Question on Nauticam EMWL setup

[crowie]

Hi,

 

I've been reading as much as I can about the Nauticam EMWL setup and wondering whether this might be a better (inc weight wise) alternative to my current setup.

 

I do a fair amount of diving in south east Asia (next trip Manado mid Feb) with a mixture of wide and macro dives. My current setup is a Sony a7rV with Sony 90mm + 12.5 diopter (sometimes a stronger diopter for really small stuff in places like Tulamben) - often with a snoot. My wide angle setup is a Sony 16-35mm f2.8 with a 180mm dome. All Nauticam gear.

 

I've never been happy with the corner sharpness in my wide angle setup (and I'm not prepared to travel with the 230mm dome) and on the macro side, given the really small stuff I tend to shoot, often find I want more depth of field or even some background subjects to make my pictures more interesting.

 

I have been debating the purchase of the EMWL setup plus the 130 or 160 degree objective lens on the basis I could ditch the 16-35 & dome and at the same time, give me a few more photographic options on these trips.

 

How practical would it be to use EMWL with the 130 or 160 for wide angle as an alternative to my 16-35 setup? I know it becomes a ridiculously long rig, but would I be losing any photographic options with this setup? With the nose heavy nature of this setup, is it easy enough to dive walls, corals and shoot bigger stuff like mantas, sharks etc? I had been toying with replacing my wide angle setup with the WACP-C, would it replace that?

 

I also do the occasional blackwater dive and purchased a Sony 30mm f3.5 which I find to be much better than the 90mm for these types of dives, could the EMWL replace this setup, perhaps with one of the other objective lens in due course?

 

Any thoughts appreciated.

 

Cheers,

Paul

[Chris Ross]

The EMWL is quite heavy, the additional components for Sony weigh 1.8 kg dry, 1.1 kg wet and much of that weight is cantilevered on the flat port with a large twisting moment that needs to resisted.  It doesn't strike me as an option for someone who doesn't want to travel with a 230mm dome.  My first thoughts for a more manageable setup would be a 140mm dome with a fisheye, but probably not ideal for sharks and mantas but adding a 1.4x times might go close to having enough reach for sharks etc.

 

typical setup have two large floats on long arms for the strobes to hold the nose up.  I would think anything with decent current and/or requiring quick maneuvering would prove trying.  I'm thinking negative entries in current prone sites might be a significant challenge?

 

The person best qualified to answer is likely to be @Alex_Mustard so hopefully he might chime in.

 

 

[RomiK]

Ha-ha, funny, I was toying with the same idea time to time but no, it’s not practical especially for the locations with current you mentioned. I use my EMWL130 with A1 and 90mm and yes, it’s major PITA for anything else than to drop from the boat and exploring nearby. It allows for great non macro shots though as you can stick it where normal dome camera wouldn’t fit and get great shots with that open background. Imagine lionfish next to corral with sun ball etc. But it’s Red Sea with no hostile environment like Indonesia 🙂. For balancing one 900g floatie placed on macro port hot shoe will do but that’s not highlight either and the rig is simply little too big for currents. Another factor to consider - optical quality will suffer, you image travels 3 times through water contact and plus you have 3 times the chance getting a debris there. Aside from debris I found the image not as sharp as from the dome setup.  

 

For what you want to do next month on the trip to Maldives I will try WWL1B paired with 28-60 and accompanied with CMC2 as both allow fast switch by bayonet. I am quite happy with WWL so I assume the CMC2 will do simple macro on the same dive.  

Having said that I just got Shinobi monitor and housing so the next thing is to try EMWL without relay lens using the Flip option on the monitor to see things not upside down. That setup I would try use for macro dives where I wouldn’t want to miss wide angle. Cheers. 

[fruehaufsteher2]

But remember: the great shot by Alex Mustard, the mackerel, was taken with the EMWL. Seems to have its upsides. 

[TimG]

But Alex could probably pull off great shots with a milk bottle for a lens……

[Alex_Mustard]

This video shows me shooting them EMWL with my SLR. And how I have the buoyancy set up. It shows set up correctly, it is very easy to handle.

 

Alex

[RomiK]

Nice video and setup Alex! Another option is to balance the weight masses independently such as here Retras with superchargers each arm with 900g and EMWL with extra 900g. Completely neutral and offers flexibility of placing strobes independently. Plus shooting upwards is somewhat easier. Beautiful thing on this activity is that each path has it own solutions isn’t it 🙂

[TimG]

Have you got a pic or two you could post, RomiK, of that shoot?

[TimG]

2 hours ago, Alex_Mustard said:

This video shows me shooting them EMWL with my SLR. And how I have the buoyancy set up. It shows set up correctly, it is very easy to handle.

Alex

Alex, could you tell me what you used to connect the EMWL to your Subal housing?

[Alex_Mustard]

26 minutes ago, TimG said:

Alex, could you tell me what you used to connect the EMWL to your Subal housing?

 

Just a standard Saga macro port - with Nauticam 67mm bayonet on it. 

 

The Saga macro ports are great. Light weight (plastic), tapered and with a 67mm thread at the end. 

 

Alex

[RomiK]

37 minutes ago, TimG said:

Have you got a pic or two you could post, RomiK, of that shoot?

It’s processed though 🙈🙂

[TimG]

Super end result! Thanks. 

[crowie]

Hi, quick update on my EMWL story! Managed to borrow a setup for my Sony A7RV with 60 & 100 degree lenses for a brief trip to Tulamben earlier this month. A few pics with the 100 degree attached here. I can definitely see the attraction - I'm considering the 60 and 160 degree lenses as a replacement for my usual 90mm macro & diopter setup as per my original post above. If I go ahead, I will definitely get the reverse viewfinder rather than the relay lens (which I found to be pretty unweildy). 

 

Appreciate the feedback!

 

Edited August 26 by crowie

[ChipBPhoto]

15 hours ago, crowie said:

Appreciate the feedback!

 

Really nice images!  You maximized the composition elements to tell the story.  Personally, I like the more environmental aspect even in the macro world.  The EMWL is really the best way to capture such scenes. Great job!