The biggest weakness of 35mm adapters is their inability to resolve detail in wide shots. I'm here to tell you that the Letus Flip Enhanced can do just that. I am really impressed with the detail retained in distant subjects.

Here is a test featuring 3 lenses (28mm, 50mm, 100mm) shooting across the other side of the lake where I live. I am thrilled with the usability of these shots instead of having to deal with the nightmare of mixing shots from the adapter and the stock lens.

So, unlike what you are used to seeing with these adapters, the purpose of this test is to see how well the Letus performs outside of the confines of shallow depth of field. Okay, I threw in two token shots of flowers :)

Softness is to be expected with these adapters but as softness goes, this is less pronounced than what I've seen with other adapters. There is also a little vignetting because I was not zoomed in enough but it's minor and outside the safe zone.

There are two versions here:

Full res 1080: http://www.pinelakefilms.com/XHA1/letuslenstest1080.wmv

or for those with slower computers:

720p version: http://www.pinelakefilms.com/XHA1/letuslenstest720.wmv

Obviously, the full detail can be seen in the 1080 version better. These files are relatively small to download (a little over 40mb a piece)

awesome! in fact, the softness and vignetting adds to those particular shots.

looks like i will be investing in nikon soon too. :/

what frame rate are you shooting at?

24 fps, always.

The A1 is my first 24f cam. I'm not getting that nice, fluid movement that you achieve on mine. While I'm shooting, it's really choppy. Upon playback it's better, but not really "fluid" or "film like." I'm also using vegas 7.
Any suggestions? I know the cam is fine. It's gotta be me.

Not sure I can help you but would you do me a favor and create a new thread for that problem? I want to try to stay on topic.

thanks.

does the flip enhanced have a 1.9 magnification like the Letus XL ?

No, it is not a fixed magnification, you can zoom in or out as far as you want.

thanks.

it would be nice to see another misty morning
park scene with that setup.

on topic, the red flower towards the end is pulsating on both wmv streams.
i thought it was the wind or shadow at first.

is the cam having issues with that color or is it the encoding?

it's also slightly on the orange flowers and very bad bleed/pulse on the edge of brick red house.

anyone seeing that?

Steven: I know this may be a bit more theoretical than you may want to go, but I've seen some beautiful stuff you've shot sans 35mm adapter in both SD and HD. Are you thinking that a 35mm adapter is another tool in your arsenal to be used in certain situation, or do you consider it a step as a complete replacement for your future film making. Just curious as to what direction you see that particular technology going.

Edit:

1. I posted this question at the office before I came home to look at the footage. Wow. Very nice.

2. Vibrating red flower- In the next to last and last scenes, I note that the red flower, for lack of a better word, vibrates on both of my lcd monitors. This is similar to a scene I filmed with a red bucket in which I had the same problem. Are you seeing that on your monitor two, or is that just my settings. Saw it with VLC and Windows media player, using .m2t file you provided.

Here is an example of red bucket taken with my Letus35a (no flip) and the HV20. Are you seeing vibration.

The XL2 would do this on certain shades of red. It seemed
to be a DV compression problem because it was not there
when viewing raw s-video.

chris, yes. same artifact in the bucket.

could this be from the rotating glass inside the letus? the pulse seems very consistant. the bleed and pulse on the house has it the worst.

i just cranked up the red on my A1 and shot a red plastic cup (without an adapter.) other than being super red..it looked quite nice.

it's curious that will had this on the xl2 as well. will, was that with the letus?

nope. stock lens. but it looked exactly the same.

weird.

OKay guys, just so we don't get too sucked into the red thing. There are certain reds that do not fair well in DV and HDV. The use of Nikons, in my experience, pumps up the chroma somewhat and I was using my VIVIDRGB setting for these tests. Clearly it is too intense for the codec to deal with.

You will see the same problem with all other HDV cams and all other DV cams. It's just the nature of the format.

Steven:

Sorry, if you believe I went OT. Thought red issue was part of the detail issue. I wondered if it was a 24 p or Letus issue. I have not dealt with anything that pronouced on my Sony VX2000 or FX1 in past.

In general the video and detail is spectacular even with the adapter. My question in the previous post was raised because I'm just wondering if you think the 35mm adapter of any type has gone far enough to get you something as spectacular as your high definition footage for instance that you posted a few months back from Yellowstone.

i've shot some really oversaturated reds on at least a dozen DV cams and never experienced anything close to that. i don't find it acceptable at all. who's comfortable dropping $4K on a cam only to "avoid" certain reds? i'm shooting in mexico like 1/3 of the year. it's basically impossible.

toot sweet, the first "red" thing i'd shoot would be the blood of that salesman.

now i have to go test a bunch of friggin' red BS things on this A1 while I still have the opportunity to return it.

No, it wouldn't be that good. I think I will use it for more narrative stuff when I get to doing it. I will also be using it for medium and closeups of wildlife and landscapes. It will depend on the situation basically. I think it brings a unique feel to the frame so I'll more than likely experiment with it a lot to see what happens.

i've shot some really oversaturated reds on at least a dozen DV cams and never experienced anything close to that. i don't find it acceptable at all. who's comfortable dropping $4K on a cam only to "avoid" certain reds? i'm shooting in mexico like 1/3 of the year. it's basically impossible.

toot sweet, the first "red" thing i'd shoot would be the blood of that salesman.

now i have to go test a bunch of friggin' red BS things on this A1 while I still have the opportunity to return it.

