Mailbox: 3,- lens gear twist jar opener

a very small jar opener on a very small lens

A few months ago I watched a video about a great find by Tony Carretti in a GH2 Vimeo group. He ran across some US $3,99 twist jar openers that you could use as a type of focus-gear. I contacted my father in the States and sent him out on the hunt for these little devices. It took him 3 stores to find a place that had them in stock and he was finally able to send them to me. Everything great, except that he grabbed size Small. I am not going to tell him after all his efforts but I was a little disappointed when I opened the envelope and found these diminuative pieces of rubber... These were not going to fit my lenses.
But at second thought, the small rubbers (!) actually came in very handy. I've purchased several small to extra-small C mount lenses in the last month and the big jar openers would not have worked on them. These little guys are ideal; without them some C mount lenses would be impossible to focus during shooting. I'll get myself some extra jar openers when I visit the States this summer and make sure they are Large.

Twist jar openers XS

Gear rings on the cheap (relatively speaking)

I never understood why a focus ring has to cost ridiculous amounts of money. Even the rings from the manufacturer of my budget follow focus, DFocus, makes focus rings that cost 30,- albeit that one size supposedly fits all (lenses). But ideally you don't want to mess with taking them off and readjusting them to a new lens every time you go out for a shoot.
So you basically want effective and affordable gear rings. Enter Half Inch Rails with their zip-tie solution. 40,- for a set of 4 gear rings. Just placed an order.


HIR Zip Tie Focus Gear from Sam Morgan Moore on Vimeo.