Philip Bloom announced and tested the new Metabones “Speed Booster” adapter. And what it does sounds as it would be some kind of magic trick! It makes any lens faster, wider and sharper! Philipp explains how it works:
“In essence, it’s an optical adapter that attaches to the E mount of a Sony NEX camera (Super 35 sensor) and then to a full frame SLR lens. The Metabones ‘Speed Booster’ is a 0.71 x focal reducer, that will effectively turn your full frame 50mm f/1.8 lens into a 35mm f/1.2 lens. Note, doing so (as a guide) will increase the aperture of that lens by one stop. Your Sony NEX Super 35 E-Mount will effectively have near full frame coverage on a full-frame lens. It also serves ‘double-duty’ as a lens mount adapter, from Canon EF lens (but not EF-S) to Sony NEX, with auto-aperture and image stabilisation.“
Amazing or not? It will be available in January 2013 from Metabones’ web site http://www.metabones.com and its worldwide dealer network for US$599 / £372 plus shipping and applicable taxes and duties.
Here is an image that shows you how it works:
The image circle gets reduced and this actually doesn’t decrease the image quality. The only real drawbacks are:
1) the lens has no fast autofocus like the recently announced [shoplink 15341 ebay]EF to NEX Smart Adapter II (they are here on eBay)[/shoplink].
2) You have to use a Full Frame lens and you can use it on an APS-C camera only (not on FF cameras).
And here is a video sample shot by Philip:
194 grams from James Miller on Vimeo.
Question now….
