Shooting with the Letus

[Timothy David Orme]

So I understand everything but this taking lens bit. I'm not sure what's the 'front' of the adapter. Is the taking lens the 35mm lens, or the lens on the Canon digital camera?

[Adrian Sierkowski]

The taking lens would be the still photo or cine lens you are mounting to the front of the adapter.

[Dukeswharf]

There is some excellent work done by a cinematographer called Philip Bloom using a Letus35 Extreme and an Sony XDCAM EX1 which you may find of interest:

 

http://www.philipbloom.co.uk/Philip_Bloom/Letus_35mm.html

 

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Peace & Love

[Brandon Freeman]

Hello, I'm the gentleman Timothy is shooting with (the owner of the Letus). We are looking to find the point which to pull focus from. The literature with the Letus says that there is a mark of some kind on the side of the adapter that shows the film plane, yet I cannot find it. Any help?

[James Madrid]

I've used the Letus Extreme once before and don't recall seeing a mark for the film plane but the film plane does line up with the back of the rail mounting bracket so you can use that as a point from which to place your tape measure. If you are using still lenses though, be careful as the distance marks don't seem to be very accurate from my experience. I would definitely take the time to remark the lenses, it'll make your life a lot easier.

[Adamo P Cultraro]

Need to know what model Letus we are speaking of here.

[Brandon Freeman]

I own a Letus Extreme as of earlier this month.

[Adamo P Cultraro]

Then sure, as long as the bracket on the extreme is oriented the right way, that will be your film plane. There are instructions that come with the LEX and also posted on their site which will tell you how to set it up correctly.

[Bill Totolo]

Timothy,

 

I've already touched on this in earlier post to you but let me expand:

 

The Letus, more specifically the Letus Extreme is a 35mm DOF adapter that utilizes a vibrating ground glass. Not all adapters use this. The M2 and SGPro, for example, use a spinning ground glass(GG). Anyways, the ground glass is actually where the image is projected upon inside the adapter. If you wee to open up the adapter, you would see the GG - it looks like a microscope slide except translucent, not transparent, kinda frosted white. The batteries you put into the Letus power a little motor that makes the GG vibrate.

 

The problem inherent to all vibrating adapters is that they are susceptible to the pattern of the ground glass showing up as grain on the image when the iris on the taking lens is stopped down too far. I don't know the exact explanation of why they do this - someone smarter than I can chime in here.

 

Suffice to say that if you had your taking lens - and by that I mean the lens you have clipped to the front of the adapter - if you have this lens set to F5.6, and then go to the next stop - F8....etc. etc. you will see progressively more grain on your image until the image will be unacceptable to you.

 

So keep the taking lens set to F1.2; 1.8, 2; whatever the lowest stop you can get away with while preserving image sharpness and not going below F5.6 (When I say below I mean closing the iris further).

 

It's a tradeoff, but totally workable. The Letus shoots glorious images, and the Letus Extreme is as good as any other adapter out there; I venture to say it produces images almost as nice as the $10k P+S Technik.

 

I am using two HVXs and Two Letus Extremes to shoot my feature in April that has Tom Sizemore in it. It will work just fine.

 

Remember that in film, you have many other devices available to you to control light. Shooting the Extreme, you can manipulate the camera's iris as well as add filters, polarizers, and ND as needed to control the light while keeping the taking lens more open than F5.6

 

 

Adam, let me ask your opinion,

 

I've been shooting for about three weeks with the RRM2 and have recently received my Letus Extreme.

I'm happy with both units, each has it's own personality, but I feel neither will prove reliably sharp enough for a theatrical release.

 

I've carefully focused each and humbly feel my settings are sharper than other works I've seen.

 

What are your findings?

[Bill Totolo]

Yes and no. I don't see how you can achieve the same f stop throughout the whole movie. You might have day exteriors mixed with night interiors - how can they all be shot at the same stop? Sure, there will be a range that you will achieve. What will you have to use in a night exterior to keep the stop the same as a day exterior????a Brute Arc? Not practical.

 

The Letus kinda makes that easy for you! There isn't alot of range between a f2.8 lens and the maximum of f5.6 the letus can shoot at!!!!! It's like two stops! Not very much range at all.

 

With lenses as slow as you are using (barring the 50mm), they will be fairly soft wide open, and probably be sharpest just below f5.6

 

As far as focus, I'm not sure what you mean.

 

Go do camera tests and see what you like.

 

 

I've been selecting the best apertures for each of my Zeiss, Nikon and Canon lenses, selecting that F stop, then using ND + pola to get me to that stop.

 

So I'll set my Zeiss at 3.5 then use my camera Iris for exposure control (having gotten my exposure in place with my ND's and/or pola). Make sense?

[Adamo P Cultraro]

Adam, let me ask your opinion,

 

I've been shooting for about three weeks with the RRM2 and have recently received my Letus Extreme.

I'm happy with both units, each has it's own personality, but I feel neither will prove reliably sharp enough for a theatrical release.

 

I've carefully focused each and humbly feel my settings are sharper than other works I've seen.

 

What are your findings?

 

 

To be honest, the largest I have ever seen the Letus Extreme projected on is a 50" plasma, where is has proved to be aceptably sharp. Some have reported edge sharpness issues, but there hasn't been anything I've seen that is scary. I have no plans to theatrically release my movie at this point so I haven't really given it much thought.

 

Personally, we're talking about a movie shot on a 6K camera - what can you get for that money that will be any sharper?

[Leo Anthony Vale]

Personally, we're talking about a movie shot on a 6K camera - what can you get for that money that will be any sharper?

 

That doesn't mean you can't cut down on sharpness by adding a couple of optical systems in front of the camera's lens.

 

Putting the background out of focus only makes the subject look sharp in comparison to the out of focus background.

 

Compared to the camera's actual lens, the add ons will give a picture that's less sharp.

[Adamo P Cultraro]

I personally cannot discern the difference in sharpness between the stock lens and the adapter, if that's what you're asking.

[Bill Totolo]

I am finding the Letus much sharper than the other unit I've been using. Wish I had the opportunity to do a film out test.

[Adamo P Cultraro]

For what it is it's a great unit. To me, it's about 95% what a P+S Technik is onabout 10% of the price.

 

There's a huge following for the Letus on DVXUser in the 35mm adapter subforum that is very helpful. Besides, you can just pick up the phone and call Hien and Quyen (makers of Letus). I've done it several times. Where are you going to get that!?

[Leo Anthony Vale]

I personally cannot discern the difference in sharpness between the stock lens and the adapter, if that's what you're asking.

 

Try some comparison resolution tests between the adater and the camera's lens.

 

Include resolution charts.

[Adamo P Cultraro]

I don't shoot resolution charts, I shoot movies. And the difference between the adapter or not is sooooooo negligible to my eye.

 

I do not doubt however, that the cam will be sharper sans adapter just because of the physics of all that glass you are adding. This is splitting hairs, though. All I'm saying is that it isn't obvious.