Canon video lens on a DSLR

[Peter Rummel]

The video cameras this lens was designed for has 3 CCD chips, while a DSLR has a single sensor. These chips on a video camera are all slightly different distances from the lens – so the lens focuses the colors at different planes. Using your video zoom on a DSLR would cause severe chromatic abberation. So the answer is no, you can’t use this lens with your DSLR.

[Micah Mcdowell]

That’d be a negative.

Even if you managed to physically adapt the lens to fit the camera, the image circle the lens produces would never cover the sensor of a 7D or especially a 5D. It would give you a tiny circle of an image with a large black vignette all around. And, even if it DID cover, it’d look very poor. That lens is optimized for three 2/3″ CCDs, not one large CMOS sensor. Would it work for a newer HD ENG camera? Most likely, but not on a Canon DSLR.

I’ve seem some B4 lenses adapted to the Panasonic GH1 DSLR, but it has a smaller sensor than the 7D and it also has a shorter flange focal distance which allows just about any lens to “fit” with enough esoteric adapters. And, I’m pretty sure they’re using a 2x focal extender switched on to make those lenses cover without vignetting, which I don’t think your lens has.

That’s a long way of saying it won’t work.

[Laura Gruszczynski]

Thanks!
I appreciate that.

Laura