here you can find the first attempt to make the FX1 with an
interchangeable lens mount (nikon)

http://www.eidomedia.com/hdv


it gave me the shivers.... bye Matteo

<<<-- Originally posted by Matteo Ricchetti : here you can find the first attempt to make the FX1 with an
interchangeable lens mount (nikon)

http://www.eidomedia.com/hdv


it gave me the shivers.... bye Matteo -->>>

There's a word beginning with the letter C that describes this for me. It's either Clever or Crazy!!! I can't make up my mind which yet...... suppose that depends on the success or failure of the attempt really.

Hope they don't want to go and claim a warranty on the cam if it fails miserably!!!

The thing is did it work?

<<<-- Originally posted by Gary McClurg : The thing is did it work? -->>>

Yes as you can see in the pics.. I think I'll put the Nikon mount in a few days (on saturday may be)

Matteo

takes a mighty brave man to do that.
you have any ideas how we could come up with a setup that uses some kind of solid state card that would record data coming out of the composite connection?

<<<-- Originally posted by Darrell Essex : takes a mighty brave man to do that.
you have any ideas how we could come up with a setup that uses some kind of solid state card that would record data coming out of the composite connection? -->>>

you mean time code data or video images.?
If it is time code is better to use the LANC port

GREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAT!!!!

i just can't beleive this!!!

fantastic!!!!

exelent job!

i cannot sleep now!


all the best,


filip

Brave? Hmmm. Crazy? More likely.

To be rich enough to throw away a camera that expensive, if it broke....

Certainly it is no longer under warranty. What if Sony has a recall to fix something?

Scary.

Like watching a lion eat a barely dead animal. Disgusting, but too interesting not to watch.

i will do the same the very next day when my camera finally arrives!!!!!

mateo you are the man!!!

keep moving! the world is waiting for pioneers like you!

i'm 100000000% with you!


filip

p.s.

i really can't sleep now!

Holy cow, somebody actually had the guts to do it! Pretty cool!

Maybe I missed something, I see that he opened the camera, removed the lens to expose the ccd block, then "held" a different lens in front of the block... and the camera registered an image. Did he actually manufacture a MOUNT that will hold the lenses?

I guess that's why I asked did it work. Can you run around and shoot with the new lens.

Richard, Matteo's 2nd post of today says "I think I'll put the Nikon mount in a few days (on saturday may be)."

So we'll just have to wait. Ain't nobody comin' at my XL2 with no screwdriver!

JS

Awesome.

Insanity - that's the only word I have for this.

Now, if you were to put a mount on it that would allow the use of professional Canon or Fujinon Glass, I might be interested. But to simply use a 35mm lens infront, I don't think it makes that much difference

The lens the camera ships with is great in my opinionl. Certainly on par with Nikon 35mm glass

DBK

Is the sensor size similar to that of 16mm film? It would make sense if the mount could use lenses intended for 16mm cameras, perhaps. Just a thought straight out of my head... I have never even used a 16mm camera myself!

you fricken psycho. i don't under stand why anyone would want to do that but..... ok

friggen psychos

If you are using 35mm lenses, all your lenses are going to be really tele. As with the XL2, they will be ~7 times more tele than what it says on the lense (in comparison to view angle.) So you will not have a wide angle at all. Using video lenses is a better idea, but they'll also be somewhat tele. So I would suggest anyone wanting to do this, think twice if you need a wide angle!

But, great work. Looking forward to some more modifications.

I salute your creativity....but you really did this only for a telephoto option? Century optics 1.6 Tele-converter, anyone? I tried to enlarge the example pic where you were focusing on the keyboard, i saw no zoom level marker on the LCD, am i correct?

I am not really an expert cameraman/AC but why are you switching out a Zeiss for a Nikon? It seems to me the only thing I would rather have in front of the CCD is some glass produced by panavision (again, only speaking from my limited exp).

Anyways, I again tried out the .4 fisheye from century optics on my FX1 today, century makes some great glass, really professional. Im brabbing the .32 fisheye and the 1.6 later this month.

I guess what Im saying is it seems more reasonable to me to just grab an adapter, but whatever floats your boat.

One thing i was wondering from this experiment...is there a way to easily and cleanly remove the on board microphone without any kind of gaping hole? that might be something I would be interest later on.



