10mm Laowa full frame lens.

[Aquatica]

The port opening on all of our housings is 4.400 inches or 111 mm.

The new custom ports we are working on will all cover the large angle of view of the lens,with no vignetting,with the shade wings removed.

 

[Architeuthis]

Did someone already test for the optimum extension for the Laowa 10mm with Nauticam 140mm and Nauticam housing?

As far as I understand Phil's postings, 10mm or 20mm with dome shade removed should do it, together with the standard N100 to N120 35.5mm adapter (Sony A7R5)...

 

(I got the lens yesterday and will start soon...😊)

 

 

Wolfgang

Edited July 6 by Architeuthis

[Architeuthis]

6 hours ago, Architeuthis said:

Did someone already test for the optimum extension for the Laowa 10mm with Nauticam 140mm and Nauticam housing?

As far as I understand Phil's postings, 10mm or 20mm with dome shade removed should do it, together with the standard N100 to N120 35.5mm adapter (Sony A7R5)...

 

(I got the lens yesterday and will start soon...😊)

 

 

Wolfgang

 

I assembled Nauticam housing, 140mm dome, 35.5mm N100 to N120 adapter, A7R5 and Laowa 10mm at home:

 

Additional 20mm extension is too much (vignetting!) and N120 10mm extension (type II) does not seem to fit on the 140mm dome...

=> I will make some photos at the next occasion, without any additional extension (I have the old 10mm N120 extension with screws here (it is available under "Classified"), but I really dislike the fumbling with the screws - I hope it will work without additional extension)...

 

Wolfgang

[DreiFish]

9 hours ago, Architeuthis said:

 

I assembled Nauticam housing, 140mm dome, 35.5mm N100 to N120 adapter, A7R5 and Laowa 10mm at home:

 

Additional 20mm extension is too much (vignetting!) and N120 10mm extension (type II) does not seem to fit on the 140mm dome...

=> I will make some photos at the next occasion, without any additional extension (I have the old 10mm N120 extension with screws here (it is available under "Classified"), but I really dislike the fumbling with the screws - I hope it will work without additional extension)...

 

Wolfgang

Correct. I've tested the Laowla with the 140mm nauticam dome and the Matty Smith 17" custom dome for nauticam n120. This is on RF system. In both cases, no extension is needed. Actually, my estimate is that around a 2-3mm extension would be optimal for putting the center of curvature of the lens in the middle of the dome, but since that doesn't exist, and 10mm doesn't work, and 20mm is too much... you're stuck with no extension by default. Here are shots with the 140mm dome and no extension. 

 

[Chris Ross]

9 hours ago, Architeuthis said:

 

I assembled Nauticam housing, 140mm dome, 35.5mm N100 to N120 adapter, A7R5 and Laowa 10mm at home:

 

Additional 20mm extension is too much (vignetting!) and N120 10mm extension (type II) does not seem to fit on the 140mm dome...

=> I will make some photos at the next occasion, without any additional extension (I have the old 10mm N120 extension with screws here (it is available under "Classified"), but I really dislike the fumbling with the screws - I hope it will work without additional extension)...

 

Wolfgang

Can't help with the extension required.  However I suspect the screws are really not needed when you have a vacuum.  If you have the reported 200 mBar vacuum on the housing the the closing force is around 22kg.  The extension ring if push and turn and it's not going to come apart with that type of closing force.

 

I see the Type II ring is now offered, it's still push and turn but has an internal lock.

[dentrock]

13 hours ago, Architeuthis said:

 

I assembled Nauticam housing, 140mm dome, 35.5mm N100 to N120 adapter, A7R5 and Laowa 10mm at home:

 

Additional 20mm extension is too much (vignetting!) and N120 10mm extension (type II) does not seem to fit on the 140mm dome...

=> I will make some photos at the next occasion, without any additional extension (I have the old 10mm N120 extension with screws here (it is available under "Classified"), but I really dislike the fumbling with the screws - I hope it will work without additional extension)...

 

Wolfgang

I have a 25mm N100-N120 adapter. 20mm ext might work with that, if 10 ext + 35.5 is a pia???

Still waiting, waiting on my 10 Laowa.

[DreiFish]

2 hours ago, dentrock said:

I have a 25mm N100-N120 adapter. 20mm ext might work with that, if 10 ext + 35.5 is a pia???

Still waiting, waiting on my 10 Laowa.

 

Might work, but it's probably too long and may vignette. No extension is almost perfect on the N120 system, I don't think 10mm extension would improve the image quality. Likely, it would degrade it vs. no extension.

