Hello,

I´m thinking of buying a matte-box and was wondering whether anybody on this forum had a good tip which one would be good (maybe also in terms of price:-)) for my F-350 and Canon KH20 lens?

Thanks a lot,
Emanuel

Hi Emanuel, I have the Vocas 325. for about 1500 euro's (have to check that, but it's the ball park) including rods etc. See here a not so good pic because the Kata glove was the subject. When I'm @ home I can take a good pic of the Mattebox.

http://img149.imageshack.us/img149/900/photo021007001kq3.jpg

Cool, thanks a lot Vincent!

There are different solutions from www.chrosziel.de at Munich, but their site is under construction. But they have a PDF catalouge and price list. You need the lightweight support 401-50 for Your camera. And then You have the choice between some filter compartements and matteboxes. The only specific part is the plastic ring to fit the lens.

A mattebox is the most important thing to improve the optical quality of a lens and a camera, even if there is no filter inserted. I don't know why such high prices are really necessary, but it is good to have it and You should have mounted it every time.

Matthias

Thanks, Matthias!
Also for the PDF-file. That´s really kind!

Best regards,
Emanuel

I also vote for VOCAS.

i'm buying Cavision's.. cheaper than others.
will reach here soon tho...
so cannot post pro/cons now...

Cavision guys support via email is quite good till now...

Cavision is also OK, but they are not so sturdy build as Chroziel and VOCAS. But on the other hand, it's like you say: they are cheaper. It's like: you get what you pay for.

Vocas is ok but no where near the professional box that the Chroziel is. I've found that the rotating frame holders eventually start to bind on the Vocas making them almost impossible to rotate.

...then again the Vocas is 1/2 to 2/3 cheaper than the Chroziel.

I'd say the mattebox hierarchy goes something like this:

Arriflex
Chrosziel
Century/Vocas
.....
.....
Cavision
Formatt
Geardear
Indiesnap

The ones above the big gap in the list are suitable for day in/day out use, and likely won't leave you someday with broken pieces of plastic in your hands after you whap your lens into a doorjamb.

The ones below, in my opinion, are suitable more for folks not making a living with the gear, and won't be subject to constant assembly/disassembly every day.

Petroff is probably not as sturdy as the top two, so it wouldn't be good for heavy rental usage. Cost is close to Chroizel, but I think a bit lower with the support system, etc. I like the Chroizel follow focus better, but also more money.

Nate has the Chroizel and we compared my Petroff with it side by side, no doubt the Chroizel is more rugged, the Petroff filter trays are very flimsy compared to a Chroizel part for example, plastic versus metal. But for a caring owner or a responsible crew, the Petroff is plenty durable.

Petroff matte boxes are very versatile and effective -- the hood is large, and like the Chroizel (but unlike the Cavision and below) the flags are all shape-adustable. It is also easy to add or remove stages, and all stages rotate. It's also available in a nice range of camera specific or custom configurations.

Due to my very wide 3.3x13 Fujinon lens, I have to use the 5x5 Petroff which also holds 4x5.625. I'm very happy with it, although using my 5x5 Tru-pol I did have to remove some material from the top and bottom edges of the rectangular frame to get full rotation with no vignetting at full wide. And then it was only possible with the first (innermost) stage.

I would bet that most boxes 5x5 or smaller would vignette during rotation with this very wide lens.

The second stage is great for a 4x5.625 filters that you wouldn't rotate, such as Pro-mists, etc., so Chroizel knew what they were doing just having the inner stage rotate.

Tip

Has anyone heard of a company called "INDIE-SNAP"?
They produce a HD Mattebox set which I found coincidently on ebay. Check out the website if you want: http://www.indiesnap.com/hd.html. The thing looks really, really big but is it any good? Actually I don´t think so, because as far as I can see one is not even able to move neither the french flag nor the side-flags. Maybe it just looks "cool and big" and doesn´t do much of a job?! What do you think? :-)

Maybe it just looks "cool and big" and doesn´t do much of a job?! What do you think? :-)

I think that mattebox is about the most horrible thing I've ever seen. It's brake-bent aluminum, has no filter trays, no way to shield filters from edge light (except tape). It's overly large and in most situations would provide zero lens shading.

I think it's a "wannabe" product.

is not even able to move neither the french flag nor the side-flags

An aside, just for clarity, a french flag is a small flag on the end of a flexible arm that gets clamped to the camera (or usually rods). Any flag-like device attached to the upper edge of the mattebox housing that creates a solid surface is called an eyebrow.

It might seem pedantic, but between assistant cameramen on working sets, these things matter. Just FYI, not sniping :-)

Hey Nate,

alright sorry for that:-)
But I wasn´t seriously intending to buy this thing, don´t worry:-) I just thought it would be interesting to show it to you as it looks really huge (a huge wannabe toy) and effectively does not much to improve your image quality really in my opinion. Was curious whether I was wrong on that ....:-)

What? No, no. No apologies necessary.

This is just one of those products where I feel the need to call it as I see it.

:-) Yes, that´s definitely one of these products:-)