I came across the R50 with an AOI housing for what seems to be a bit of a steal deal as I was looking at some versatile & budget friendly choices for a friend. Backscatter's AOI R50 housing

She currently uses a TG6 for snorkeling and diving, but has an older Canon dslr that she definitely does not want to house (she says it can be too slow to focus and doesn't like the video); the only lens she has that would uw suitable is an old canon 100mm macro.

What are the downsides of the R50? She loves garden bugs, birds & horses on land but underwater likes a bit of everything, rarely dedicating a dive to something specific unless it's like on holiday with the manta night dive in Hawaii or similar.

What are downsides of the AOI housing (other than being poly)? It looks like one can still pop on wet mounts for macro and wider if need be, so it should be a fairly flexible system?

As i am still dithering over my own options as I contemplate a move from a Canon 7dmkii/Nauticam with a whole bunch of lenses, ports & bits, I am getting a bit more confused and trying not to project too much on her quest! heck, maybe I should consider this, too 🙃

Originally budget was "what's the best I can get to get started for about 4-5 grand USD" but coming in with the gear at a nice fraction of that would mean a whole 'nuther diving trip. Really appreciate any input.

The Canon R50 specs incorporate many features of higher $$$$ models and I currently own one. It's fast and small and a joy to shoot above and below.

I had the Nauticam NA-R50 housing to make nice photos trying a few less expensive wide angle lenses plus the Nauticam WWL-B a friend loaned me. You can search under either Canon R50 or my name for some previous posts. A few sample pics are below.

I have an AOI UH-R50 on order as I prefer lighter weight and cost these days. Just my choice and I have 3 friends who own the Nauticam NA-R50 and like them.

People dismiss the Canon R50 choice as you're locked into the Canon RF-S 18-45mm IS STM "kit" lens but it works well for small (5" or so) creatures to larger fish with the lens alone behind both Nauticam and AOI housing's flat ports . Adding a wide angle lens for more versatile scenic images is easy. You use the built in 67mm threaded port or buy an adapter to "bayonet" those on and off.

I've had both lens mount approaches on housings and will use a straight 67mm thread on wide angle lens initially on the AOI UH-R50.

"Burping" an add on lens has been discussed with some touting the bayonet choice but I'd done plenty of dives with a 67mm thread on lens never removing it. I enter the water and look for any trapped air bubbles behind lens rear element and port front glass. There has to be a thin water area there so just swish it around a bit and any trapped bubbles that could cause OOF (Out Of Focus) elements are gone.....

I'm not a macro shooter these days so can't comment on adding close up lenses but I'm sure for most people they'll work fine.

Both Nauticam and AOI use the Canon R50's but in pop up flash to trip strobes in TTL or manual flash triggering. Works every time, no hot shoe flash trigger dilemmas to sort through......

Looking forward to getting my new AOI UH-R50 housing soon :)

David Haas

Sample shots using the Nauticam NA-R50 and a Canon R50. Some with my borrowed WWL-B lens, several with a less expensive but not full zoom through Inon UWL-H100 adapted lens.

I own that lens and an AOI UWL-09f lens which IS a ZOOM through focus lens going from approximately 130 degrees angle of view to 60 degrees.

Edited September 1Sep 1 by dhaas

@dhaas thanks so much for the information. It definitely sounds like this will suit her and I'm very tempted to give it a whirl, too. At this price point, I wouldn't even stress if I find out it doesn't suit exactly and i need to "upgrade" in the future, unless I'm missing some huge issues.

@dhaas do you have examples of the widest scene and smallest creature with no add ons?

The R50 with the 18-45 suffers from the same things any lens does through a flat port in that wide is not very wide when it comes to big stuff and zoomed in is not quite zoomed enough for macro. Thus the Nauticam housing and the AOI housing are both configured for use with their respective macro diopters and wide angle lenses. Otherwise it is what I call a fish pic lens ;).

My one real complaint for the lens is that it is an 18mm and would prefer it be a 16mm, thus the WWL-1B or the AOI UWL-09 will be needed instead of the slightly more compact WWL-1C.

