Evolution of my JVC 750 at DVinfo.net

Paul R Johnson · August 28th, 2019, 02:47 PM

I've had a fruitful week. Mainly due too Ryan's posts, I've discovered some old lenses invested in an adaptor and got some useful improvements to my usual way of working.

I mentioned in another topic that I'd got the Canon J13X9 from my old Betacam from the 90s, and the adaptor to mount it on the 750 I got from an Ebay seller from the Ukraine for half the price of the 'official' JVC item. This arrived within the week and I was very pleased to get pretty decent results. no vignetting, and the 2x converter loses a couple of stops of light but gets in amazingly tight. Today, I found the companion to the Betacam in another flight case, this time with a Fujinon 14x9 zoom attached. Subjectively this lens appears identical, but on a test chart towards the edges, black/white contrast lines have green fringing on the inner edges where black meets white. Resolution is also slightly softer - not much, but on the test chart you can see it, but not really differences you can see on images.

best of all I found a rather nice Matte box that I'd never been able to fit to my modern cameras as the tube spacing was (presumably) imperial not metric. On the Canon (but not Fuji) lens were four inserts that the matte box tube adaptor fitted perfectly.

The 1.8X magnification fro the adaptor means the lens on the ⅓" sensor camera is medium at its widest setting and very long at the narrow end, with 2x extra if needed. All the stuff was really just video junk sitting on the shelves, and all I've spent is £125 on the adaptor. I can use the stock ⅓" HD lens for wide shots but the telephoto shots I can now get are going to work well.

I'm going to try it on my post head and longer legs next and see if this is more stable - because very long lenses wobble if you blow on the pan handle - well, almost. I'm wondering about aircraft shots where distance usually means filling the frame difficult. That's for the future.

Paul R Johnson · September 3rd, 2019, 05:18 AM

I thought maybe some would like to see a few more things I've been up to with the lens and camera combination. It's long enough to get images from the ground of skydivers leaping from the aircraft. I'd love it if the result was sharper, but the image is OK for the purpose.

I've had to put it on the ancient Vinten Cygnet post head and more chunky legs to enable me to shoot at very steep angles, but I did forget one very important rule - DON'T get too close to the action. I managed an excellent position but they were falling to a point around 30ft from me, which meant they'd be coming at me from all angles and I couldn't pan around that quick. Some pans ended up being 300 degrees around me and very fast - so the legs of the tripod were in the way. Even worse, it was bright sunshine so I had to use the viewfinder on the side. I've included some images of the camera, and will try to post some images from the video if the client OK's it.

August 28th, 2019, 02:47 PM	#1
Paul R Johnson Inner Circle Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Lowestoft - UK Posts: 4,045	Evolution of my JVC 750 I've had a fruitful week. Mainly due too Ryan's posts, I've discovered some old lenses invested in an adaptor and got some useful improvements to my usual way of working. I mentioned in another topic that I'd got the Canon J13X9 from my old Betacam from the 90s, and the adaptor to mount it on the 750 I got from an Ebay seller from the Ukraine for half the price of the 'official' JVC item. This arrived within the week and I was very pleased to get pretty decent results. no vignetting, and the 2x converter loses a couple of stops of light but gets in amazingly tight. Today, I found the companion to the Betacam in another flight case, this time with a Fujinon 14x9 zoom attached. Subjectively this lens appears identical, but on a test chart towards the edges, black/white contrast lines have green fringing on the inner edges where black meets white. Resolution is also slightly softer - not much, but on the test chart you can see it, but not really differences you can see on images. best of all I found a rather nice Matte box that I'd never been able to fit to my modern cameras as the tube spacing was (presumably) imperial not metric. On the Canon (but not Fuji) lens were four inserts that the matte box tube adaptor fitted perfectly. The 1.8X magnification fro the adaptor means the lens on the ⅓" sensor camera is medium at its widest setting and very long at the narrow end, with 2x extra if needed. All the stuff was really just video junk sitting on the shelves, and all I've spent is £125 on the adaptor. I can use the stock ⅓" HD lens for wide shots but the telephoto shots I can now get are going to work well. I'm going to try it on my post head and longer legs next and see if this is more stable - because very long lenses wobble if you blow on the pan handle - well, almost. I'm wondering about aircraft shots where distance usually means filling the frame difficult. That's for the future. Attached Thumbnails

September 3rd, 2019, 05:18 AM	#2
Paul R Johnson Inner Circle Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: Lowestoft - UK Posts: 4,045	Re: Evolution of my JVC 750 I thought maybe some would like to see a few more things I've been up to with the lens and camera combination. It's long enough to get images from the ground of skydivers leaping from the aircraft. I'd love it if the result was sharper, but the image is OK for the purpose. I've had to put it on the ancient Vinten Cygnet post head and more chunky legs to enable me to shoot at very steep angles, but I did forget one very important rule - DON'T get too close to the action. I managed an excellent position but they were falling to a point around 30ft from me, which meant they'd be coming at me from all angles and I couldn't pan around that quick. Some pans ended up being 300 degrees around me and very fast - so the legs of the tripod were in the way. Even worse, it was bright sunshine so I had to use the viewfinder on the side. I've included some images of the camera, and will try to post some images from the video if the client OK's it.