Complete List Of Cine PL Mount Lenses

This list aims to document every PL mount cinema lens available today.

PL Mount (positive lock) lenses are the standard for Cine cameras and can be adapted well to most mirrorless cameras. There is a fairly new LPL mount that is designed specifically for the new larger sensor cinema cameras. If this ever gets fully adopted by all the third-party lens manufacturers I may break them into their own lists, but for now, very few companies make the LPL mount and very few people are even aware of it.

Still a work in progress but eventually I will have everything here. I’m doing this PL lens list as more personal research and since I now have a nice table system that pulls from external spreadsheets, I should be able to keep it updated regularly without it being too much of a time research. I don’t expect this page to get a lot of traffic as PL lenses are not really consumer products, but, if there is anything you’d like to see differently or if there is anything I can do to make this page better, let me know in the comments.

All of these lenses can be used as cine lenses for Canon RF or Cine lenses for Sony E with adapters, but for Canon EF, many of these lenses also come in the EF mount for those using that setup on their cine cameras.

Currently use mostly B&H links for a few reasons – I can build links in about 1/5 the time with B&H Photo, plus they are a great company with a staff that’s always been very helpful. I’ll likely also add Adorama in the future and some rental options.

List of Cine Lenses – The Legends

Usually, I break these lenses down based on the manufacturer, for example, Z lenses start with Nikon. However, with PL mount, it’s an open system sort of led by ARRI but many PL lenses like Arri and Cooke are famous. With this list, I’ll start with the big brands like Arri (from Germany) and Cooke (from England), then break down the list by region.

Arri PL Cine Lenses

While Arri is known for its legendary cameras, some of its cine lenses are also quite popular. Arri has partnered with Zeiss and Fujinon to produce some of the best most widely used cinema lenses out there. With the Zeiss Partnership Arri has produced the Master and Ultra line of spherical and anamorphic lenses and they’ve tapped into the Fujinon expertise to produce the Alura cine zoom lenses.

Arri has also developed the new LPL mount with uses the ARRI LDS-1  LDS-2 data transfer interface which is also compatible with Cooke/i technology. There is no lack of features and technology around every ARRI lens.

Cooke PL Cine Lenses

Cooke, the academy award-winning lens manufacturer out of England is also one of the largest producers of cine lenses and has several series of primes for S35, FF, and Large Format sensor cameras. Cooke also produces several zooms that provide a full frame range from 19mm up to 215mm.

Cooke’s different PL Mount lens series are all color matched and produce minimal flare, distortion, and aberrations. They also use various /i technologies ( which are open protocols) to link lens data to the cameras that support it. They also keep their classic lenses alive but with modern mechanics and optics in the Panchro series. What are Cooke Classic Lenses? Cooke says they say their Panchro lenses are based on the older cinema designs that are responsible for the “Cooke Look”. Since we don’t have the optical formulas for these lenses my guess is that these designs are inspired by older lenses from back before lenses were packed with aspherical elements and exotic glass. I would expect low-element lenses with high micro-contrast with maybe some field curvature and more natural-looking bokeh.

Panchro lenses are available for Full Frame sensors and Super 35 sensors, but the long lenses of the Super 35 lineup will also cover full-frame sensors.

Some of the lenses in the anamorphic series feature elements with different coatings. Regular and SF for enhanced flare coatings.

Some of Cooke’s full-frame and large format lenses can be converted to LPL mount, or some lenses like the Varotal/i lenses are available in the LPL mount according to their website.

Lens minimum focus distances measured from the Front I marked with F, otherwise assume the measurements are from the image plane. I’m pulling the stats here from B&H and some from Cooke’s website which doesn’t always match up. Even Imperial vs Metric on Cooke’s own website doesn’t always match with some lenses, so double-check with Cooke for exact measurements.

Zeiss PL Cine Lenses

While it’s comment knowledge that many of the photographic Zeiss lenses are manufactured now by Cosina in Japan, the Zeiss Cine line of lenses is still being designed and manufactured in Oberkochen, Germany.

Similar to Cooke, Zeiss PL Mount lenses are also known for their “Zeiss Look,” or you may have heard of the Zeiss Pop. What is this? From my experience Zeiss T* coatings can produce a unique almost blue cast to some of the lightings and flaring, but also their lenses have a very unique pronounced contrast that is really unique to Zeiss. With many of their photography lenses, it does seem they try to keep the element count on the lower side which can help produce a punchier high saturation/contrast with good micro-contrast, which helps contribute to that 3d Zeiss Pop. However, some of their more modern designs have lost some of this aesthetic in favor of optical perfection.

