Anamorphic / Letterbox capture of single stills with DSLR?

[ahsanford]

I've been intrigued with the concept of the Hasselblad XPan / Fuji TX cameras, which shot two 35mm frames side by side in one exposure to generate a nearly 3:1 aspect ratio shot. I'm interested in trying it on my 5D3 if possible. But I haven't shot film since middle school, and quite candidly, have no intention of going back.

What options do we have to today to compose and capture panoramically in one exposure? And no, I don't mean cropping in post -- I mean framing a wider than 3:2 aspect ratio shot through the viewfinder.

I am a ground floor neophyte on all things video (I only shoot stills), but I seem to recall anamorphic lenses or adaptors are out there so 3:2 sensors could reel in film-ish 2.35:1 aspect ratios for video work. Would these work for stills? What would I see through the viewfinder -- a compressed width shot filling the frame or a black bars at the top and bottom? I am gunning for the latter.

What about something as simple as cropping before you take the shot? Do they sell screw-in front filters for SLR lenses with different aspect ratio opaque filters with rectangular cutouts of different aspect ratios? This seems inane (i.e. it's the same as cropping in post, but you're throwing some image away up front) but I'm actually intrigued to compose shots in a different aspect ratio, something that requires me to either blind portions of the lens with a front filter (or similarly blind the viewfinder I guess?).

I own a 16-35 f/4L IS and I've got half a mind to just grab a beat up old 77mm filter and blacken it other than a 3:1 rectangle in the center and use it as a 16mm prime, but I'm assuming there's a better/faster/higher quality/more flexible way to do this.

I'm quite clearly rambling. Any ideas? Please share some knowledge and point me in the right direction, thx.

- A

 

[AUGS]

Yes, anamorphic lenses are available for dSLRs for stills. Here is an example of their use:
http://www.samhurdphotography.com/2014/technique/shooting-anamorphic-lenses-dslr/

I don't see why you would "black out" a filter as the sensor will still capture the black space and you will still have to crop that off later anyway. Why not give yourself the freedom to crop in post to what may look better in hindsight or any other minor corrections?

 

[ahsanford]

Yes, anamorphic lenses are available for dSLRs for stills. Here is an example of their use:
http://www.samhurdphotography.com/2014/technique/shooting-anamorphic-lenses-dslr/

I don't see why you would "black out" a filter as the sensor will still capture the black space and you will still have to crop that off later anyway. Why not give yourself the freedom to crop in post to what may look better in hindsight or any other minor corrections?

I want to shoot with different framing, that's all. Consider it a composition exercise.

Thanks for the link!

- A

 

[ahsanford]

Yes, anamorphic lenses are available for dSLRs for stills. Here is an example of their use:
http://www.samhurdphotography.com/2014/technique/shooting-anamorphic-lenses-dslr/

I don't see why you would "black out" a filter as the sensor will still capture the black space and you will still have to crop that off later anyway. Why not give yourself the freedom to crop in post to what may look better in hindsight or any other minor corrections?

Read the link. Ok, so if I understand that link correctly:

1) You focus with a normal lens.

2) You attach something (something asymmetric / cat-eyed, I presume) to the front of your lens to widen the FOV in one direction only.

3) You then focus that item.

4) You take the shot.

5) You back out the wide shot by compressing/reducing the height of the image in post -- you don't stretch the width.

If so, ouch. Taking shots with a patient, stationary subject while I'm fiddling with focusing and attachments is not what I had in mind with this. Are there any anamorphic lenses that are standalone constructs (not a lens attachment) that have AF?

- A

 

[Tinky]

This is a bit like using a tilt shift for fake minature.

Not really what they were designed for.

From a stills perspective you will essentially have to undo the anamorphic horizontal compression by converting to a custom pixel aspect, then re-sampling as square pixels if you want to do anything with it print or web wise.

Anamorphic lenses were designed to allow the benefits of telephoto compression and wider composition.

In a video context projectors often had (or can be adapted) with an anamorphic lens for playback. With film this wasn't an issue really, for pixels it is. And it will destroy your bokeh.

All panoramic film cameras had a wider gate. Optical cropping if you like. APS-P was an exception as it ate into the vertical film area. You could get 135W backs for some medium format cameras, essentially a horizontal crop from the 645 image circle.

 

[ahsanford]

Appreciate the context!