[Architeuthis]

7 hours ago, DreiFish said:

Correct. I've tested the Laowla with the 140mm nauticam dome and the Matty Smith 17" custom dome for nauticam n120. This is on RF system. In both cases, no extension is needed. Actually, my estimate is that around a 2-3mm extension would be optimal for putting the center of curvature of the lens in the middle of the dome, but since that doesn't exist, and 10mm doesn't work, and 20mm is too much... you're stuck with no extension by default. Here are shots with the 140mm dome and no extension. 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you - great results...👍

 

I already was thinking about screwing the old 10mm extension on the 140mm permanently and then using an additional 20mm II extension, when I use it with the Canon 8-15mm. But better when te 10mm extension is not needed...

 

What was the aperture used in the photo?

[DreiFish]

23 minutes ago, Architeuthis said:

 

Thank you - great results...👍

 

I already was thinking about screwing the old 10mm extension on the 140mm permanently and then using an additional 20mm II extension, when I use it with the Canon 8-15mm. But better when te 10mm extension is not needed...

 

What was the aperture used in the photo?

 

Good question. Since the RF-mount version is manual only, I can't confirm from the EXIF data for the test with the 140mm dome, so I'm going to re-do it. For comparison, with the Matty Smith 427mm custom dome, I used F11, and here are the results:

10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17

[Davide DB]

1 hour ago, DreiFish said:

 

Good question. Since the RF-mount version is manual only, I can't confirm from the EXIF data for the test with the 140mm dome, so I'm going to re-do it. For comparison, with the Matty Smith 427mm custom dome, I used F11, and here are the results:

 

10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 338.07 kB · 1 download 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 271.54 kB · 0 downloads 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 260.26 kB · 0 downloads

 

Which kind of files are they?

 

[DreiFish]

1 hour ago, Davide DB said:

 

Which kind of files are they?

 

Hey Davide - standard JPEGs. Not sure why they're not linking. 

10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17

[Davide DB]

6 minutes ago, DreiFish said:

Hey Davide - standard JPEGs. Not sure why they're not linking. 

 

10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 338.07 kB · 0 downloads 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 271.54 kB · 0 downloads 10mm Laowa F2.8 prime, no extension, 17 260.26 kB · 0 downloads

 

I see they have no extension (.jpg) so the forum is not able to render them.

 

[DreiFish]

Ok, I've retested the Laowa 10mm with the Nauticam 140mm dome (dome shade removed), no extension on N120. This time I made sure the aperture was F11. The results are a bit improved, which suggests my earlier test must've been at a wider aperture by mistake.

 

Here it is on the right compared with the Matty Smith Custom 427mm dome on the left. 

 

 

Observations:

• The 140mm dome needs a slightly longer extension to put the entry pupil in the center of curvature than the 427mm dome. This is because the latter is more hemispherical than the former. Still, no extension on N120 comes pretty close. A 5mm-10mm extension might be optimal, depending on the size of the dome.
• Center performance is a little better with the larger dome, especially the contrast. But it's not bad with the smaller dome.
• Corner performance is improved more with the larger dome, but it's usable in my view even with the 140mm dome. 
• With the shade removed, the 140mm dome doesn't vignette at all. There is slight vignetting at the top and bottom edges with the shade on.
• The Laowa 10mm is much more usable with the smaller 140mm dome than the Canon RF 10-20L, which probably needs a 230mm dome or larger to perform well. Here is a comparison of the Laowa 10mm vs the RF 10-20L with the 140mm dome. Laowa on the left, Canon 10-20L on the right. The corners especially suffer, probably because the Canon has a MFD of 250mm compared to 120mm on the Laowa.
• 
• 
• If you're curious, the two lenses perform much more similar to each other behind a 427mm dome. Head to head tests in this thread. 

 

[Architeuthis]

5 hours ago, DreiFish said:

Ok, I've retested the Laowa 10mm with the Nauticam 140mm dome (dome shade removed), no extension on N120. This time I made sure the aperture was F11. The results are a bit improved, which suggests my earlier test must've been at a wider aperture by mistake.

Observations:

• The 140mm dome needs a slightly longer extension to put the entry pupil in the center of curvature than the 427mm dome. This is because the latter is more hemispherical than the former. Still, no extension on N120 comes pretty close. A 5mm-10mm extension might be optimal, depending on the size of the dome.
• Center performance is a little better with the larger dome, especially the contrast. But it's not bad with the smaller dome.
• Corner performance is improved more with the larger dome, but it's usable in my view even with the 140mm dome. 
• With the shade removed, the 140mm dome doesn't vignette at all. There is slight vignetting at the top and bottom edges with the shade on.
• The Laowa 10mm is much more usable with the smaller 140mm dome than the Canon RF 10-20L, which probably needs a 230mm dome or larger to perform well. Here is a comparison of the Laowa 10mm vs the RF 10-20L with the 140mm dome. Laowa on the left, Canon 10-20L on the right. The corners especially suffer, probably because the Canon has a MFD of 250mm compared to 120mm on the Laowa
• If you're curious, the two lenses perform much more similar to each other behind a 427mm dome. Head to head tests in this thread. 

