Lens manufacturer Cooke Optics will be the recipient of the Cine Gear Expo 2013
Technical Lifetime Achievement Award, in recognition of ’the significant contributions
Cooke has made to advancing the art and craft of filmmaking’.
The award will be presented at the Cine Gear Expo VIP Reception at the Paramount
Theater and Paseo Grounds in Los Angeles on Friday 31 May 2013.
“We are honoured to receive this accolade celebrating our 127 years of innovation
within the motion picture industry,’ said Les Zellan, chairman and owner, Cooke
Optics. “I like to think that the original founders of Cooke lenses would approve of
what we are doing today, following in their ground-breaking footsteps to create the
best possible lenses for today’s filmmakers.’
Cooke will present its latest innovations at Cine Gear Expo, including a prototype
from its new Anamorphic/i lens range which was unveiled at the recent NAB 2013. The
Anamorphic/i range will consist of seven brand new prime lenses – 25mm, 32mm,
40mm, 50mm, 75mm, 100mm and 135mm, all at T2.3. These new lenses are
approximately the size of Cooke’s industry standard S4/i lenses, retain the Cooke
Look, are colour matched with the Cooke 5/i, S4/i and miniS4/i ranges, and come
equipped with the next generation /i tTechnology to capture lens metadata. Cooke’s
anamorphic range is expected to start shipping in Q2 2014.
Industry reaction to the launch of Cooke’s anamorphic lenses has been enthusiastic.
Mike Seymour from fxguide.com took the lenses for a brief test-drive at NAB 2013 and
had this to say: “Cooke has brought to anamorphic lenses the character, warmth and
cinematic qualities of a ‘Cooke look’ lens. They have balanced a crisp new modern
look with the key qualities from the past that make you want to shoot with an
anamorphic in the first place.’
At Cine Gear Cooke will also show its new lens test projector, the first product from a
new range of affordable and innovative lens testing equipment designed by Cooke
and manufactured by Pure4C, under the brand Cooke Metrology. Many current
projectors cannot pass a beam correctly through lenses that are faster than T2. Cooke
Metrology’s projector is so bright that it can be demonstrated in daylight, making it
much easier to discern flaws and artifacts in fast lenses.
