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Angenieux 8-64mm = The little Angenieux c-mount that could

My Story of the Angenieux 8-64mm c-mount lens:

The Angenieux Zoom Type8x8B 8-64mm f/1.9 c-mount lens was the first legacy zoom lens I purchased for the m4/3 system. I was pretty green at the time and when I initially got the lens I popped this lens on my GH1 and I saw the image was a tiny fuzzy circle as big as the size of a quarter. I was pretty disappointed but did not want to give up so I gave the lens to Steve Serota from Classic Camera Workshop to see what he could do with it. He spent close to a year cleaning up the lens. He just loved that little lens and said he was surprised at how sharp it was and how he finally got it working nicely with his 16mm camera. When I got the lens back I thought this would be it. I thought I’d have a nice clear image but when I popped it back on my GH1 camera I still saw the quarter size image only this time it was sharp only on the telephoto end not on the wide end. At 8mm I still saw an image that was out of focus and still could not get the lens to infinity focus. With the results only a shade better then before the lens was repaired the Angenieux 8-64mm was useless to me. I still kept it though because it was the last zoom lens Steve Serota repaired for me before he passed away.

This past summer I was about ready to sell the lens but I heard the GH2 was announced with the extended tele conversion (ETC) feature that allowed the ability for small lenses like this to be used in the full HD resolution of the camera. I wanted to give this lens one more shot. I knew I would need to find someone to get this little lens machined so that it can achieve infinity focus on a standard c-mount to m4/3 adapter. I knew that the best legacy mount m4/3 manufacturers were in China so I sent an e-mail to “R.J.” also known as ebay seller jinfinance to try to see if he would be open to machining my lens to fit his c-mount adapter. R.J. is one of the more well known legacy mount makers in China and is best known for his reliable C-mount to m4/3 adapter and Canon FD to m4/3 adapter.

I sent pictures of the lens to R.J. and he told me that he could not guarantee it would work because there could be a possibility that the lens would fall apart. I decided to just go for it anyway and sent the lens to him in China. I thought if it falls apart then it was meant to fall apart and if it works then it would be pretty unbelievable and make for a good story to tell. After a two month waiting period I got the lens back before X-mas just in time to test with my new GH2.

R.J. had done it. He had machined a significant portion of the rear of the lens. I popped the lens on the RJ c-mount adapter and on to the camera and engaged the ETC of the GH2 and took a deep breathe. I set the lens on 8mm and saw the the quarter size image had almost filled the screen. It was not the sharpness that Steve Serota was excited about but the picture on the wide end was in focus and had that soft Angenieux quality that was very pleasing to me. Then I brought the lens to the telephoto side and that’s where the sharpness of the lens really shined. It was all worth it. It really was a huge journey to get the Angenieux 8-64mm c-mount to work on the micro 4/3 system. There are a number of flaws that I have found out as I’ve played with the lens a bit more but I feel the journey was worthwhile and the lens will serve its purpose. The big pluses for me is that this lens is a very tiny fast zoom so you can carry it around with your small GH2 and images become sharper as you go up the focal range.

Here are two sample stills at 64mm.

One thing to note is because the image circle is very small at 8mm there is vignetting and edge distortion when using the GH2′s ETC mode.

You can definitely work around these problems or make the issues work as a part of the character to your film. The Angenieux 8-64 lens despite all it’s problems represents to me why I do what I do. The idea of collecting legacy lenses is also the idea of keeping the story alive and passing on what was once old and worthless and making it new again. In a small way, this journey is hopefully honoring the previous owners who may have used this lens on their own films and also honoring the guys like Steve Serota who repaired it.

The Angenieux 8-64mm lens was first used in my test film footage for the indiSYSTEM Bulldog and indiSYSTEM BallGrip in a piece called Aloha Winter.

If you’d like to try this with your own Angenieux 8-64mm lens it will take a few hurdles, some patience and a few key pieces of knowledge:

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Send the lens to R.J. (ebay seller: jinfinance) in China. It cost me about $60 to machine the lens.
R.J.’s c-mount adapter works well but the best mount to get you infinity focus with this lens on the wide end is with the “Hawk’s Factory Made in Taiwan” adapter from Hawk Peng or ebay seller hawks_factory. I have only tested the old version which works great. The new version I will be testing shortly.
This is a very small c-mount zoom and works best wide open and sharp near the mid to higher focal ranges (20-50mm).

