The First Footage with the Leica Summilux-C Lenses

5/31/11, 11:26 AM

Effective: April 11, 2011
(scroll to the bottom to see all three demos)

Band Pro Screens First Leica Lens Footage at NAB 2011

Band Pro announces that their first production footage of the new Leica Summilux-C prime lenses will be screened in booth C10308 at NAB 2011. Band Pro will also have the lenses available on a variety of cameras including RED EPIC, ARRI ALEXA, Sony F35 and the ViewPLUS 4K 12-bit RAW camera showing live 4K output to a 4K monitor.

Band Pro recently provided cinematographers Harris Savides, ASC and Tom Lowe as well as Band Pro’s Randy Wedick with a set of the new PL Mount lenses and tasked them with pushing the lenses artistically in demanding situations of their choice. “We wanted to avoid demo footage image fatigue of the many well-known Los Angeles scenes and opted for less common settings,” explains Amnon Band. “The technical tests will be performed a million times over once the lenses get out into the world. Our idea was to go for the artistic heart of what the Leica lenses are capable of and the character they represent.”

Savides paired the lenses with the ARRI ALEXA and recorded to a Codex Onboard in New York. His footage explores the luminous quality of the lenses and the way they portray skin tones and deal with highlights as well as shallow depth-of-field, flaring and their ability to hold contrast in heavy backlight. The footage was finished by fashion photography colorist Pascal Dangin, who does covers for Vanity Fair and Vogue. He used the Filmlight Baselight finishing system and ARRIRAW workflow.

Lowe captured his images with a RED EPIC-M and Canon 1D with a PL mount, carefully choosing California locations. His footage includes time-lapse and astrophotography, pushing the lens resolution, corner-to-corner sharpness and showcasing the lack of distortion on the wide end (18mm). He was also able to shoot wide open at T1.4 and maintain sharp images that usually require a 2-stop down on lenses. Lowe’s footage was finished by Lightiron in Los Angeles using RedCine-X.

Wedick took a Sony F35 with Codex Onboard to the San Francisco Bay Area and Sonoma County. His footage challenged the lenses in high contrast situations, the quality of lens flares and their bokeh characteristics. This footage was ingested into the Codex workflow system at Tunnel Post in Santa Monica and finished utilizing the Nucoda Film Master finishing system.

“The results were amazing,” says Amnon Band. “By freeing ourselves from test charts that simply gives nuts-and-bolts answers we were able to give our selected cinematographers a chance to really expound on the creative possibilities of these lenses. Each of the three mini-features, shot with different cameras and in different places, really tells the story of what these new Leica lenses can do for today’s filmmakers.”

Footage by Harris Savides, ASC