I have been given the opportunity to test out an inexpensive 35mm depth of field adapter designed for the small consumer camcorders. JAG35.com sent me a JAG35 PRO with the Canon to Nikon adapter to mount my Nikkor glass to the front of it. My first impression was positive. This is an entry level $400 35mm lens adapter that works quite well.

But, it does have a few limitations and this adapter would never replace my Letus.

I have posted a video to my “Equipment Reviews” section of this website visually reviewing this product. I will go into a little more detail with this article.

First of all, this adapter does not have a flip prism inside of it. The good part about that is the fact that the device is quite small and lightweight. The bad part is that the image is recorded to the camera upside down. It is very easy to flip the image in post when editing, but when shooting, the up-side-down image is hard to work with.

JAG35 offers a hack to most video cameras that will basically add a switch that will engage “mirror mode” with the LCD so that the camera displays the image from the JAG35 Pro properly. The great part about having the switch added is that you can set the camera back to normal when you want to just shoot without the film adapter.

Another issue I found is that the adapter is light hungry. If you are going to use the JAG35 pro inside or in low light conditions outside, you will need fast lenses. I used a Nikon 50mm f1.4 and was having trouble exposing in the overcast and dark forest.

If you are shooting in broad day light, I am certain that this depth of field adapter will work quite well. I plan on shooting more with it to test it out in other lighting conditions.

One thing that JAG35 is working on are multiple lens mounts. Currently, the JAG35 Pro only has a fixed Canon mount. I had to use a Canon to Nikon metal adapter ring to mate the Nikkor glass to the JAG. This proved slightly problematic as the extra piece added some wobble and slip when trying to pull focus.

I did find this adapter to be surprisingly sharp and clear of ground glass artifacts. The motor is powered by two rechargeable (user replaceable) AAA batteries. To turn the motor on, you just flip a switch. When running, there is a bright green indicator light. The motor is very quite and in the video review I did, I used all the audio for my voice and the water directly off the camera mic! While the JAG35 was vibrating!

There is an interesting add on that proved to be invaluable. On the side of the JAG35 pro is a small white button I call the “super charger”. When pushed the motor speeds up to a crazy rotational speed as it get a jolt of power . When released the motor goes back to normal. This came in handy when I had difficulty getting the motor to spin. Sometimes, the weight on the end of the motor that shakes the ground glass as it rotates has trouble getting started on its own and needs a jump start. I had this problem on my Letus Extreme on occasion. With the Letus, I had to open up the front and “finger” manual start the motor. This “super charger” sends a bust of power to the motor and gets it spinning in a flash. There is also a small screw that regulates how fast the motor spins. I need to experiment with that to see if by turning it up, the motor will work better.

In my test, I was able to run the motor for two hours continuous before it died. I must say that I was running off the charge that the batteries were under shipped from JAG. So I will have to test this again under a full charge to see if the motor really operates for 20+ hours like the JAG35 website states.

When charging the batteries, you simply plug in the included a/c adapter into the small hole on the side of the JAG35 pro. There are no indicator lights to confirm a charge is in progress or when it is done, but I have been told that it will complete the trickle charge (with no confirmation) after about four hours.

When I brought the footage into my Final Cut system, I was really happy with the look of the the video. I did have to log it all upside-down, which was a first for me. All the blood was rushing to my head! Even though it was shot with a $650 interlaced tiny single cmos chip camera, the footage looked very good. Not nearly as good as the Sony EX1 with a Letus, but certainly good enough to pass as “film-like” high definition footage.

There are several ways to flip the image on the timeline. I just rotated everything in the “motion” tab.

I only used the super fast 50mm f1.4 Nikon lens in my initial test. I tired to mount the 55mm f2.8 macro lens to the front of the JAG35, but found serious vignetting in the low lighting conditions of the dense forest and cloudy, near-dusk skies. I will have to preform more experiments with this camera system.

Overall, I recommend this to anyone who just wants to “play around” with the film look on your little consumer camera. I do not recommend this to people who want to shoot high end stuff for broadcast. Please go and buy a Letus and a proper camera for that.

As far as this setup goes…
Total cost of the the camera, adapter and lens: $1,200. Just goes to show that you do not need to spend thousands to shoot sick looking video.

I shot a review video talking about and testing out the JAG35 Pro. You can see it by clicking here.

If you want more information, please visit JAG35.com and letusdirect.com.