Catching up in mini35

[Dennis Hingsberg]

I owned the mini35 300 and sold it several years ago on through this very site. What is the story these days with HD and mini35? I recall the 400 was best for HD, but now there appears to be a compact version out too. What do people recommend for an HVX200 as far as PS Technik, and non-PS Technik 35mm lens adapters?

[Bob Hart]

Dennis.


So far as I know, the "Compact" is suited only to cameras which have the ability to "flip" the image in-camera, notably the JVC GY-HD250. It features less light loss through not using a prism or mirror flip stage. Jim Frater, professional camerman here in W.A was pleased with his.

I had a look inside it recently after it was damaged on a rent out. I found signs somebody had been in there before me. The build quality as with all P+S is excellent.

The P+S groundglass seems to be the sharpest of all at 22mm motion picture frame width.

Unfortunately, with lens-in-camera style cameras which enable zoom-back to cover more groundglass area, the P+S adaptors are engineered to be reliably and predictably faithful to the motion picture image frame only.

You cannot procure better apparent resolution as you may with the alternative adaptors by covering more groundglass area and using very fast stills lenses.


The next contender I can speak for is the Letus Extreme which is a favourite through being familiar with it. I have messed with the one I have a little to push the apparent resolution up a bit.

I did this by adding a lateral-only centering adjustment vaguely similar in function to the X-Y adjustment of the Letus Ultimate so I can back off as far as I can to scale the groundglass texture smaller relative to frame size.


With that I can go very close to native camera resolution on the EX1/EX3. With a hack I can do quite well on the SI2K but there is a bit of corner softness as I used a stills lens for relay to the 2048 x 1152 sensor.

Here is a test chart which is on bottom of the page 1 of an older post. I have since made a correctly framed one which still shows the "A" and "F" blocks are optically resolved. These represent 1920 x 1080.

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/let-us-d...g-extreme.html


I can't speak for Cinevate Brevis, SGPro/Blade, Redrock M2 and its son, as I have not used them. All the alternative products have progressed beyond the first "pioneer" generation and are well matured in build quality and function. Brevis and SGPro/Blade offered swappable choices of groundglass textures and I think Redrock's latest does as well.


I have previously referred people to look at the movie "Dear Wendy" which is on DVD. This was shot on a custom Sony HD camera head tethered to a remote recorder and used a P+S Technik Pro35 adaptor and older cine lenses for a particular "look". The behind the scenes "others" are worth viewing.

A crew fitted a Pro35 up to a SI2K in Russia for a feature movie.

Phil Bloom has tried about every adaptor known to humankind and his site Philip Bloom - DP, Director, Filmmaker is worth a look.


Unfortunately I cannot now recall his name but a professional cameraman in Europe put a SGPro ( I think ) on a Viper which I think was a 2/3" system, using Zeiss optics in custom barrels and achieved amazing test results. It was posted here on dvinfo.

[Michael Galvan]

The compact version is built specifically for some JVC and Canon XL H1 cameras at the moment.

P+S has always been a favorite of mine for adapter use, their build quality really are fantastic.