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Cooke 18-100mm rear filter question


George A

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Hi!

 

Do Cooke 18-100mm zoom lenses have a slot for rear round filters? I did some research but I'm not sure.

 

How about the older version of the zoom, Cooke 20-100mm?

 

Thanks! Really appreciate it,

George

The 20-100 has a slot for gelatine filters.

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George,

 

The Cooke 18-100 does have a filter slot that accommodates 2 types of filter holders, gel filters or glass filters.

 

 

IMG_20140223_0002_zps8414a263.jpg

 

 

The 2 types of holders

 

IMG_20140223_0002_zpsdc2478be.jpg

 

 

I am most familiar with the 30.5mm glass filters and holder as I used that the most. Gels can be slow, and get messy when you are in a hurry! I have 2 glass filter holders so you could preload a 2nd filter pack to change filter requirements quickly.

 

 

The glass filters were mounted in a metal ring that screwed into the holder.

 

IMG_2409_zps0bb3f335.jpg

 

IMG_2406_zps6111e091.jpg

 

 

The Cooke glass filter holder

 

IMG_2394_zps7286228b.jpg

 

With Filter

 

IMG_2398_zps0bfa3357.jpg

 

 

Top view of holder w/o filters

 

IMG_2410_zpsca830217.jpg

 

Holder with 2 filters screwed in

 

IMG_2417_zps2ba392e4.jpg

 

In the States, the 30.5mm filters were sold through Les Zellan's ZGC. They were Tiffen filters that were ground down to fit the very thin metal rings that was required to fit into the opening on the 18-100. I believe you could buy the mounted filters through Tiffen also, but that was years ago. But, thanks to Ira Tiffen, I was able to acquire some blank metal rings from Tiffen so I could mount nets on them. They also ground down (thickness) a couple of specialty filters for me, one being a 1/2 value Enhancement filter. Not many shooters remember the Enhancement filter these days.

 

One word of caution, while Cooke claims that "no degradation of optical performance or shift of back focus", I found that you had to be careful when using "effect" filters, not N.Ds, 85s, 85NDs, or EFs etc. With one filter on the holder no problem, but when you added the 2nd filter, well, sometimes there was a slight change on the focus scale. Different thickness of the glass filters, or the type of "effect" filter could cause slight changes. So, I'm not dissing Cooke, but it's the type of glass you put into the "optical path" that mucked things up.

 

For table-top shooting, the rear filter holder in the 18-100 was a very welcome feature, no big matte box to hold 6.6 X 6.6 filters!

 

This could lead to a debate, is an effect filter better in front of a variable focal length lens when the magnification is changing on the effect filter, or is it better in the optical path after the image has been formed, whether it's wide or tel? Film or digital, doesn't make a difference, in my opinion.

 

 

The 20-100 has a Gel Filter holder as shown here

 

IMG_20140223_0001_zpsbadbd9c3.jpg

 

 

Also, the 18-100 has a very nice look on both 35mm and 16mm. The close focus helps also.

 

Charlie

 

 

 

P.S.

 

George, it's best to use your full name on the forum. Da rules.

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