<<<-- Originally posted by Filip Kovcin : i will do the same the very next day when my camera finally arrives!!!!!
-->>>


yeah somehow i doubt that your first urge after buying an the camera will be to break it open. you have no experience in operating the camera, why would you change out one of (if not the) most important acccesory from day 1?
that just strikes me as a little ignorant. Sometimes I wish we could have an FX1 forum for hearsay, "my friend told me..." stories and general rubbish spouted by people who do not own the camera. Not to sound harsh, but I have had to sift through a lot of blatantly false information, misstated facts and garbage from people who were just talking out of their ass. It really is detrimental to someone who is looking to research this pricey investment.

sorry Evan, but with your permition - i WILL do whatever i want to do with my camera.
even to throw it thru window if i wish. (but i will not :))

if you do not beleive - sorry. that's your opinion. i do not want to push anyone to beleive me.

if you need to now why i'm so entusiastic about that - it's because with this dissasembling you can do whatever you want - to use 35mm still lenses, to use 2/3" video lenses, to use aldu/agus adapter more easier, to "glue" mini 35 directly to ccd without fighting with normal - already connected with the camera body - lenses (it will short all unit), and probably you can put CCD upside down to have instantly proper image when using aldu/agus adapters etc.

and this is fantastic.

but if you want to see my dissasembling - i'm kindly invite you to poland to dissasemble Z1 together.

all the best,

filip

I guess for some people it's just like customizing a car.

Some mod their stock standards with fairings or mags, while some go way out....dropping in new blocks and all!!

I just have the quezzie feeling that doing this to a FX-1 or Z1 is a bit like customizing something like the Mazda RX-8....

Sony may not realize it yet, but I feel this camera is a piece of classic technology, and the gains you get from messing with classic technology are usually of very minor consequence.

just to explain why: I own this camera and I am very happy of the quality of it. I work with BetacamSP and DV and I am used to digital betacam as well. This is far better of all of them.
The weakness of this camera is indeed the lens: not too bad but not as good as the electronics. The main defect is a color fringe (red/gren) that sometimes appears and a little soft focus when not used at totally wide or tele zoom (mid tele is not so good).

If you make nature documentary you need to switch to serious telephoto lens and the add-on converters are not so good. The same for macro...

I have always made lens adapters for my cameras since an old Hitachi 3 tubes in the '80.. Hope in a few day to put some images talken with this modification.. bye, Matte

<<<-- Originally posted by Steve Crisdale :
Sony may not realize it yet, but I feel this camera is a piece of classic technology, and the gains you get from messing with classic technology are usually of very minor consequence. -->>>


steve, i agree on this what you said, i also beleive that this peace is again THE classic. like many other sony models.


but if you can do something WITOUT destroing (at least i beleive that nothing will be destroyed durnig that process) there is no problem.

you stil have the camera, you have the all parts around - you can use it the way you like it. and if you can and know how to put it back when needed and your camera still works... who cares.

anyhow - i beleive that every owner of the camera can do whatever he wants to do with it - if this is not dangerous for other people's healt (and his own fo course).

just a thought

all the best,

filip

<<<-- Originally posted by Matteo Ricchetti : I work with BetacamSP and DV and I am used to digital betacam as well. This is far better of all of them.
-->>>

matteo,

will you use B4 2/3" mount on your unit or what?

(BTW i'm also working in beta world)


filip

Evan I understand that you wouldn't want to experiment this way with your camera, but people are free to do whatever they want with theirs. And I personally think it's rather interesting.

Matteo...

Sorry I am not following you quite all the way. Your saying a flaw of the stock Zeiss has something to do with the way it renders red/green colors? I can kind of follow you on the soft focus in mid tele (but again, keep in mind im not really a DP/AC)

Have you been able to shoot any sample clips with the new lens? If you could post a clip or two I know the entire community would be grateful. Also, what particular Nikon lens are you using?

edit:
penfold: that wasnt neccesarily a comment on this thread but this forum in general. I mean....this is actually one the of the best explained, documented and techinical threads with real world results I have seen! :P

Everybody is calling them crazy and insane....

Why?

How do you know they don't have a $750,000.00 budget to shoot a horror film in March 2005???

And they told their Exec-producer that they will use $3500.00 of their $750,000.00 to make some non-destroying experiments to get that perfect shot...and if it works, they will buy 5 of these cameras and do the same if its a success? (Spike Lee used 20 brand new minidv cameras on Bamboozled).

Everybody is not a wedding videographer who has to beg their wife to dip into the savings account to buy gear, guys! *smile*

- Shannon W. Rawls

ok......... did you find pee pee in your cheerios?

Well, Shannon, of course you are right.

