Kinoptik Special Cine 210mm T3 Part III

The Kinoptik Special Cine 210mm f2.8 (or more accurately, T3), is a large lens, as expected for a fast lens of this focal length.  It weighs 1.87 kg with my home made adapter, original front cap and the rear cap.  It's roughly the same weight as the Canon EF 70-200mm f2.8 IS lens I have.  Despite being so heavy, the lens is surprisingly easy to focus.  I can focus it with two fingers, it's that smooth and light.  The aperture ring is also very light and easy to set.  The apertures are step-less.  There are no clicks between apertures. 

When mounted on the Panasonic G1, it looks kind of ridiculous and very hard to attain critical focus, due to the 2x focal length factor, making the lens having a view of a 420mm lens.  But, on the 5D, it's a much better fit.  Getting critical focus is surprisingly easy, although I do have an EE-S screen installed to aid manual focus lenses.

I quite like the images that come out of the lens and the 5D.  The pictures have a more 3-dimensional affect than my other lenses of similar focal length.  The bokeh is especially beautiful.  This is not a high contrast lens, but is the lens is very sharp, but not "dry".  Some lenses, especially older Nikon lenses are very sharp, but are very high contrast and thus giving the dryness feel to the pictures.  If I have to compare, pictures from the Kinoptik is like a medium rare steak done well, whereas pictures from other lenses are like well done steaks.  It's a well balanced lens between sharpness and contrast.  And the colour is wonderful.

I can't wait to shoot some portraits with this lens.  I think it's a nice portrait lens.  We'll see.

All pictures were taken with a Kinoptik 210mm f2.8 and Canon 5D.  Click on picture to see a larger version.