CVP’s European Lens Summit returns, offering knowledge, networking and insightful sessions designed around real tools and real-world tests.
In a digital world of bits and bytes, lenses remain reassuringly analogue and a solid unbreakable link to the way that content has been shot since the early days of film. Cinematographers will often talk about lenses as if they’re characters. “This one’s got soul”. “That one’s too clean.” Or sometimes, “It flares just right.” There’s more than an acknowledgment of the fact that lenses are the part of the creative process that balance artistry and science together like no other. Where else can something be prized as much for the decades of imperfections they bring to an image as for the volumes of crisp metadata they contribute to precise post production?
But for all the poetry surrounding them, cinema lenses remain one of the most technically misunderstood parts of the image-making chain. Few people get to see behind the curtain—to the physics, the tolerances, and the decades of design thinking that go into shaping that character.
That’s why the European Lens Summit (ELS) has been such a success. In a world where cinematographers often take the spotlight, the European Lens Summit exists for the people behind the precision: the lens technicians, service engineers, and optics specialists who quietly ensure that every frame is tack sharp, mechanically sound, and character-consistent.
Heart of glass
Scheduled to return to CVP’s Brentford facility on 12 and 13 July, the European Lens Summit is more than a networking opportunity or trade showcase. It’s a technically rigorous, hands-on forum for sharing deep knowledge about cinema optics. The sessions aren’t designed for passive viewing. They’re for the lens techs who ask: Why is that element flaring early? Why does that rear group drift under thermal load? And what’s actually going on with that out-of-spec back focus?
“We want to foster an environment where technicians feel comfortable asking questions, sharing ideas, challenging assumptions, and refining their understanding,” says CVP’s lens engineering manager, Gary Leach.
In putting it together, the team behind the Summit had a huge number of conversations with the people who live and breathe glass day in and day out. As a result they have identified three key issues that lens technicians currently care about, and taken together they provide a fascinating insight into one of the last great alchemical outposts of digital transformation.
1. Servicing and sustainability: lenses that last
As budgets tighten and expectations rise, long-term serviceability has become just as important as optical quality. Technicians, rental houses, and DPs are increasingly wary of boutique lens brands that launch with plenty of hype but offer little to no support 12 months later.
It is a double-edged sword. On the one hand the surge of affordable lenses from Chinese manufacturers has opened up new creative options for filmmakers. But for technicians there has been a huge downside to this. What some celebrate as accessibility, others characterise fairly as “disposability.” Parts are scarce and support is often non-existent.
“Too many of these lenses look great until something breaks — then they become paperweights,” says one senior rental technician. “If there’s no service path, we just can’t risk them.”
It’s a growing concern, and one reason why the Lens Summit has begun pushing manufacturers harder on training, spare part availability, and long-term servicing strategies.
Downtime is, of course, lost revenue. A lens that sits on a bench waiting for unavailable parts is no good to anyone. In today’s market, the true value lies not just in performance—but in the ability to service, calibrate, and keep a lens running reliably.
Leach says that at CVP the company is now judging lenses by the following criteria: Availability of spare parts, manufacturer response times, long-term viability and support, and repairability by independent technicians.
It’s not a binary proposition. Lenses don’t have to either be effectively disposable at one end of the spectrum or cost five figure sums at the other end. There is a balance that can and should be struck here.
2. Everyone wants character again
The call for character-rich optics has returned. DPs are increasingly turning away from sterile, “perfect” lenses in favour of glass that flares and falls off in interesting ways.
Vintage isn’t just a fashion though, it’s a whole workflow that has to be considered. Yes, rental houses are busy rehousing Canon FDs, K35s, Zeiss Super Speeds, and other optic stars from previous eras. But with vintage character comes vintage headaches: inconsistent behaviour, scarcity of parts, and the ongoing and decidedly non-trivial challenge of set matching.
For lens techs, this means endless hours chasing reliability across inherently inconsistent gear and a delicate ongoing balancing act that seeks to give producers the character they crave without sacrificing the consistency they also demand.
What is interesting to note is that where vintage can’t go, modern lenses are being detuned to effectively send them back in time. They are being stripped of coatings, optically altered, or physically modified to emulate the quirks of older glass. It’s highly technical work, often experimental, and always evolving. Feedback from CVP is that tools and techniques for detuning are a regular topic in CVP’s community, with recent experiments around the Angénieux EZ series in particular drawing attention.
The new normal? ”Make it imperfect—but make it perform like it’s perfect.”
3. Full-Frame vs Super35: a battle, not a transition
Anyone who thinks Super35 is dead hasn’t been around the sharp end of the industry lately. The Alexa 35 brought it right back virtually single-handedly. Smaller glass, better depth control, cheaper rigs, and loads of legacy stock made compelling arguments in the market.
But Full-Frame isn’t going away either — it’s just less dominant than the initial hype perhaps said it would be. Leach says that CVP is still having to carry full sets of lenses for both. The real issue is that vintage glass rarely covers both well, so it’s a logistical mess.
“Before we even talk about how it looks, we have to confirm it works,” says one rental house team lead. “That’s the reality now — format first, aesthetics second.”
The key takeaway? Double the stock. Double the tests. Triple the headaches.
More than just a talking shop
All these issues and plenty more will be discussed at the European Lens Summit. But it is worth pointing out that this is far more than just a debating chamber; there’s a hands-on practical element to the Summit that is hard to find anywhere else.
Partly this is because of where it’s being held. CVP is immensely proud of its manufacturer approved, state-of-the-art facilities. With a 32ft projection room, dedicated workshops, a lens testing bay, and access to an unmatched inventory of modern and legacy glass, CVP Brentford is uniquely suited to support hands-on exploration.
As a result many of the Summit’s sessions are designed around real tools and real-world tests. Subjects on the table this year include: collimator calibration and back focus accuracy; evaluating breathing and optical performance on the projector; and, of course, plenty of side-by-side set comparisons under test conditions.
Yes, there is plenty of talking too and, as you can see from the above there is a lot to talk about. But it’s a special type of discussion, one that is designed for a specific audience. Anyone who has ever logged inconsistent torque settings or re-collimated a prime after a hard drop? This is your kind of conversation.
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CVP’s European Lens Summit takes place on 12 and 13 July 2025. For more details, visit here.
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This article was sponsored by CVP.