But as a prosumer, it still rattles me right down to the bones to see something I worked many hours to buy, treated that way. Yes, they probably know what they are doing. But it is a fearful thing to see.

I used to rip things apart when I was a kid. When I went into the Army, I learned to put stuff back together.

Now, I pretty much use things they way they came from the factory.

so did you get it finished? the pics look like you just got the cam apart.

Good luck!

What I think would be truly brilliant would be a modular front on the camera that would allow for multiple lens mounts. I own an Arri 2c that can be changed out for PL and Panavision mounts; it's not hard to imagine being able to do a similar thing here so that you could remount the stock lens, switch to a Canon XL mount to use their series of lenses or the Canon relay for the Mini35, a B4 mount to use any broadcast lens, a PL mount for using 16 or 35mm cine lenses, or a still camera (Nikon, Canon etc) mount . Obviously a lot of work to make all of these, but it would provide maximum flexibility. The tricky bit is seating aluminum parts into those molded plastic shells--a bit dicey. And really, there would be a significant issue with weight capacity, the camera structure is not designed to support a signficant lens up front. Even with still lenses, watch out for the big zooms or fat wide-angles...most fixed focal lenses should be OK weight-wise. I'm sure you guys are on to that.

I applaud those who have the cojones and/or resources to do this sort of thing. As a tot I was surrounded by some of the original hackers, gents who frequented the MIT Media Lab and to whom everything was a potential hack. Later, as a fledgling Steadicam operator with an ancient rig I was constantly having new parts built and retooling the thing bit by bit. I think the curvy plastic/solid state nature of these cameras make them seem a bit daunting to break into--you expect a gaggle of warning lights to go off, and the unit self-destructs in your hands into a puddle of slag, but it's still just a widget after all, and every widget can be improved on.

Go nuts, guys. Let's see what it can do.

2nd day THE FLANGE

again at www.eidomedia.com/hdv the 2nd part of the work... now we have a C mount on the camera after a lot of efforts to make around it enough space to put a Nikon barrel...



tomorrow I'll put online the first shot made with the nikon lens...

Many thanks for the visit to the site... Matteo

holy hell! nice flange....I bet it took some time in the lathe. Its gonna be nice when you get done.

Why are you using the c-mount video lens??? Wouldnt a 35mm film or still lens provide a more movie like look with deeper depth of field and have better glass?

35mm still lenses don't rotate smoothly, for one...

The depth of field wouldn't increase with lenses designed for 35mm. The size of the imager is the determining factor in depth of field. If you put a C-Mount lens designed for, say 16mm, you'd simply get a more telephoto lens because the imager area for the FX-1 is smaller than a 16mm film aperture. If you put a lens designed for 35mm on this camera, you'd get a lens that is MUCH more telephoto than it would be in 35mm.

Regardless of the lens used, there will be a certain depth of field for a lens with a certain angle of view. For instance, if it takes a 35mm lens at 100mm telephoto to get a certain angle of view, and a 16mm C-Mount lens at 50mm telephoto to get the same angle of view, the depth of field will be the same for both of those lenses.

I know my math is wrong, but I'm just trying to illustrate a point. The smaller your imaging surface, the more telephoto a certain lens will be, and the more depth of field you will have.

I think that C-mount would be the ideal option for this camera, due to the low price and availability of lenses designed for 16mm or Super-16 film. Wouldn't the quality and resolving power of these lenses be plenty for HDV work?

/thinking of holding on to my 16mm Bolex for a bit longer

Alright guys. Reality check time. The Nikon lens mount looks cool and offers a few advantages like much much longer lenses but before you open your camera up don’t forget what you DONT get or even LOOSE when you make a modification like this:

1)You no longer have a lens that can give you a wide angle. Thats right. No remotely wide shots anymore due to the 7X factor.

2)You do NOT have 35mm DOF. You still only have 1/3" DV DOF. It may appear like you do but thats only because its using a lens that is much more telephoto than the built in camera's lens. You can get the exact look right now if you put a 2X lens in front. Lenses this long will give you the appearance of shallower DOF but it will also feel like every shot was taken from a great distance away as if you were constantly spying on your subject. Distracting.

3)Auto focus....gone. No a big deal for most but some people use auto focus.

Don’t get me wrong. This mod would be GREAT if you’re into doing surfing videos and wild life videography – basically anything that solely uses long to extremely long lenses. For most other types of videography though it’s little more than a gimmick and one that actually limits the camera more than empowers it. For me personally it seems like your giving up too much for too little.