Cine Lens Test : Trialled by SICA!

SICA after very good response on Arri Alexa 35 and Sony Venice 2 cameras dynamic range test titled ‘ Trialled by SICA’.

Now a series of videos had been published by SICA regarding the Cine Lens test through  youtube.

Under SICA cam benefit trust program knowledge sharing activities are very much important.

General secretary Ilavarasu on his note says Digital film making as opened lot of doors..each one having different workflow and characteristics, while getting used to new one.. another technology emerges…so it is very important for SICA to bring new technology information in a authentic way through SICA website, social media handle and conducting Camera, lights and lenses test to our members.

Ace Cinematographer Sakthi Saravanan took initiative to get organizing various cine Lens brand test on a particular day was challenging.

Sakthi says that ”In the world of filmmakers…many  brands are customized for a particular way ,but without a proper Lens  test, we never really know precisely the character of a lens. Judging a Lens by watching a finished project is tricky one as we may be not aware of the shooting conditions. Unless we have a real side-by-side lens shoot comparing the exact same scene with the exact same lighting and model  it’s hard to discern between lenses.Many of us have done lens comparisons of one or two sets of lenses to make a final decision for a project, but we at  SICA  took a  broader view of bringing individual videos of 5 different brands and comparative study comprises nearly 32 videos on SICA YouTube handle”.

While  testing event  SICA President karthick raaja, Executive committee Vetrivel mahendran , Moses and SICA member, Black wings Lens rental owner  Siddarth were present.

Here the Info

Cameras used : Arri LF and Mini LF.

Lighting – Aperture T 4

Lens T stop – Wide Open for most of the Lenses around T 2

Lenses Under Test

Arri Signature Primes/ Zeiss Supreme Primes/ Cooke Panchro i classic/ Black wings 7

SICA shares the video link of Lens test of
*Arri Signature primes
*Zeiss supreme prime radiance
*Cooke Panchro/i classic
*Black Wings7
* Canon Sumire Primes

Arri Signature primes compared with Zeiss radiance/ Black Wings7/ Cooke Panchro I classic / canon sumire primes

18mm,25mm,35mm,50mm, 85mm,135mm series videos.

Comparative study of Cooke Panchro i lens with Black Wings7/ Canon Sumire / Arri Signature Prime Lens

Black Wings7 compared with Canon Sumire/ Arri Signature Prime and Carl Zeiss radiance https://youtu.be/TPtyLzsdpVg

SICA videos of Lens test comparative study of Canon Sumire cinema lens with Arri Signature/ Zeiss/Cooke Panchro


https://youtu.be/d3Z73N7QanY https://youtu.be/A9Za3B-zFYA https://youtu.be/2KxjigFF1_M

Comparative study of Zeiss radiance with/ Cooke Panchro/ Black Wings7/ Canon Sumire

On a final note Sakthi Saravanan shares his opinion as ” Lenses can be divided into two categories one as Performance and other as Character Lenses.

I would classify Arri Signature as Performance lenses as it is  high speed  lens  with consistent aperture  over  all focal lengths and Zero distortion and aberrations, flares are very much controlled this will give advantage while shooting for vfx.

Canon Sumire comes closer to the look  of Arri Signature with same qualities like contrast, even illumination across the frames with the advantage of lesser cost than Arri Signature Primes…it has T 1.5 opening i would suggest to cut to T2 where the lens performs much better. Still i recommend always to test shoot to your individual needs.

Zeiss Radiance i could state in all these set of brands this is the high contrast lens, with beautiful flares.

Cooke Panchro full open is T 2.2  according to me it is a low contrast Lens …i could see a beautiful glow towards the high light area with a muted color tone…i see it has a character Lens, Image center is sharp but gradually there is a fall off quality at the edges which is good for a romantic subjects.

Black Wings 7 is the lens i was very much interested that lead to this Lens Test. specialty of Black Wings is it can be tuned according to the need of the customer, they have three types of tuning process as S T and X tuned lenses, Here S stands for Straight  is a customary type,  T ( Transient) Tuned Lenses are of  special character where it has good sharpness at center and a gradual organic fall off at the edges with  Mid Contrast and X (Expressive)is very low contrast lenses….on a final note i would suggest to look carefully the videos and interrupt images according to your needs.

SICA is happy that these videos  was also presented by PC Sreeram  at his twitter handle.

Edited by

CJ Rajkumar