Just bought a 7D. Which primes to buy for movie making?
 

Hey everyone, just decided to go with a 7D and wondered what lenses work best for filmmaking? I currently have a Canon 50 1.4 and I love it to death at the moment but when I start getting into making movies I'm going to need something wider. I know I can run old Nikon primes w/ an adapter but can someone shine some light as to which ones work best? I've been a Canon guy all my life so I don't really know how Nikon's older lens lines work. Should I maybe go for some Zeiss glass? I don't have the budget for Canon L glass so I want to keep the cost low and buy some older primes and stick adapters on each one.

Image sharpness isn't all that important to videographers so I'd go down the route of buying older lenses with adapters.

I was thinking of selling my Ziess 35-70 3.4 becasue I just don't use this lens anymore. If you can work with not having auto focus (which you can), this lens is better then 24-70 2.8 at more then half the price.

Some of the older Nikon lenses are really amazing. As Tom said, you don't need ultimate sharpness, as the most you can shoot at is 1080p. Besides, some L lenses are shit.

Which ones?

Mostly the older ones like the 35mm f1.4, 100-400, 24-70, 70-200 f2.8 IS, 24mm f1.4 I, 24mm TS-E I. Not really shit, but potentially soft on a high pixel density DSLR. They should be ok for 1080p video though.

Didn't know that... I thought the 24-70 was one of Canon's best lenses? (isn't the Nikon 24-70 good?)

What do you mean by 'best'?

It is certainly not one of the sharpest. Nikon's 24-70 & the Sony/Zeiss 24-70 are noticeably sharper than the Canon...and the Sony/Zeiss has image stabilization. The Sony/Zeiss is probably the sharpest of the three, but Zeiss has sacrificed smooth bokeh for ultimate sharpness, while the Nikon is probably the best compromise of the three. Don't worry, as I'm sure Canon is going to update the 24-70 very soon, as it is the oldest one of the group - possibly with IS.