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GH2 ETC mode in creative movie mode is the best way to get the lens working but this mode cuts off some of the sharpness and on the wide end you will still see vignetting and edge distortion especially when stopped down.
Since this is a legacy lens there is no optical lens stabilization so in the GH2 ETC mode it’s best to lock your camera down on a monopod or tripod any bit of camera shake will be magnified greatly in this mode.
Because of the design of the lens at the farthest focal length (64mm), you will unfortunately see two metal elements from the interior of the lens on the edge of the frame of your shot especially when stopped down. Unfortunatey, I do not think it is possible to remove these metal elements from the interior of the lens.

Special Note:

When using the GH2 ETC mode for still pictures you will have to make sure you set the camera quality to capture only JPEG and not RAW stills and also set the picture quality to 1920×1080 16:9. Creative Movie Mode gives a larger picture than when shooting in any still mode with the ETC engaged.

Angenieux Zoom Type L2 and Type L3 lens

As promised here are some initial impressions of the Angenieux Zoom Type L2 and Type L3 1:2.2/17-68 C-Mount lenses.

The Angenieux zoom Type L2 and Type L3 lenses are very hard to find these days but well worth having as part of your GH1 arsenal if you can grab one. Many of these older c-mount cine lenses were used on Bolex and Bell and Howard 16mm cameras. I was fortunate enough to pick up a Type L2 and Type L3 Angenieux zoom and despite the fact that the image circle of the lens is smaller than the sensor and you do get the “peep hole effect” and a bit of vignetting, there are still some great things going for these older lenses. As far as I can tell from the recent tests both the Type L2 and Type L3 Angenieux zoom lenses had the same image circle size, bokeh and sharpness.

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At wide open F/2.2, the lens is tack sharp, much faster than the 14-140 stock lens at F/4
The small size. This little zoom lens fits inside my pants pocket! Much lighter than the 14-140 stock lens and makes the GH1 feel like a toy with the extremely light weight feel of the Angenieux
The beautiful Angenieux bokeh, creamy and lovely especially at higher focal lengths to display that shallow DOF.
With the GH1′s 2x Digital Zoom, you move beyond the vignetting and get a nice usable picture.

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As was brought to my attention from the Indy Pros at DVXUser Barry Green and Illya Friedman, there are image degradation issues with the digital zoom engaged even at 2x. Illya Friedman who runs Hot Rod Cameras informed me that “Extended Optical Zoom is just windowing the sensor, effectively lowering the number of pixels used to create the image by about 75%.”
Obviously, no autofocus and image stabilization capabilities so you can’t really use this lens on a steadicam or for tracking shots.
With the GH1′s 2x Digital Zoom engaged in movie mode, camera shake increases with magnification so you must use a tripod or DV stabilizer for decent results.
With the GH1′s 2x Digital Zoom engaged in movie mode, the focal lengths double from 17-68 to 34-136.
This particular cine lens need a Series 7 step ring to use ND filters.

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If Panasonic could give us .5x, 1x, and 1.5x as an option for the Digital Zoom in movie mode and Extended Digital Zoom in picture mode I think it would help with the flexibility to use these c-mount lenses with much greater control. The Angenieux Zoom Type L2 & Type L3 with out the use of the digital zoom feature at 17mm is a little shy of filling the sensor. With the ability to use a 1x instead of a 2x optical zoom we’d have the ability to have a wider frame with perhaps less camera magnification jitters and image degradation.
So far, I can only use creative motion picture mode on the GH1 because it is the only mode that I can engage the digital zoom feature. Again, most c-mount zooms and primes under 25mm will have a small image circle and vignetting so in order to use these lenses you need to engage the digital zoom in movie mode. It would be nice if Panasonic allowed us to use the optical zoom in picture mode for still camera use currently I could not engage the extended digital zoom in any of the picture mode settings.
Maybe someone out there could make a c-mount teleconverter or reducer that has a large enough image circle to fit the sensor so that we would not need to engage the Gh1′s optical zoom. That would be the ideal.