The pros are also the cons, no ports to tote about, no expensive trigger than does not work when I need it to, more travel friendly but relies upon external wet optics but you get by with a single camera lens and no domes, vfs, monitors.

For surface photography, my complaint there is that please Canon, come on now, give the little thing a modicum of weather/dust sealing please.

The R50 is fast to focus, not fussy about dim light, takes pictures like what you would expect of a Canon camera. The guys with the latest full frame Sony AR7-5-6-IIIV-B will not be impressed with their domes and monitors and whatever that $7,500 Nauticam lens is and 45 degree view finders, but heck, the idea was a compact outfit that can produce stunning photos and hold it's own and that is what it is.

@Nemrod Thanks! The 18-45 has never really been interesting to me, just seems not enough of anything with too much compromise on everything. It seems that this setup, with wet lenses, gives almost the lovely compactness of the TG but with definitively better images across the range. I'm particularly thinking of mid to wider shots where the TGs background gets a little icky (this is my biggest frustration with my beloved TG setup). The R50 option seemingly would eliminate that.

I also saw that SeaFrogs has a little housing complete with interchangeable ports for the R50 - even a setup for the mighty EFS60 macro. So intriguing!

So many gear options.

2 hours ago, Kristin said:

@Nemrod Thanks! The 18-45 has never really been interesting to me, just seems not enough of anything with too much compromise on everything. It seems that this setup, with wet lenses, gives almost the lovely compactness of the TG but with definitively better images across the range. I'm particularly thinking of mid to wider shots where the TGs background gets a little icky (this is my biggest frustration with my beloved TG setup). The R50 option seemingly would eliminate that.

I also saw that SeaFrogs has a little housing complete with interchangeable ports for the R50 - even a setup for the mighty EFS60 macro. So intriguing!

So many gear options.

You perhaps misunderstood, the 16-45 is the lens that AOI and Nauticam and Marelux R50 housings are designed to use with the intention that the range is expanded on the macro end using various available macro diopters like the CMC-1/2 and on the wide end by the WWL-1 or the AOI UWL-09Pro. Both producing a wide 130 degree field and a huge zoom range. My lament was that had it been a 16-45 I could use the WWL-1C being slightly smaller than the WWL-1 and the UWL-09. Of course the WWL-1C can still be mounted with the FOV limited to 118 degrees vs 130+.

Edited September 3Sep 3 by Nemrod

R50 user here, came from an RX100V set up as I wanted to upgrade without the complexity of worrying about ports, lenses, domes etc. The simplicity, form factor and cost was appealing to me. I pair mine with WWL-1 and 2 x Inon UCL 165s, YS D3 DUOs, it's a fairly modest set up compared to what many are running here but in my own humble opinion feel I'm pretty happy with the results. If you are heavily into ting macro then this probably isn't a great choice but I feel it does ok with the 2 x diopters.

A few pics from a month in Alor earlier this year:

Edited September 3Sep 3 by PomInOz
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@PomInOz which housing are you using? I'm assuing these are all with the kit 18-45 lens?
Thanks for sharing the lovely images and especially for showing such a great range. Super helpful to see more images!

Nauticam NA-R50, WWL-1, Inon S220X2, Roatan:

Edited September 5Sep 5 by Nemrod

The whole premise of the 18-45 with the R50 in Nauticam and AOI with the fixed port is to use it with wet lenses, wide is quite OK, the WWL-1 gives a nice range and focuses up to the port. You can get to 0.8x with a 44mm working distance with the CMC-1, all the data is on the port chart here:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/15eHIQlhHCVuz8zPu2pzFTHPhgqHwsn0v/view

the CMC-1 only focuses between 44 and 81mm so is a bit cludgy compared to a TG-7 in this regard, but certainly it's workable. 44mm working distance is getting a bit small and hard to light though. The CMC-2 would be easier at the cost of only getting 0.6x. These figues would apply equally to the AOI housing, assuming you can mount the right bayonets.

Swapping between the WWL and CMC is a bit of an issue, some people are happy to do it, others state they don't want to deal with what to do with the big lump that is the WWL-1B , you need to put it somewhere when you take it off. It can get very close and do semi macro shots though.

Thanks for the information, @Chris Ross !