Eric,

There are certain reds with certain values that do not do well on HDV/DV. If you go over to the PRESET LIBRARY thread, you will see that I took a shot of my son in a red baseball shirt and it did fine. It's like a bass frequency and the way one in particular would cause the speaker to vibrate momentarily. All other frequencies, including very similar ones do not react this way.

Also, if you are going to encounter a lot of reds in your shot, you would need to take the color gain way down anyway as a general rule. You can pump it up again in post.

Oh, I'm fully aware. Further, people welcome the feeling of a vibrating bass.
This is completely different.

When I said "I'm shooting in Mexico 1/3 of the year" ..I meant that
I have been for several years and will continue to do so. I will know in a few moments as to what cam I will be doing it with.

I'm actually lining up a bunch of "red" things right now. lol.

I've been shooting for probably 15 years and DV for at least 10. I find it really hard to believe that I've just never run across "that red."

On your latest post it's orange, red, and dark red. I really can't believe you accept this and pass it off as "nature of the format."

I pass this off as something that was not unexpected when I was using a preset that intensifies colors to the extent VIVIDRGB combined with Nikon lenses does.

For me to shoot something planned with the same setup, I would use one of the flatter presets and this would not be a problem. I have shot quite a lot of reds with the Letus using my XLH1 with no problems.

So what I am accepting is that there is a problem in general with how HDV and DV formats handle some kinds of reds. Most of them are acceptable if not cranked to the max like I have done.

Does that make sense?

If you look at Canon's promo video for the XHA1, you will see that there are lots of reds in many shots and they do fine.

Indeed. In fact - the letus, nikon, preset combo is what I was attributing it to ( or the encoding ) until Chris posted his "bucket" and Will informed us about his Xl2. So now I'm concerned.

Okay, let us know the results of your own tests.

Wow, it seems like it's a 24fps thing.

I gathered a lot of red items and just found but one, the grip on my pliers, that pulsed at an unacceptable level..but only in 24f! Some other shades were slightly noisy. In 60i they were all solid.

Which would explain the debate - hence, "24 fps, always." and "The A1 is my first 24f cam."

Chris and Will, were you shooting in 24 as well?

Since I never experienced anything like this on my Xl1-S or GL2 - but Will did on the XL2, 24fps would again explain it.

I went through all of the presets, including Wolfgang's, which takes the red really over the top. In 60i it's awesome. Everything looked pretty good.

I'm relieved. I mainly shoot 60i.

I shoot 24f all the time and never had trouble with reds, even ridiculously saturated ones.

Wow, it seems like it's a 24fps thing.

Which would explain the debate - hence, "24 fps, always." and "The A1 is my first 24f cam."

Chris and Will, were you shooting in 24 as well?

.

Yes. With my new 24p rig, the HV20. This was my first 24p use with the adapters. Before that I was Sony Fx1 60i

We shot 24p exclusively with the XL2.

There seemed to be one particular shade of red that caused problems.
Usually it was something around 255 Red (in photoshop your RGB
values are Red: 0-255 Green: 0-255 Blue: 0-255) so it's only the most vivid
of Reds. I believe we fixed it by just adjusting the red saturation
in our presets, but every once and awhile it would give us trouble.

well, i think we have found it. will can even pinpoint it.

what's interesting is that it is consistant across 3 different Canon cams.

it took me quite a bit of "reds" to get that pulse.
one item out of roughly two dozen. reds that did not
pulse could also be "ridiculously saturated" as marlon stated.

i think the letus and the preset may increase that artifact over a wider range of colors.

well, i think we have found it. will can even pinpoint it.

what's interesting is that it is consistant across 3 different Canon cams.

it took me quite a bit of "reds" to get that pulse.
one item out of roughly two dozen. reds that did not
pulse could also be "ridiculously saturated" as marlon stated.

i think the letus and the preset may increase that artifact over a wider range of colors.

Check this one out. The toy car behind looks like it is greenscreened against girls pants:

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=Y2763PSV

Has anybody found difference in 24p v. 60I

yikes! i don't get anything like that in 60i.

what was your shutter speed?

default on the A1 at 24f is 1/24. I'd like to try some red tests again
at 1/48 and see if that makes any difference.

Eric:

My post may have been misinterpreted. I shot this in 24p also, but was asking if anyone had issues in 60 i.

As far as shutter speed, it could be 1/48 or 1/60. I remember playing around a bit to see what difference it could make, and don't remember what was going on. I wasn't really thinking about the red issue when I shot this, and was actually trying shooting the HV20 upside down on a mount I made.

Guys, would you please take this topic to a new thread for a couple of reasons

1. We have gone completely off topic related to the resolution ability of the Letus (the original intention)

2. The significance of your tests will be lost in a thread that deals with Letus detail.

Thank you,