Over all, the GH1 has literally breathed new life into these older cine lenses. In the beginning, it was the G1 users capturing amazing pictures with these c-mount lenses but now that the GH1 has hit the scene, many are using these cine lenses for what they were intended for and that is film. As stated in other forums and blogs, the digital zoom and extended optical zoom features do degrade resolution on the GH1 but with the right elements in place, these lenses are great fun and you can get some really nice images. For some the image degradation and resolution loss will not be acceptable for others this may be a chance to bring retro cine flair to your new GH1 and you may find these images will work for your needs.

So despite the resolution drawbacks, the Angenieux Type L2 and Type L3 are great for the on the go casual shooter who wants that “Angenieux look” with out having to carry a huge lens and who can sacrifice some resolution loss. You’ll still need to step back to get that wider shot but for those who want that shallow DOF there’s still some nice bokeh and sharpness in this lens that will be a great addition for narrative work and even talking heads documentary shots. For those wanting to find a good deal on these older lenses, you might want to go to local camera shops first, explore the ones that still carry 16mm camera gear before going on ebay. Just within the last six months these lenses have all jumped up in price so be prepared to pay at least $400 for this lens if not more.

Thanks again to Barry Green and Illya Friedman for providing me with updated information concerning the Digital Zoom features on the GH1.

Angenieux C-mount Zoom Lens – Neoscene

One of the challenges with working with AVCHD is removing pulldown. If you do any kind of ENG work or are on a tight deadline using the GH1 is definitely not for you. You have to do a few things before starting to edit– pull down removal. So if you have a little time on your hands you can use Compressor, VoltaicHD, or Cineform Neoscene to get true 24P. My previous post used Compressor which looked pretty good but there was still some remnant frame jitters and the 1080P looked a little lighter than the original footage that I shot with. So I decided to try out Cineform Neoscene and these were my initial impressions.

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Faster to do pull down than compressor but not by much.
Gives you the option for realtime editing with the Cineform (MOV) codec
No left over frames and weird frame jitters
Very good at fixing Chroma issues on the GH1
Overall great contrast and sharpness and does a really nice job of retaining the original clip

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Program is still a little buggy, it occasional crashed on me when I tried to close the program
There are no instructions, you have to search the net to figure out specific details or call or e-mail Cineform support

Overall, in terms of using c-mount zoom lenses on the GH1 my assessment is they are very usable and depending on your needs you can get some great results. Be aware there is some resolution and image degradation with the digital zoom engaged. Do not do the 4x digital zoom that looks horrible. 2x digital zoom is passable footage by some and for others it may still be quite impressive. For pulldown removal Cineform Neoscene seems to be the best at doing this process and is worth the additional cost. You can go to Videoguys and pick up Neoscene for $99.95 and if you are new to purchasing stuff at videoguys you get a $10 discount just for signing up so that saves you a little bit. Looking at both the compressor and neoscene footage, I would recommend to follow these guidelines when shooting with a c-mount zoom lens:

Shooting with the “Peep Hole” effect and cropping and scaling your footage in post will keep the sharpness and color rendition of the original footage on your wide shots. If you scale for that close-up of course you’ll see image degradation but for a little scaling to fill the sensor frame seems to hold up pretty well.
When using Digital 2x on the GH1, transcoding AVCHD footage with compressor seems to affect image color and sharpness, just a little bit though. The image is a little darker, colors are a little crushed, and you do see a little softness. When transcoding with Neoscene, I do not see a change in color from the original footage. Overall, the 2x digital zoom footage is still very usable despite image resolution loss. Be aware that you’ll probably be having to do some work in post to match footage.
In 2x Digital Zoom- there is no image stabilization when using manual lenses. You’ll have a lot of camera shake as you saw in my own footage. Use a tripod for those tight shots whenever possible.
I would definitely use the Angenieux Type L2/L3 c-mount zoom for still photography. It’s a lot of fun because of the small size you can get some fun results with out worrying about camera shake.

Here is the Neoscene Angenieux Type L2/L3 1:2.2/17-68 C-mount Zoom Lens footage 1080/24P (I could not use the 720/30P footage in Neoscene).