The "Cooke Look" - REAL or just HYPE?
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- Опубликовано: 9 июн 2024
- In my continued journey down the lens rabbit hole, it was inevitable that I would arrive at the venerable and legendary Cooke Optics. As I take a quick look at their lenses, let's talk a little about the landscape of what matters, what might not matter, and how I would encourage you to think about these things. Enjoy!
If i ever win the lottery, i'll get 2 sets of lenses. One is Cooke the other is Leitz Summicrons. BTW, Schneider Xenon is a good budget alternative, close-ish to Cooke. Sony Cinealta's even cheaper, but they are awesome. Less character but not sterile at all.
There is something about that painterly bokeh, too....
Would love to hear your opinion on the Cooke look vs. the new DZOFilm Arles lens.
The difference between DZO Vespids and Cooke SP.3s is enough to fund a microbudget feature.
Cooke is my favorite lens company! There IS something to the look and TBH I can never put my finger on it when I compare my CN-E stuff to my MiniS4 stuff. I can definitely “feel” the difference on larger screens.
I say the same about Sigma Art EF lenses. I absolutely love the look they produce. Better yet most of them resolve 33mp worth of detail
Oh my! Yes, we used the Sigma Cine lenses paired with REDs to film a factory that manufactured oil drilling lines. The images was very clean and nice. I love those lenses too. Haha.
I appreciate your response. Your points about lighting are well taken.
I have enjoyed the footage I've seen from the new Cooke lenses when I saw them paired with the new Sony Burano. What I realize is an issue for me is that I question my technical eye. A few months back, I made a comment on a short film made with the GFX 100 II and a post production guy told that outside of functionality, camera bodies are largely irrelevant, that anybody with decent post skills can make the images into whatever they want. I couldn't argue with him because I've heard other pros make similar claims. But....???????
I came to filmmaking through writing and painting. I respond to imagery as a person who has been an artist for longer than half of my life. I have seen images from cameras like the Canon C70 or Sony A7IV which completely blew me away. The new V-Raptor and the new Arri Alexa 35 both in their own ways have a certain "sensual" quality to them.
The blurry line between technical precision and artist voice seems to be blurrier as the technology continues to evolve.
I agree with the general premise that the camera is very low on the totem pole of “what matters.” I wouldn’t say totally irrelevant, but let’s say it’s maybe the last few yards in a 100 yard dash. What a nicer camera can do, especially when we’re talking about dynamic range, is give you a higher latitude for mistakes. You can under expose or overexpose by a greater degree and still get the right image. With a lesser camera, you need to have your exposure nailed down better, and/or be an environment with less dynamic range generally. You don’t want to film in mixed lighting conditions with a camera that only has nine stops of range. But outside of those fringe cases, any legitimate cine camera can do just as well as another. And you also highlight another important aspect, which is the “processing in post.” Most folks would do well to prioritize learning color grading in da Vinci resolve. That $300 program can provide more benefit than $300,000 worth of lenses will.
The S4s and the original Panchros really had the dialed-in signature look for Cooke. IMHO all of the modern manufactured lenses have less artifacting and characteristics creating an situation where there is marginal separation.
Agreed, I think the "Cooke Look" started with distinct pincushion distortion by the S4s where the background seems pushed away.
What flavour was the cool-aide? Jk, I always struggle with this stuff and often think I’m either liking some sort of optical imperfection, or it’s placebo effect. So hard to know.
Same here, but I always gravitate towards Cookes.
You should compare the DZO Arles with the sp3s!
great content. thank you.
Thank you!
I love ur video! Do u have IG to follow your work?
Thanks Diego! No I don’t have an IG. Just this :-)