My Anamorphic Lenses | Adapters | Solutions

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Over the last few years I’ve been lucky enough to own and review quite a few anamorphic lenses and adapters. I’m often asked which one I would recommend, but everyone has different needs, so instead of pointing people at half a dozen different posts, I decided to put together a post that includes all the anamorphic solutions I’ve tried so far. If you are getting into anamorphics, hopefully this guide will help you find something that will meet your requirements.

The video above will give you an easy to digest overview of almost every lens in this guide and below you will find additional useful info including Pros & Cons, links for relevant in-depth reviews and the quick ebay links.

Optex (Century) 16:9 1.33x | REVIEW 

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Most Compact & lightweight in this guide
• Straightforward to setup and use
• Nice anamorphic flares
• Single focusing setup

Cons:

• Quite soft, especially around the edges
• 1.33x stretch lacks some of anamorphic characteristics
• Poor close focusing distance
• Quite rare
• No filter thread for diopters (but can be added)

Isco Wide-Screen 2000 | REVIEW

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Compact and Lightweight
• Straightforward to setup and use
• One of the sharpest lenses in this guide
• Single focusing setup

Cons:

• Poor close focusing distance
• No filter thread for diopters (but can be added)
• Rare

Proskar-16 | REVIEW

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Cheapest lens in this guide
• 2x stretch provides all anamorphic characteristics
• Nice flares

Cons:

• Quite soft
• Double Focus Setup
• Additional clamp is needed to fit it onto a taking lens
• No filter thread for diopters (but can be added)

Kowa Vidoscope | REVIEW 

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Quite sharp
• One of the cheapest lenses in this guide
• 2x stretch provides all anamorphic characteristics
• Nice flares

Cons:

• Double Focus Setup
• Additional clamp is needed to fit it onto a taking lens
• No filter thread for diopters (but can be added)
• Rare

Schneider Cinelux

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• One of the sharpest lenses in this guide
• Very sharp
• 2x stretch provides all anamorphic characteristics
• Quite cheap

Cons:

• Almost unusable without an additional focusing device

FM Lens | REVIEW

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Provides single focus solution for projection lenses
• Can focus down to 0.60m without additional diopters
• Solid, pro filming solution

Cons:

• Expensive
• Big and heavy
• Rare (currently discontinued)

Canon FD 50mm F1.4 | REVIEW 

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Cheap for a 50mm F1.4
• Quite sharp
• Great character

Cons:

• Poor compatibility with EF mount
• Flares easily

Helios 44-2 | REVIEW  

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Super cheap
• Amazing flares and bokeh
• Quite sharp

Cons:

• Flares can be overpowering
• Some copies perform worse than others
• Anamorphic Clamps

Anamorphic Clamps 

eBay Links: US | UK | DE | CA | IT | FR | ES | AU | NL

Pros:

• Cheap way to mount projection lenses onto taking lenses

Cons:

• Not very professional solution

If you want to learn more about any of the lenses above, make sure to check out their individual reviews (except Schneider Cinelux). There are also a few more anamorphic lens reviews on the website that haven’t been featured in this video:

Sankor 16F – A great alternative to Kowa Vidoscope if you will have trouble finding one

Iscorama 42 MC – Very expensive, but probably the best anamorphic lens, besides cine anamorphics.

I hope you found this overview useful. If you’d like me to review any other anamorphic lenses, feel free to drop your suggestions in the comments section below! Lastly I want to say a big thank you to Tito Ferradans who helped me a lot in my own anamorphic research!