Zoom lenses for handheld

[Travis Cline]

I'm going to be shooting a feature in a couple of months, most likely using a moviecam. Normally, I'd rather shoot with primes, but the director wants to do a bit of zooming in shot. Also, we are going to be doing alot of handheld work. My prime lenses will be a set of Zeiss super speeds. What suggestions do you have about which lenses will match with the superspeeds and are light. Thanks everyone.

 

Travis Cline

[Patrick Neary]

hi- I'll toss in a vote for the Cooke 20-60 if you're on a budget, (scroll down a bit in this forum and you'll see a few other comments about it).

 

I just used one (from Panavision/H'wood) for a commercial, and it seemed to match their ultra-speed primes very well (I can't remember if those are zeiss glass or not, someone here will know for sure).

 

It was quite small, more like a big 16mm zoom, a bit slow at t3, great close focus (around 2') handled flare extremely well, and was sharp as anything. Whether or not Panavision did some tweaking to it beyond the original Cooke design I don't know, or maybe it was just a well-maintained, choice specimen, but it was veeerrrry nice.

[Brent J. Craig]

Clairmont has the 28-70 Century T3. We have used in on several commercials and like the look. It is a rebuilt stills lens and only weighs 3 pounds. It has Canon glass, I believe.

 

Have also used the 17-35 Century T3.

 

If I recall there are some zooms made by Hawke that are lightweight for handheld.