Testing anamorphic looks with the Helios 44-2

I don't have a full frame camera at the moment, though I'd love to get one as soon as possible. Unfortunately it seems like full frame sensors are quite expensive out of nowhere, and more so in this part of the world where tech is imported and sold with a ridiculous mark up. Though that isn't stopping me from enjoying the Sony A6000 and its crop sensor for now. And at the moment I have been really enjoying the Helios 44-2 lens I've been using on it with an adapter. A Soviet era lens that has been quite famous within the film industry in recent times due to some very characteristic bokeh it produces when the aperture is wide open. Now, the bigger the sensor, the more of this bokeh effect you'll notice. But it doesn't mean that the crop sensor which is smaller won't also produce some beautiful results. And I've been running a few tests with it over the last few days as the weather has picked up and offered more light.

Highlights are where the lens and its oval bokeh shine best. Though this requires being a certain distance from the subject for the bokeh to really display itself. It's not something that always is found within an image. You do have to hunt for the right angles and find the good background with plenty of highlights to really notice it. And in some distances from the subject the oval bokeh just doesn't really appear at all. It's a lens known for having quite an anamorphic look to it while being a significantly smaller cost of entry. Especially when you can pick one of this up for around the 40 USD mark in Russia. To increase some of that anamorphic look I've been testing around and setting the camera up on my gimbal, finding the right distance form the subject and shooting video with it. These are a few stills from some of those experimental videos. Shot at around 1080p. And then upscaled slightly in post, with a few changes. Primarily a change in aspect ratio to widen things a little, while zooming. I do think the first example is the best one so far.

These are more tests for upcoming shoots I intend to do. Using the Helios 44-2 a bit more and finding some ways to go the extra mile with the gear I have. Ideally being able to shoot video and pull off that anamorphic look a bit more. Shooting natural environments and day-to-day locations. These tests are helping a ton with realising what sort of environment works best, what sort of lighting I would want, and how different locations and subjects are a unique challenge. For example this vintage lens isn't the sharpest, and manually focusing on moving subjects is quite a difficulty. Depth is also incredibly important. I'm having a lot of fun though, and this does excite me a lot for once I'm back in Yerevan and summer really picks up. It's still a little too windy here in Tbilisi at the moment, so most of these shots are taken around sunset during the day before it gets a bit harder to shoot.