Arri also has a series of anamorphic lenses by Zeiss which you can find in the Arri table.

American PL Mount Lenses

Atlas PL Cine Lenses

Atlas is a fairly new company out of Glendale California that has brought some nice affordable cine anamorphic PL mount lenses to the market. From what I understand, they keep these lenses affordable by using the same anamorphic lens groupings but with focal range expanders or reducers in front or behind the grouping to give different focal lengths. I wouldn’t be surprised if most companies do this to some extent with their lineups considering they all have very similar setups. Most cinematographers are liking these lenses for the price. They can be a little soft at f2 but really shine at f4, and I’ve seen some comments on the very prominent blue flares.

Lensbaby PL Lenses

Lensbaby is a company out of Portland Oregon known for its special effects lenses. They have engineered a few of their designs for the cine market to be used with the PL mount.

Finish Lenses

Whitepoint Optics

I believe Whitepoint optics is a fairly new company out of Finland.

More info coming soon.

French PL Lenses

Angenieux PL Cine Lenses

Angenieux is a french company founded in 1935. As an optics company, they produce a wide range of lenses, from commercial and medical applications to cinema and photography.

They have a full range of Prime and Zoom PL Mount lenses designed for super 35 and full-frame sensors that use the Cooke /i and LDS metadata interfaces.

The Angenieux Zoom lenses cover 3-Perf to 4-Perf 35mm sensors, which is Super 35mm of different heights. These lenses have an almost modular design and come with interchangeable rear groupings so the lenses can be adapted to full frame, and the anamorphic lenses can be configured with spherical kits.

The Optima prime lenses have a replaceable iris blade unit for the configuration of the look of the bokeh, this also includes an anamorphic effect.

Many of the zoom lenses can be configured with an ASU Servo Unit.

German Lenses

Gecko-Cam Lenses

Gecko repacks classic lenses in cinema housing and I think they have their own designs as well. More info coming soon.

IBE Optics

IBE optics designs and produces optics for various applications. This is the same company that worked with Kipon to design their original Leica M mount lenses, but they also make their own PL cine lenses.

Leitz Cine Lenses

Leitz, the original name of the founder of Leica, is kept alive as a brand where that continues to make cine lenses out of Germany. Leitz Cine lenses are designed for large format 65mm sensors and are available in the PL or the LPL mount.

P+S Technik Lenses

A cine lens company that got its start in the 1990s by refurbishing camera technology until eventually come out with its own optics later that decade. Now, over 30 years later they have a full line of anamorphic cine lenses.

coming soon.

Schneider Kreuznach Lenses

Founded in 1913, Shneider optics produces lenses for the industrial and photographic markets. Their full-frame cine lenses are available for multiple brands in multiple mounts.

coming soon

Japanese PL Lenses

Canon PL Mount Cine Lenses

Canon has a few cine PL lenses and they are generally well-received. Not too expensive and you get Canon expertise, what’s not to like?

Their prime lenses are designed for full-frame sensors and they’re also available in the EF mount. The full-frame primes have a 114mm front diameter which is the most common front diameter making lens swapping between other brands a little less painful. The primes are also threaded for 105mm filters since Canon cine lenses are a little more popular with run-and-gun documentary filmmakers that don’t always use matte boxes.

Canon has a line of full-frame zoom lenses that fill a range from 20-135mm at f2.4, then for S35 they have some Cine SERVE lenses and a nice super zoom.

Fujinon Cine PL Mount Lenses

Fujinon, a Fujifilm company is fairly legendary when it comes to its cine zoom lenses. They’ve even partnered with Arri to produce a few zooms for the Arri cine lineup. Under their own brand, Fujinon has several cine zoom lenses available in the PL mount, both for S35 and Large Format sensors. Their lenses are generally loved by cinematographers.

Musashi Optical System

Musashi Optical System out of Japan has closed down and filed for bankruptcy. Maybe one day they will be back, or sell off their IP to another company, but for now, their lenses are unavailable.

Sigma Cine Lenses

Sigma a family-owned Japanese company known for its photography lenses also has a pretty massive lineup of Cine lenses. Their lenses typically have a higher element count and are very corrected for a very clean look.

Tokina Lenses

Tokina is another very popular lens manufacturer out of Japan that also has a great line of FF cine lenses in the PL mount.

These are the PL mount Tokina lenses, but they also have some LPL lenses available.

Korean Cine PL Lenses

Samyang / Rokinon Lenses

Samyang / Rokinon has some really interesting PL cine lenses. Some standard primes, some anamorphic as well as some ultra-light carbon fiber primes.