at the Wild Heerbrugg (Leica) 98mm f1.4 lens. Originally made for aerial reconnaissance cameras, it has an image diameter of roughly 90mm and it's blistering sharp wide open.
While it does have an aperature, it lacks any sort of focussing.... some machining might be required.

The large image diameter translates to about 300mm on a s35 sensor.

[Shane Kelly]

The large image diameter translates to about 300mm on a s35 sensor.

wouldn't it still be a 98mm lens, no matter what sensor it's being used on?

[Steven Veldkamp]

wouldn't it still be a 98mm lens, no matter what sensor it's being used on?

True, but the resulting image would be comparable to using a 300mm lens. ;- )

[Shane Kelly]

True, but the resulting image would be comparable to using a 300mm lens. ;- )

You'll have to explain that one to me.