February 2013 www.tvbeurope.com


TVBEurope 27 Acquistion Focus: Camera Lenses


Made up: Procam supplied cameras and lenses for the latest series of Made in Chelsea


lFocused onenses


“YOU CAN'T capture a great shot without fantastic glass and demand for our top-brand lenses, such as the Arri Ultra Primes has certainly risen over the past few months,” says Paul Sargeant, head of operations at rental and crewing company Procam TV. He’s confident that such lenses will remain "future proof" for the time being and, are well suited to cameras like Sony's F65, the Arri Alexa and “the highly anticipated” Sony F55. Paul Goodwin, head of


Broadcast Products at Pyser- SGI (Fujinon’s UK & Ireland distributor), is seeing the traditional broadcast lens (“an extremely high quality product with sophisticated control systems”), becoming restricted to studios and outside broadcast use and perhaps some location productions where system cameras are used. This applies to both box-style and ENG lenses, although these will remain important for studio, sport and location OB work. “I am not sure it is yet an endangered species, but it’s not going to be as dominant as in the past,” he says. “All features shot on film in the last 50 years or so have had


a negative of around 6-8K, and we’ve been in the motion picture business for over 100 years, so our lenses are already capable of shooting above 4K,” says Les Zellan, chairman and owner, Cooke Optics (see p38). “In the world of the Alexa, Sony F65, Epic and all these 2K, 4K and 5K cameras, we are seeing a new market for our lenses in high- end broadcast drama and documentaries, since these cameras can produce a cinematic look but without that


the current marketing and engineering buzz; it doesn’t matter what the spec is if the look is right for your story,” he insists. “When looking for a lens for the higher resolution formats, it really does boil down to ‘you get what you pay for’,” adds Sargeant. “For example, if you use a standard ENG lens on a 4K sensor – the image will not have the level of clarity you'd expect from such a resolution – the end result may appear ‘soft’,


feature film budget. However, digital cameras produce clean, clinical images and the choice of lens can make all the difference to the end result. While ‘cold and clinical’ is sometimes required, the renowned ‘Cooke Look’ gives digital images a pleasing, warm and cinematic feel. In the end, we’re in a visual industry and what matters is what’s right for the story. 4K is


which may lead to the disconnection of the audience. Admittedly, if you are watching the footage on a standard HDTV (anything below 70 inches or so), the degradation won't be as noticeable – but the actual ‘effect’ of 4K will be lost – so when selecting a lens for such a usage, it's best to go for something like a Master Prime (Zeiss), which has been


With an increasing number of higher- resolution, larger sensor cameras on the market, how are lens manufacturers responding – while coping with the eternal demands for smaller, lighter and cheaper? David Fox reports


rated to clearly capture up to 8K (and beyond).” Canon has a range of 4K


lenses, both zooms and primes. Its top-end wide and tele zoom lenses, the CN-E14.5-60mm T2.6 L S/SP and CN-E30- 300mm T2.95-3.7 L S/SP, go beyond 4K and are suitable for both 5K and 6K productions. Canon 8K prototype lenses were also tested at the Olympics. “We are definitely seeing an


increase in demand for 4K lenses. 4K transmission for


Since the first arrival of Sony’s F3 and Arri’s Alexa, there has been “a massive rise in the popularity of digital 35 shallow depth-of-field pictures; this will undoubtedly grow further” Paul Sargeant, Procam TV


broadcast does not exist yet, however, many broadcasters and production houses are just starting to use 4K for archiving and future proofing purposes,” says Ken Koyama, European broadcast products director, Canon Europe “The new wave of interest,


and rapid growth, in DSLR and PL-mount products, and the ability to do electronically that


which was almost exclusively the domain of film in the past, coupled with the longer term growth and relative maturity of the smaller but increasingly capable camcorder products, mostly with integral lenses, has […] altered the balance of optical products sold into the respective market sectors most notably over the past five years,” says Goodwin. While film-style production


“is likely to develop quickly over the next few years”, the market is also being stretched downwards by the rise of smaller, prosumer HD cameras, “with some really good products available”. But, from a broadcast lens sales perspective, Goodwin points out that all these cameras with integral lenses reduce opportunities for further sales. Even so, he predicts that the lens market will remain extremely competitive, and become “increasingly polarised with the high-end products forming a small but growing part of the market volume, but with relatively high prices/margins, whilst the lower cost one-piece camera with lens will become an even larger section of the market with higher volumes but perhaps in


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