In 1997, Sony® Corporationasked Panavision® to helpdevelop a camera systemwhich would be used bycinematographers to cre-ate motion picture qualityimages f rom a new 24 frame CCD camera.Panavision’s customershad also been asking for adigital camera system tailored to their needs asfilmmakers.

Panavision® realized that acomplete imaging systema p p r o a c h w o u l d b e

imperative for a new digi-tal camera with no motionpicture precedents. Thebasic HDW-F900 wasdesigned to be an ENGstyle hand held cameraintended to support lightweight ENG style lenses.

Panavision® has ruggedi-zed the camera and devel-oped a lens mount that willsupport our new series ofPrimo Digital® lenses. Thecamera will also interfacewith all appropriate exist-ing Panavision accessories.

The 2/3" CCD imager isactually only 11mm indiagonal (as compared tothe 27.5 mm diagonal of a35mm motion picture filmframe). Therefore, for anygiven screen size, the 2/3"CCD will require 2.5 timesmore horizontal magnifica-tion than a 35mm filmframe. This required thatour new Primo Digital®

lens series be designed toh a v e 2 . 5 t ime s t h e

performance of our bestcine lenses (fortunatelyfor a smaller image size).All of the new PrimoDigital® lenses will providetheir optimum perform-ance at their maximumaperture, including ourtwo new f1.5 11:1 andwide angle 4:1 PrimoDigital® zoom lenses,which are more than 1stop faster than any otherzoom lens designed for the2/3" CCD format.

On the left side of thisgraphic is a 16x9 format,35mm film camera aper-ture. On the right is theimage area of a 2/3" CCDdrawn to the same scale.In order to have the same

performance as a Primocine lens, Primo Digital®

lenses must achieve 80%contrast at 50 line pairsper millimeter on the 2/3"CCD (2.5 times better fre-quency response).

Digital Cinematographycamera system

THE IM PORTANCE OF OPTICS

Historically, 525 and 625 linevideo systems were con-strained in their perform-ance by almost everythingbut optics. However, withSony's introduction of thefirst progressive output2/3", 2 million pixel (percolor) CCD camera it wasimmediately apparent thatoptics were going to be crit-ical to maximizing the performance of a DigitalCinematography System.

Panavision® has thereforeintroduced a new series oflenses, designed specificallyfor prism beam splitters andthe small target size of the2/3" CCD. The PrimoDigital® lens series isdesigned to provide the max-imum image performancefor this format while retain-ing all of the other lens char-acteristics Panavision’s®

customers have come toexpect from Primo® lenses for film.

U LT R A P R E C I S I O N E Q U I P M E N T F O R T H E M OT I O N P I CT U R E I N D U ST RY

6 2 1 9 D E S OTO AV E N U E , W O O D L A N D H I L L S CA 9 1 3 678 1 8 - 3 1 6 - 1 0 0 0 • FA X 8 1 8 - 3 1 6 - 1 1 1 1

F I LM /HD COM PARATIVE LENS RESOLUTION3 perf. 35mm film aperture

20 cycles/mm

2/3" CCD

50 cycles/mm

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6 2 1 9 D E S OTO AV E N U E , W O O D L A N D H I L L S CA 9 1 3 678 1 8 - 3 1 6 - 1 0 0 0 • FA X 8 1 8 - 3 1 6 - 1 1 1 1

In addition to requiring 2.5 times the frequency response of itscine counterpart, the smaller target also has 2.5 times greaterdepth of field for the same angle of view and f-stop as theequivalent cine lens (f4 on 1.85:1 35mm film format is f1.6 inthe 2/3" CCD format). In order to provide creative control overdepth of field, the Primo Digital® lenses have been designed tooperate two stops faster than the equivalent cine lenses.

Panavision has designed the Primo Digital® series of lenses inorder to address the issues of resolution and depth of field thatthe 2/3" CCD format creates for the cinematographer. Theselenses will provide the same high contrast with low veiling glareas first established by the Primo® cine lenses. The first twolenses, available now, are functionally equivalent to the Primo11:1 and 4:1 wide angle zooms.

Panavision’s next offering, will be two lightweight zooms and aseries of primes beginning with a low distortion 5mm wideangle (equivalent to a 12.5mm in 1.85:1 Academy format).These lenses will provide the same high performance at fastapertures. Primo Digital® primes will be T1.6 or better, andweigh less than 6 pounds (or 2.7 Kilos).

As with film, Panavision is committed to continually developingour digital camera system in collaboration with our clients, toensure that their needs are met.

F I LM VS. V IDEO COLOR IM ETRY

U LT R A P R E C I S I O N E Q U I P M E N T F O R T H E M OT I O N P I CT U R E I N D U ST RY

The “film” versus the “video” look is an extremely controver-sial issue, and is an aesthetic decision based on many factorsthat include colorimetry, gamma, frame rate, image enhance-ment, granularity, etc. The Primo Digital® lenses have aunique internal design which enables interference type spec-tral modification filters to be incorporated within the lenses.When coupled with other optical pre-filters within the cam-era beam splitter optics, the “Panavised” camera can achievea wider color gamut than standard CCD video cameras.

9.5mm–105mm T1.6 11:1 zoom

6mm–27mm T1.6 4.5:1 zoom

5mm T1.9 wide angle prime

7mm T1.6 prime

10mm T1.6 prime

14mm T1.6 prime

20mm T1.6 prime

35mm T1.6 prime

6mm–27mm T1.8 4.5:1 zoom

25mm–112mm T1.9 4.5:1 zoom

1.85:1 2.40:1 2/3 CCDF-stops

2 2.8 0.8

2.8 4 1.1

4 5.6 1.6

5.6 8 2.2

8 11 3.2

11 16 4.4

16 22 6.4

PR IMO D IG ITAL™ LENS SER IES

DEPTH OF F IELD COM PAR ISON

Primo Digital, Primo Zoom and the Panavision nameare registered trademarks of Panavision.

where, T = measured lens transmission

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