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FAQ

Signature Zoom lenses

  • Aesthetically, yes. You should expect Signature Zooms and Signature Primes to intercut seamlessly. Their center resolution, warm hue, skin tone rendition, bokeh, and focus roll-off are a perfect visual match.
      
    Completely eliminating any one aberration results in enhancing another, so we pursued a balanced approach such that no single aberration stands out. We then built our look upon this base. 
     
    Signature Primes are remarkably distortion free, to a degree only possible with prime lenses, so Signature Zooms will show more distortion by comparison, but considerably less than one might see in other zooms.
     
    While most Signature Primes exhibit no visible focus breathing, Signature Zooms do show some of this at longer focal lengths, where it is less noticeable to the eye. At the wide end, where backgrounds tend to be sharper and focus breathing is more obvious, they show no visible breathing. 
     

  • Similar to Signature Primes, you will see consistent corner illumination when these lenses are used at equivalent focal lengths. This results in the familiar ARRI Signature “cat’s eye” bokeh at wide open apertures, no matter which focal length is employed.

    ARRI Signature Primes show this effect at T1.8, transitioning to perfectly round bokeh by T2.5. ARRI Signature Zooms see the same change from T2.8 to T5.6. This is by design.
     
    The exposure in the center of the image DOES NOT CHANGE with focal length. There is no overall drop in exposure, only a subtle vignette designed to match the characteristics of ARRI Signature Primes. This illumination characteristic is consistent across all ARRI Signature Zooms. Changing from a Signature Zoom to another Signature Zoom or a Signature Prime does not result in a dramatic change in look.
     

  • There are many aspects of the ARRI Signature Zooms’ design that contribute to their light weight. Chief among these is their advanced optical design and the use of machined magnesium in their housings.

  • All ARRI lenses are built from scratch to our exact specifications. We define the look and feel, and our manufacturers must achieve our goals within very fine tolerances. Our Signature Zoom manufacturing partner produces high-precision optics for a number of other industries, and has never made a cinema lens before. This made them receptive to crafting a lens with a radical new look for digital cinema, as they had no preconceived notions regarding what a cinema lens should look like.
     
    Every lens offered for sale under the ARRI name is an original design, and the Signature lenses are no different.
     

  • No. LPL is the new standard for the digital era. It is designed around the specific needs of digital cameras and will not work on film cameras. LPL’s reduced flange depth allows for high-performance lens designs across multiple formats.
     
    All Signature lenses are near telecentric. Light exiting the rear of the lens will strike the sensor at as close to a right angle as possible across the entire surface of the sensor. This eliminates a number of digital sensor-specific optical and color problems and should work with all foreseeable future sensor designs. A requirement for near telecentricity is that the rear of the lens must be as large as the sensor. For this reason, a PL mount lens can never be made telecentric for a large-format sensor.

  • No. ARRI Signature lenses are multi-format lenses. They work just as well with Super 35 sensors as they do with large-format sensors, and they perform spectacularly on cameras with both small and large pixel pitches.

  • The Signature Zooms share the same timeless look as the Signature Primes. They are high-resolution lenses, but this does not equate to a clinical look. An exceptionally high-resolution lens resolves the transitions across edges with greater accuracy, resulting in an image that captures all the detail present in the scene, but without harshness. Rather than edges feeling hard or aliased, they feel smooth and natural. One cinematographer describes the Signature look as “like looking through a beautiful window.”

  • The ARRI Signature look is designed to meet the needs of HDR, both technically and aesthetically. As displays increase in resolution and dynamic range, they feel more immersive. Lens aberrations, such as chromatic aberration, become more noticeable and distracting. ARRI Signature Zooms are perfect for fast-paced feature and television productions with a long shelf life, as their look will improve with time rather than degrade.

  • The ARRI Signature Zoom 1.7x Extender is a high-performance optical device which is optimized for the Signature Zoom 65-300/T2.8 and Signature Prime 280/T2.8. It delivers its best optical performance with just those two lenses. We can only guarantee mechanical clearance for these two lenses, so please don’t use the extender with any other lenses. When you use the extender with these two lenses you have to remove the Magnetic Rear Filter Holder from the base lens and put it onto the rear of the extender.

  • No, only the Signature Prime 12/T1.8, the Ultra Wide Zoom 9.5-18/T2.9, and the Anamorphic Ultra Wide Zoom 19-36/T4.2 have optical image rotation.

  • Every Signature Zoom lens will have a dedicated aluminum case.

  • Changing between metric and imperial scale (meters and feet) is quite simple. Just remove the existing scale ring, turn it by 180° and assemble it again.

  • Every Signature Zoom will be delivered with a zoom lever, which you can mount at different positions and angles.

  • This problem is caused when the supply voltage of the Sony Venice camera is set to a value which is too low. This leads to the behavior that the lens is not recognized by the camera, in which case no lens information (Cooke /i) is shown on the camera display. However, it can also happen that the lens is detected by the camera, but the metadata is only available sporadically, which leads to a flickering of the lens information on the camera display.
     
    The problem can be solved as follows: the Sony Venice has the option to choose between two different supply voltages:
    - 8-24 V
    - 24 V 

    By choosing the option 24 V, a continuous detection of the lens by a Sony Venice camera can be ensured. 
    The supply voltage of the Sony Venice can be set in the following menu: Technical > Lens Configuration > PL-Mt Voltage > Set to 24V

    Please see the Sony Venice Menu for further details.

Impression Filters

  • IV stands for Impression V. The number 330 refers to the strength of the filter (in this case: 330 = 3.30 diopters). The letter behind the number tells you if it is a positive diopter filter (P) or a negative diopter filter (N).

  • ARRI is offering an Impression V Filter Kit that contains all eight filter types, 4 positive and 4 negative filters. All necessary shims and a torque screwdriver, as well as an inscribable Velcro set to label filtered lenses on set, are included in the kit.

    Each filter type can be ordered individually as an ARRI Impression V Filter Pack. Each of these packs contains 3 filters of the same type.

    As negative filters need to be shimmed with one additional shim when shooting at open aperture (T1.8), packs containing a negative filter type will also include a set of shims. In addition, both the negative and the positive filter packs also include sets of inscribable Velcro tabs.

    It is also possible to buy separate Impression V Shim Packs and Impression V Velcro Packs. Please see the product configuration overview in the download section for more information.

  • No, to properly attach the rear lens cap to the mount, the Impression V filter must first be removed from the lens. With this procedure we want to make sure the Impression Filter is not forgotten on the rear side of the lens.

  • Each filter type can be purchased individually in a separate three-filter pack.

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