Letus Direct User Wiki


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Letus Lens Mounts

All of the Letus mounts work on all of the Letus adapters.1)

SLR Lens Mounts

Cine Lens Mounts

Carl Zeiss Lenses

We offer both SLR and Cine lenses from Carl Zeiss, please see this page for more information on Carl Zeiss Lenses - Carl Zeiss Lenses

Basic SLR Lens Recommendations

Camera Lens Sizes
Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

When deciding what lenses to get for your Letus 35mm adapter Letus recommends the following:

  • Highest speed lenses you can find/afford
  • Fully manual lenses
  • Prime lenses
  • Full frame lenses (not DSLR specific lenses)

High speed lenses (low f-stop number) are more light efficient and allow for a shallower DOF. The lower the f-stop the wider the aperture and the wider the aperture the shallower the DOF. On the vibrating style adapters (Mini, Extreme, and Elite), you will be limited to about f5.6 before the ground glass grain starts to appear in your image. On the Ultimate, this limitation is not applicable.

We recommend fully manual lenses because they are much easier to adjust while shooting, many auto lenses must be attached to a camera body in order to change the aperture and adjust focus.

Zoom Lenses

Zoom lenses can be used on our adapters however, you need to keep a few things in mind when using zoom lenses.

  1. When using a zoom lens, for example a 70-200mm at 70, you can adjust the back focus to reach infinity, but at 200 it may be out of focus. Since the back focus will need to be adjusted often while using a zoom lens, you will want the back focus adjustment ring. This ring is built into the Elite and Ultimate, and is available for purchase for the Extreme - Elite Upgrade This feature is not available on the Mini.
  2. Zoom lenses are generally not as fast as prime (fixed focal length lenses). A f1.4 50mm prime will be more light efficient than a f4 18-200mm lens. The lower (wider) the f-stop number on the lens, the more light efficient. You will also be able to achieve shallower DOF with a wider f-stop such as a f1.4. On the vibrating style adapters (Mini, Extreme, and Elite), f5.6 will be the upper limit of f-stop. Using higher f-stop numbers may cause grain to appear in your image. On the Ultimate, this limitation is not applicable.
  3. When using a zoom lens, you will want to make sure it is a SLR lens designed for film or full frame digital. Some DSLR lenses (such as a Nikon DX lenses and Canon EF-S lenses) are designed to project on a smaller imaging plane may vignette when attached to a Letus adapter. The Letus adapters are designed to work with 35mm full frame lenses.

Some popular Zoom lenses used with Letus adapters are:

  • Canon 70-200mm f2.8
  • Nikon 17-35mm f2.8 ED
  • Nikon 80-200mm f2.8 ED

DSLR Lenses

APS-C vs. Full Frame

DSLR Lenses will work with our adapters but since our adapters do not have electronic interfaces any automatic controls of the lens will not work, i.e. auto aperture, auto focus, and image stabilization. Also, some DSLR lenses do not produce a full frame 35mm image2), these lenses are designed specifically to work with DSLR cameras that do not have full frame 35mm sensors such as: APS-H, APS-C, and Four Thirds (see chart above)3)4) Non full frame lenses can still be used, you will just need to zoom in further on the ground glass to eliminate vignetting.






Wide Angle Lenses

Our adapters will work fine with wide angle lenses (12mm) as long as they are full frame lenses (not APS-H or APS-C, see chart above)

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