MODERN LENSES | VINTAGE LOOKS
What Is It?
We’re that vintage lens emulation company! Wait emulation? You can do that?
V35 Project was started by Northwest Camera Co with the belief that all lenses are capable of more than one look and we could essentially upcycle them as trends move along. . Instead of rehousing old vintage lenses that have issues with availability, parts, color matching, breathing, uneven t-stops etc, our approach is to go the opposite direction. We start out with current production lenses where the housings and mechanics are great and through many modifications, change some defining looks of the lens like flares, edge performance, focus falloff, bokeh texture, color, sharpness, contrast and more. We analyze and breakdown the aesthetic looks of our favorite vintage lenses and emulate that look onto newer modern lens sets.
After our successful first run of our K35 Inspired CN-E’s, we are continuing to develop products that fit in the empty spaces of the current lens market. We base all of our optics currently off of Full Frame cine lenses to help future proof your needs, but with that said, to see most of our added character, you will want to shoot on full frame/vista vision sensors to see 100 percent of the benefits of our tunings.
V35 Project proposes a new way to think about lenses. While manufactures compete for best specs and best technical performance, that doesn’t always translate to what we, as cinematographers want from lenses. But that makes these modern lenses a perfect place to start when talking about aftermarket tuning, that’s where we come in!
How It Works
You can either buy new lenses for us to modify or send in your old sets (Available on most of our lineup) to have these modifications done. All work is performed between the front and rear element to provide the least amount of downtime should something happen to them on set. From there, all of our modifications are completely reversible. Say you want to shoot a TV show with a set of modified Tokinas that you own, but after the show, you want to go back to your normal corporate work, well for a very small fee, you can have the best of both worlds. We believe in modularity, and uniqueness and want to use our modifications to reshape and re-imagine what the lens landscape looks like today. You pay a deposit per lens and ship to us for the tuning, when done we collect payment and ship to you.
Not only do we offer the tuning, but full servicing and maintenance needs as well should anything happen to your sets in the future.