BREVIS XL ex1 first short

[Phil Bloom]

Philip Bloom Stuck with you

Just a little fun piece to test out. I will be doing some more shooting with it over the next week or so then will write a detailed blog about my experiences.

I just need to adjust my XY, get it more centered and zoom in no more than z77 really and the edge sharpness will be spot on. It does go edge to edge soft the more you zoom in past the optimum point. At the sweet spot it's, er, sweet!

[Benjamin Eckstein]

Very curious to hear your findings.

[Paul Joy]

Originally Posted by Phil Bloom

I just need to adjust my XY, get it more centered and zoom in no more than z77 really and the edge sharpness will be spot on.

Very interesting. Dennis mentions in his video that anything past 69 is going downhill [no smutty jokes please ;)]. Are you zooming up to 77 to get past the darkened edges? I can get full frame at 70 but get light fall off at the left and right edges.

Just out of interest Phil, what do you need to zoom to with the Letus Extreme & Ultimate?

[Phil Bloom]

hi paul

i can get away with z70 with the letus ultimate when perfectly xy adjusted. it's just a shame you can't zoom into z99 like you can with the letus line without badly losing edge focus.

[Paul Joy]

Originally Posted by Phil Bloom

it's just a shame you can't zoom into z99 like you can with the letus line without badly losing edge focus.

Thanks Phil. So when using the Letus adapters, do you vary zoom levels for shot composition? I'd assumed that zooming with a 35mm adapter would be to a one off affair just to get set up.

I'll try zooming in a little further next time I get the camera out and see how my results vary.

[Dennis Wood]

The EX1 is rather unique among video cameras in terms of its focus field curvature behavior, and is a challenge to deal with depending on what adapter is attached, and the nature of its optics. For this reason, we tend to point folks to our EX1 shooting guide to make sure they're aware of the factors that should be taken into account for camera setup. Phil has alluded to this previously in terms of the "sweet" spot.

While other manufacturers have just increased achromat strength to get the camera to a different zoom range, we have not done this in order to preserve the chromatic and spherical cleanliness of our flip unit. You'll find that the Brevis MP.1 flip is extremely clean in this regard...but few compare adapters on this criteria these days. We've got more coming on the EX1 front, but I can't really discuss that project until our legal work is done :-)

Cheers,
Dennis Wood
www.cinevate.com

[Phil Bloom]

Originally Posted by Paul Joy

Thanks Phil. So when using the Letus adapters, do you vary zoom levels for shot composition? I'd assumed that zooming with a 35mm adapter would be to a one off affair just to get set up.

I'll try zooming in a little further next time I get the camera out and see how my results vary.

yep the letus lets me zoom from z69 to z99 with very little loss of resolution. The Brevis/ flip is more traditional. There is a definite sweet spot that you need to lock down.

[Dennis Wood]

We've had a project in the "skunkworks" for about six months with regard to the EX1 and cameras with similar field focus curvature issues. The project involves highly refined optics that approach the challenge quite differently from what you've seen so far. You'll see more from us on this one over the next 3 weeks...but so far only good news :-)

Cheers,
Dennis.

[Paul Joy]

Hi Dennis, can you tell those of us who have invested in Brevis units for the EX1 if this mystery solution is going to help us too?

If this new product is an add on to the Brevis that's designed to tackle the light fall off issues we're seeing it will be very good news indeed.

It would be great to get your feedback.

Best regards

Paul.

[Dan Chung]

Dennis,

I second Paul's point, after all the time of sticking it out for the Brevis and the EX-1 'fix' I am still not really satisfied with the result enough to use it for my daily work. I've invested a lot in Cinevate products and shipping gear back and forth for upgrades, I had thought the CF-XL 'fix' was going to be the answer to my prayers. Also I was led to believe that the fix work equally well for my non-flipped configuration, but it seems this is not so.

Dan

[Dennis Wood]

What our research is telling us, thanks to your feedback and hands-on testing, is that not all EX1 stock lenses behave the same. This is consistent with early feedback from the field from those shooters using the EX1 bare. The stillmotion.ca crew just left here after using our EX1 and lens collection over the last week...and you'll see the impressive results very shortly.

Anyone who has been with us for a while knows that as long as I'm not 100% happy, the R&D efforts on a project are on-going. I'd refer you to entire line of imaging elements that have been developed to ensure our shooters are happy with just about every camera out there. To that end, we've been working on cleaning up the issues across the EX1 range, with serious consideration being made to the next hot camera that ships with focus field curvature in macro situations.

In other words, just like everyone with myopia goes to the optometrist and gets a custom prescription, we've developed similar technology for video cameras. At the end of the day every existing Brevis MP.1 will gain the benefits of this modular technology so that we will be able to guarantee "perfect" adapter performance with not just the EX1, but your future camera platform too. It just so happens that our first "prescription" is being written for the EX1. If you're thinking I'm just hyping...check your flip interface alignment ring and ask yourself what the internal threads are there for :-)

[Dennis Wood]

Dan, I forgot to mention this, but all of our optical fix components must be used with the flip configuration for best performance. This was a choice we had to make as over 90% of our customers use the flip exclusively, and we simply can't afford to engineer both flip and non-flip solutions.

To summarize, our bare non-flip/flip components will continue to work very well with cameras having "normal" optics like the HV20, XH-A1, HVX200 etc. For units like the EX1, the flip will be strongly suggested for use with our modular optics. These modular fixes are professionally engineered solutions that require that our flip optics be integrated in the CAD optics profile.

[Dan Chung]

Dennis,

That's all well and good but I did go to extreme pains when ordering to point out that I was not going to use a flip and had no desire to use one when I purchased the EX-1 'fix', I also made it clear that I was only using the EX-1 and nothing else with the Brevis. I was told the 'fix' worked equally well for a flipped and non-flipped Brevis. Now you are telling me that I will have to buy the flip in order to get the thing to work, this is really not very satisfactory.

Dan

[Dennis Wood]

Dan, I'm not saying it won't work. What I am saying is that the solution is engineered with the flip in mind. Being that 95% of our users are using the flip, that's where 95% of the resources end up. Every single camera challenge we've been presented with has been dealt with to the point that the Brevis adapter system is the most flexible system in the world. Once our relay lens drops, we'll have a fitment range (where you don't have to just "zoom in" to clear vignetting that shouldn't be there) that spans $800 cameras to $75 000 cameras.

The EX1 is one camera that has required special attention, but rather than just throw a single solution at it, we're taking the time to make sure that the solution is modular, retrogradeable, and when the next "problem" camera comes around, it will be a nearly instant fix. We know that some folks are still not happy, and we won't be either until 100% are satisfied.

[Paul Joy]

Hi Dennis, thanks for letting us know that you're on the case with this problem. I'll certainly be interested in trying out the solution once you have it available.