Old anamorphic lenses and an experiment

Jarin Blaschke · January 27, 2004

In a couple months I am shooting a 20 minute piece in anamorphic with a few flashback sequences. I have yet to choose my lenses for the body of the material - I've only used Primos before and would love to test the Es and Cs once I can make it to Woodland Hills. By the way - is there a certain person I should speak to there to get a full look at all sets of lenses?

Anyway, for the flashbacks, I'd like a much different look - introducing more softness, distortion, maybe some fun flares, perhaps even a select shot or two with some veiling. Basically older, ill-corrected optics. Does anyone have any knowledge/experience with the super speed anamorphic lenses - particularly shooting near or at wide open (exagerating the imperfections)? What can I expect from these lenses? For example, do the lenses display any distortion at the longer end, say the 75mm and the 100mm? What sort of flares can I anticipate?

This film might also have very brief distorted flashes from the past. I once did a music video (spherical) where I took a plastic lens from a very old TLR snapshot camera - the piece intended for viewing rather than shooting through, actually. It was a single piece of plasic in worse shape than your typical magnifying glass. I mounted it in a piece of cardboard and measured it's diameter to get a rough f-stop. I then simply held it in front of the open lens mount to shoot abstract images of broken glass. Instead of panning and tilting, I would just move the glass. Really nice - murky softness with glowing hotspots and even some chromatic abberation. Anyway, I might want to employ this technique for some very brief imagery in this film. The only problem is that we are shooting anamorphically and as strange as I want the images to be, I don't want any horizontal stretching. We will have only one camera. Is it possible to obtain just a naked anamorphic element and mount it onto the lens mount? I could then just hold my toys in front of that. Or should I attatch (tape) it to my simple lens? The only other option, it seems, is to do an unsqueezed extraction and just crop 2.39 from that. But I wouldn't expect there to be a standard 35 groundglass available in that ratio(well, maybe, if I expect there to be a mountable, bare anamorphic element somewhere) and most importantly, I'd like to avoid opticals if I go to print. Not to mention all the nice anamorphic artifacts I'd love to get. Anyway, I'd appreciate any and all advice on this strange attempt of mine.

Thanks,

Jarin

Mitch Gross · January 27, 2004

Is it possible to obtain just a naked anamorphic element and mount it onto the lens mount? I could then just hold my toys in front of that.

You can get an old rear of lens anamorphot adapter used to switch spherical zooms to anamorphic. They were made in mounts that resemble a 2x adapter--stick the anamorphot into the camera lens mount and then the zoom lens onto the adapter. Isaia & Co. have one in PL for their Russian PowerScope anamorphics, but since you're shooting Panavision you'll have to ask them in Woodland Hills. They'll need to go rummaging around the back room to see what's available.

Jarin Blaschke · January 27, 2004

Thanks, Mitch - have you had any experience with the superspeeds?

Tony Brown · January 28, 2004

A subject dear to my heart. The problem is that even really old lenses rarely contain that sort of character you seek - and believe me there is an army of us out there looking for that 'good' bad lens, something quirky that will produce a unique or at worst 'unusual' look.

I've tried old PV lenses, Kowas. B&L, Pinhole, etc...at the end of the day they are all developed to reduce the 'characteristics' you seek. My advise would be go back to basics. Take a look at Julia Margaret Cameron for some beautiful images. You'll see what I mean.

http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/cameron/highlights.html

Enjoy - truly brilliant woman

GregIrwin · February 16, 2004

I still believe that the "C"'s and "E"s are the best. Talk to Dan Sasaki at Panavision for he is the anamorphic guru. As for distored lens look, ask him about a 100mm slant lens that we had made for a picture. It's pretty bizarre looking.

Michael Nash · February 17, 2004

Greg, wasn't there a 40mm and a 100mm that you used in the hospital scene in "Pearl Harbor"?

GregIrwin · February 18, 2004

Greg, wasn't there a 40mm and a 100mm that you used in the hospital scene in "Pearl Harbor"?

We had a D40mm and a C100mm on PH in addition to many others. But as for the hospital scene, it was an old 100mm of some sort that we intentionally messed up pretty good. Dan Sasaki turned it into a slant lens. Much of that scene was shot on steadicam with Robert Presley shifting the slant from side to side along with me trying to watch his monitor in order to focus the correct side of frame. It was definately tricky and it worked very well. I also had Panavision make the first 20mm anamorphic lens for us on that picture. That image is wild. When I couldn't get that lens due to it being commited to another project, Panavision made a second 20mm for me on "The Core". Great lens.