Ottica fotografica convertita in cine lens con ghiere ingranate

Cinemod

Plenty of stills lenses render the way you'd want on set, with mechanics that won't let you work: smooth rings where a gear should be, an iris that clicks, front diameters all over the place within the same set.

A cinemod works on those mechanics without rebuilding them and without touching the glass. The lens stays itself — character, rendering, flaws included — and becomes usable with follow focus, motors and mattebox.

This page also tells you where cinemod stops, because it's the part nobody writes down and the one that decides whether it's the right job for you.

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The gear rings

Module 0.8, the cinema standard, so they work with any follow focus or motor out there. Other modules can be made on request.

Every ring is designed from scratch around that lens. There's no catalogue of standard sizes to pick from: we measure the lens, draw, print, test, and if it doesn't fit we do it again. It's the difference between a part that turns as one with the original ring and one that slips under load.

Materials. PETG CF and PAHT CF as standard: carbon-fibre filled, stiff, temperature-stable, light. Aluminium or stainless steel on request, when weight isn't an issue and you need a firmer hold.

Thickness, width, position and colour are your call, not ours.

Iris de-click

It takes the clicks out of the aperture ring: the change becomes continuous and silent, useful both for pulling exposure in a shot and for not having a click in the middle of an audio take.

It's reversible. In almost every case the click can be put back later. The mechanics that don't allow it are a small minority of unusual lenses, and when we come across one we tell you before we start, not after.

The front diameter

Matching the front diameter across a set means one set of filters, one mattebox ring, and no reconfiguring when you change focal length.

We don't impose a standard. Any size can be reached; in practice we recommend 95 mm or 114 mm, because those are the diameters the rest of the kit on set works best with.

Normally we use off-the-shelf step-up rings: they're reliable and keep the cost where it should be. We can make them to measure in aluminium, but it weighs heavily on the quote and only makes sense in specific cases.

Mount conversion

Here physics is in charge, not preference. You can only convert to a mount with a shorter flange focal distance than the original: extra space can be filled, missing space can't.

In a cinemod the mount change is done with a purely mechanical adapter, with no optical elements in between, and it normally needs no shimming. When a mount built to measure makes sense instead, we've covered it in Custom mounts for stills lenses on cine cameras.

Target mounts: Sony E, Canon RF, L-Mount, Nikon Z. Source mounts we convert:

Leica M: 27.8 mm
M39 / LTM (Leica thread mount): 28.8 mm
S-Mount (Contax / Nikon rangefinder): 34.85 mm
Canon FD: 42.0 mm
Minolta SR / MD: 43.5 mm
Canon EF: 44.0 mm
M42 (Pentax, Praktica, Zeiss): 45.46 mm
Pentax K: 45.46 mm
Contax / Yashica (C/Y): 45.5 mm
Olympus OM: 46.0 mm
Nikon F (AI / AI-S): 46.5 mm
Leica R: 47.0 mm

What about PL?

PL isn't part of a cinemod. Its flange is 52 mm, longer than every one listed above: to get there you either partly dismantle the lens, or fit an adapter with a corrective optical element — which lengthens the path but changes the rendering.

It can be done, but it's a Custom solution job, with different timings and different costs. If what you're after is a PL set, we start there rather than from a cinemod.

Full sets and matching

We work on single lenses and on complete sets.

On a set we do the matching, which is what a cinemod done properly makes possible and one done piecemeal doesn't:

the same front diameter on every focal length;
the same distance between the rings, so the motors don't move when you swap lenses;
the same ring size, where the original mechanics allow it.

In practice: you change focal length and the rig stays where it is. Some of the sets that have been through our bench are in the portfolio.

What matching can't include is consistent focus scales from one focal length to the next. The reason is in the section below, and it's the same reason as the focus throw.

Where cinemod stops

This section exists because the most common misunderstanding about this job is precisely about what it doesn't do.

The focus throw doesn't get longer

If your lens has 90° of travel from minimum focus to infinity, after the cinemod it still has 90°. An extra ring fitted over the original one doesn't change the lens's angular travel.

What changes is the gear ratio: the new ring has a larger diameter, so the motor or the follow-focus gear has to turn more times to cover the same travel. On the focus puller's knob you gain resolution, and that's no small thing — but the lens scale stays what it was, with its 90°.

To really get to the 270° of a cine lens you have to rebuild the helicoid, and that's rehousing, not cinemod: we've set out the difference in Rehoused vintage lenses vs native cine lenses.

Focus scales don't become consistent

For the same reason. Making the scales of two different focal lengths identical means rebuilding the mechanics of both, not adding a ring on top. That's rehousing too.

The original scale stays the original scale

We don't redraw it and we don't move it. We design the rings so they don't cover the engraved values, and at most we clean up faded paint and restore it in the original colours, so as not to compromise the integrity of the lens.

We don't open the lens

A cinemod works from the outside. The glass isn't touched, which also means any optical faults stay: fungus, haze, decentring.

If the lens needs it, internal cleaning and an overhaul are a Servicing job, which sits alongside the cinemod and is quoted separately.

What a cinemod doesn't include

Consistent focus scales across different lenses
A genuinely longer focus throw
Mount conversion to a mount with a longer flange than the original
Opening the lens, unless requested as a servicing job

Turnaround

One week of work, whether it's a single lens or a complete set.

That's not a typo: the time is set by the arrival of the parts for the front, which doesn't depend on us and doesn't grow with quantity. A set of five lenses doesn't take five times as long as one.

As with our other work, this is bench time: the overall delivery time includes shipping and final checks, and we give it to you in the quote.

Warranty

The rings, adapters and components that leave our bench are covered by warranty: we designed and made them, and we stand behind them.

Shipping and delivery

Shipping both ways and insurance are at the customer's expense. We provide packing instructions. You can also drop off and collect by hand at the workshop, by appointment.

Frequently asked questions

No. The ring's travel stays the original one. The larger ring increases the gear ratio, so the follow focus turns more and you gain precision on the knob, but the lens's degrees of rotation don't change. To really lengthen them you need a rehousing.

Almost never as a cinemod: PL has a 52 mm flange, longer than every common stills mount. It can be done by partly dismantling the lens or with a corrective optical adapter, but that's a Custom solution job.

In almost every case, yes. The exceptions are unusual mechanics, and we tell you before we start.

We use PETG CF and PAHT CF, carbon-fibre filled: stiff and stable, not generic plastics. If you'd rather have metal, you can have them in aluminium or stainless steel.

No. A cinemod works from the outside and doesn't open the lens. If it needs an overhaul, that's added as a servicing job.

Make your own call; we can tell you how we work. Every time a lens comes into the workshop we open a new project and design the part to measure. Once it's ready it goes to print and gets tested, and the process repeats until we have a prototype we're happy with and that fits like a glove. Only then do we move on to the real thing. Materials, colours, gear module, thickness and width can all be tailored to what you need. It's the difference between buying a tuxedo off the rack and having one made to measure.

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