ROKINON announces new ultra light wide angle XEEN CF cine primes

One of the challenges of designing and making full frame glass is keeping the weight down. ROKINON has added to its CF (carbon fibre) line with the addition of two new wide angle lenses.

It isn't a material you wouldn't normally associate with camera lenses, but ROKINON's latest additions to the XEEN CF lens line utilise a carbon fibre construction to help keep the weight down.

Traditionally carbon fibre hasn't been used in the construction of precision machinery due to the difficulty of moulding, so the company had to invent brand new techniques in order to make it suitable. ROKINON has also stated that another hurdle to overcome was the price premium of using such a material. The lenses still had to be kept to a price where they were still within reach of aspiring cinematographers, not just those on Hollywood budgets.

The two new lenses, a 16mm T2.6 and a 35mm T1.5 are fully designed with 8K in mind. Weight wise the 16mm weighs in at 0.9kg, while the 35mm lens weighs 1.08kg. The lightweight nature of them means that they will be ideally suited for use on drones. The addition of the new glass takes the CF range up to a choice of five different lenses.

The Rokinon Xeen CF 35mm T1.5

The new glass consists of the following stand out features;

• Fast T1.5 and T2.6 apertures
• Dual left and right side scales
• Available in PL, Canon EF and Sony E mount
• Carbon Fiber construction
• Eleven blade apertures
• Covered by an industry exclusive three year warranty
• Compatible with large image sensors (43.3mm image circle)
• Luminous markings allows use in low-light environments
• Standard 95mm front diameters for easy compatibility with matte boxes
• XEEN X-Coating controls internal reflection
  for dramatic images and a distinctive look
• Uniform focus and aperture ring locations for quick lens changes when using follow focus devices
• Uniform 200-degree silky smooth and damped focus throw across all models enables precise focus adjustment

Pricing will be $2495 US for each lens, and they are expected to be available in April.