- A

 

[bhf3737]

Yes, anamorphic lenses are available for dSLRs for stills. Here is an example of their use:
http://www.samhurdphotography.com/2014/technique/shooting-anamorphic-lenses-dslr/

I don't see why you would "black out" a filter as the sensor will still capture the black space and you will still have to crop that off later anyway. Why not give yourself the freedom to crop in post to what may look better in hindsight or any other minor corrections?

Read the link. Ok, so if I understand that link correctly:

1) You focus with a normal lens.

2) You attach something (something asymmetric / cat-eyed, I presume) to the front of your lens to widen the FOV in one direction only.

3) You then focus that item.

4) You take the shot.

5) You back out the wide shot by compressing/reducing the height of the image in post -- you don't stretch the width.

If so, ouch. Taking shots with a patient, stationary subject while I'm fiddling with focusing and attachments is not what I had in mind with this. Are there any anamorphic lenses that are standalone constructs (not a lens attachment) that have AF?

- A

Zeiss has a set of Master Anamorphic Lenses:
https://www.zeiss.com/camera-lenses/en_de/cine_lenses/master_anamorphic_lenses/master_anamorphic_lenses.html

I think they are 2x anamorphic lenses (i.e. twice a wide horizontally as a lens of the same focal length)
Usually used on ARRI.
Panasonic GH4 which has a native anamorphic support (4:3 ratio) and 2x anamorphic lenses with M4/3 mount can be used with it.

 

[scyrene]

That article was interesting and the results looked good.

I'm wondering if you can't achieve the same effect, however, by stitching a horizontal panorama? A letterbox Brenizer, if you will.

 

[cayenne]

I bought the SLR Magic Anamorphot 1.33 anamorphic lens adapter:

http://www.slrmagic.co.uk/slr-magic-anamorphot-133x-50-anamorphic-adapter-dioptres-kit.html

I got mine with the diopter set, for shooting video on my Canon 5D3. Interesting set up, works great, but definitely had lens limitations you can use it with.

I'm currently editing my first video with it in use.

I got mine off Adorama's eBay open box sale, thing is perfect shape, and got the whole kit for like $599 or so I think...so, worth looking for bargains.

I've not shot photos with it yet, but plan to in the near future....

Do a bit of research on them.

Here is a non-published very quick test video I did when I first got it, and was testing out the desqueeze process and all with davinci resolve:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33Synw4vUcw

This was same thing, desqueeze with AE CS6:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxFt653ZUtA

Anyway, that's what it looks like about 3ft away, I think this was hooked to my Canon 40mm pancake lens...

HTH,

cayenne

 

[ahsanford]

I bought the SLR Magic Anamorphot 1.33 anamorphic lens adapter:

cayenne

Appreciate the link and test video. I do believe you are describing step two in my journey here.

I don't need the small DOF + wide FOV or the fancy flare effect that the cinematic folks love. I just want to compose shots in a very wide aspect ratio frame. I want to experience those constraints in real-time through the viewfinder and take wide aspect ratio shots in one exposure.

Step one would be the baby steps before investing in hardware. Before I plunk down > $1,000 for a style of shooting I've never tried, I think I'm going to make some opaque lens blinds to crop my shots for me -- something I can laser cut and crop on to a 77mm filter and use on my 16-35 f/4L IS.

If I like that and it works well enough, we can talk about renting some anamorphic gear.

- A

 

[danski0224]

Wouldn't it be better to put the letterbox onto the focusing screen and then match that with a crop in post?

I don't envision a mask mounted to the front of the lens giving clean results.

 

[ahsanford]

Wouldn't it be better to put the letterbox onto the focusing screen and then match that with a crop in post?

I don't envision a mask mounted to the front of the lens giving clean results.

Agree. Front stencils do some fun things with wide open bokeh, but I imagine a stopped down, sharply rendered image would have a nutty halo on the fringes of such a lens obstruction.

Also, my candidate lens (the 16-35 f/4L IS, likely to be used at 16mm) has a small amount of distortion that needs to be corrected in post, so for the lens filter idea to work, it wouldn't be a true rectangle -- it would need to be a slightly barrel-shaped rectangle. (If I used a pure rectangle, the distortion correction would pinch in the top and bottom of the image. I could skip distortion correction with these, of course -- I won't be shooting architecture with this little experiment.)

I also might just massacre an eyepiece and build the framing mask into that. This seems the cheapest and simplest way to handcuff my framing (my goal of all this) while retaining a pure file that I'd subsequently mimic the crop of in post.

No chance I'm touching my focusing screen. That's a last resort for me -- I'd honestly consider renting an anamorphic lens before messing with camera internals.

- A

 

[ahsanford]

I just gaffered two black bars on the top and bottom of my eye piece.

Seemed like a good idea at the time, but then I remembered that physics exists. ;D

Still had a full 3:2 viewfinder FOV. Horrible fail. Scratch that idea off the list.

- A

 

[danski0224]

The focusing screen can usually be easily removed without tools, and they are relatively inexpensive.

It's possible that focusing screen dot com either has one already masked, or can do it.

I don't see how gaffers tape on the viewfinder would help because the rest of the image could be seen around the tape through the viewfinder.

Therefore, masking off the focusing screen seems to be the only solution.

Maybe Magic Lantern has framing options for live view.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

You can set the aspect ratio in the camera, use liveview, and process with DPP. DPP will recognize the aspect ratio and crop the top and bottom (or sides). This only works when shooting with liveview.

Unfortunately, you can only go as wide as 16:9, but you get the effect, and see the image in liveview as it will appear when processed in DPP.

Turn on the method of display on your liveview image, to see letter box on the camera LCD (bars on top and bottom or on sides), or just a black line outlining the area.

DPP also shows a video with the bars, but I don't know how you process the video to get them to show in a player. (I'm not a video person)

 

[ahsanford]

Just cut out a 2.35:1 blind in thick black posterboard to place in front of a 77mm filter as a trial of concept.

I intended to have it sit on the 70-ish mm ledge at the bottom of the filter threads, but my terrible scissor work landed an effective diameter of about 75mm with enough high point / asperities in the cuts to sit loosely on the edge of the main filter ring. That turned out to actually be helpful as it let me tape down to the ring with two tiny spots of gaffer to nail down the rotation (taping it directly to the filter would have thread clocking problems, clean-up required, etc.).

My DIY craftsmanship was poor but it crudely worked as intended. AF was fine (recall most of the 5D3 AF don't wander too far up/down from the center anyway). The edges were fuzzy due to my non-perfect cuts having to be made with multiple exacto-knife passes, but it basically did what it was supposed to do. It only worked at 16mm on the 16-35 f/4L IS as I suppose the front element is only doing any (complete) image heavy lifting on the wide end, so zooming to 35mm 'looked through' the blind and gave a standard aspect ratio shot -- much like my fail with the viewfinder eyepiece, I suppose.

Funny thing is my 2.35:1 ratio didn't hold up in post. A true 2.35:1 clean-up re-crop in post definitely cropped more from the top and bottom than the sides.

A fun Saturday Photojojo-level DIY tinkering project. I may go so far as to knock out some much better made laser cut plastic pieces if I find some time.

- A

 

[cayenne]

I just gaffered two black bars on the top and bottom of my eye piece.

Seemed like a good idea at the time, but then I remembered that physics exists. ;D

Still had a full 3:2 viewfinder FOV. Horrible fail. Scratch that idea off the list.

- A

Yes..but you are going to be losing image that way...with a true anamorphic lens or adapter, you are getting the full image squeezed, and then when you de-squeeze...you'll have the full image.

I might suggest you *rent* either an adaptor or anamorphic lens and give it a try for real...?

HTH,

C

 

[ahsanford]

Yes..but you are going to be losing image that way...with a true anamorphic lens or adapter, you are getting the full image squeezed, and then when you de-squeeze...you'll have the full image.

I might suggest you *rent* either an adaptor or anamorphic lens and give it a try for real...?

HTH,

C

Totally okay with throwing out data. This is an experiment just to see if I enjoy composing photos under this new aspect ratio constraint.

As far as renting goes, that's certainly on the table. But for now, I'll work the terrible DIY angle to confirm I enjoy composing shots this way and then I'd logically rent some proper hardware next.

Someone else was making some focusing screen suggestions, and even if I could do that with my 5D3, I don't want to cripple my only FF body to tinker like this, so I'd strongly prefer a lens or filter-based solution.

But again: let me tinker, let me see if I like it, and then I'll check back in.

- A