 

 

Thank you DreiFish, for this very informative and useful (for making buying decisions) testing....👍

 

I wished someone would do this also with Sony FE WA zoom lenses (I find it is a real pity that the companies producing these domes do not make their testing results available, so that people could see what they get when purchasing a specific domeport/lens combination)...

 

Surprising to me is that the center performance of the Laowa 10mm is better with the big acryl dome compared to the 140mm glass dome. What could be the reason (aside from variability of the sample)?

I speculate it may be the much smaller and closer virtual image that is photographed: eventually the very close distance performance of the lens is worse compared to the longer distance. It could, however, also be caused by small inaccuracies in the focus adjustment that come out more prominent with the smaller and closer virtual image...(?)

 

I am trying to find out how zero extension on Nauticam RF FF housing (with the Laowa lens in RF version) compares to Nauticam Sony FF housing with 35.5mm N100/N120 adapter (that restores the right distance for Canon EF mount, when a e.g. Metabones adapter is used) for the Laowa lens in Sony FE version. Did someone make the exact comparison?

 

 

Wolfgang

[DreiFish]

1 hour ago, Architeuthis said:

 

Thank you DreiFish, for this very informative and useful (for making buying decisions) testing....👍

 

I wished someone would do this also with Sony FE WA zoom lenses (I find it is a real pity that the companies producing these domes do not make their testing results available, so that people could see what they get when purchasing a specific domeport/lens combination)...

 

I'm curious about the way the Sony FE WA zoom lenses perform also. Especially from the perspective of getting a lens that works well with a 180mm dome -- Interceptor 121's tests suggested that both the 16-35F2.8 GM and Tamron 17-28 III do fine in that configuration. Probably helped by the 16/17mm wide end. On RF mount, I'm struggling to find a WA lens that performs great in a 140mm or 180mm dome. My hope was that the RF 15-30 might be that lens because of its shorter MFD.. but.. if anything, I guess my tests have shown me that they definitely perform better with a bigger dome. I guess the grass is always greener on the other side. I'm contemplating a side-grade to a Sony A1 system in part because of access to the 16-35F2.8 GM lens (also for access to the Nikonos 13 conversion, an AF-capable Laowa 10mm prime -- which works well enough with the 140mm dome -- and 1/400s flash sync speed). So stay tuned.. maybe I'll do these tests with the FE WA zooms in the future. I hope the results in that case won't be that the RF WA lenses were better after all 😄

 

(Joking and GAS aside, the differences that can be discerned in these controlled tests may not really matter much for real world images. It's always good to keep things in perspective -- probably any of these lenses with any of these dome combinations could produce great images with the right subject, composition, etc.. Doubt anyone seeing my photos on Instagram on their phone would ever notice the difference in corner sharpness if I got the other stuff right...)

 

1 hour ago, Architeuthis said:

 

Surprising to me is that the center performance of the Laowa 10mm is better with the big acryl dome compared to the 140mm glass dome. What could be the reason (aside from variability of the sample)?

I speculate it may be the much smaller and closer virtual image that is photographed: eventually the very close distance performance of the lens is worse compared to the longer distance. It could, however, also be caused by small inaccuracies in the focus adjustment that come out more prominent with the smaller and closer virtual image...(?)

It's an interesting question. Three possible explanations (that I can think of):

• Minor differences in focus -- especially since I had to manually focus the lens. Possible, but I doubt that would change the microcontrast, which is the biggest difference I see in the center crop
• Differences in how close the lens entry pupil ends up compared to the center of curvature of the dome. Although the Nauticam 140mm port is fisheye port, it's not quite exactly half a hemisphere, whereas the Matty Smith dome is. I don't understand the physics well enough, but seem to recall that misalignment of the entry pupil would mostly result in image degradation in the corners, not in the center of the image. So it's probably not this.
• Probably the most likely reason is actually the amount of water I'm shooting through. I tried to keep the framing the same, which means roughly the same distance from the subject to the camera sensor with both domes. But since the test set-up is in a small tank, and the subject filling the frame was a 15" chessboard, that means the camera is quite close to the subject. With the 427mm dome (213.5mm radius), the front of the dome is almost touching the subject, which means you're shooting through very little water. Only a few centimeters of water as you can see in the shots of the test setup below. 
• 
• With the 140mm dome (69mm radius), it's an additional 144.5 mm of water you have to shoot through, with all it's associated loss of contrast and resolution. This might very well explain the difference. Which also means you wouldn't see such a clear difference in center resolution/microcontrast in the real world where you'd be using a 230mm (120mm radius) dome vs a 140mm dome (69mm radius) and where the subject is 1-2 meters away or more.  Goes back to my earlier comment that while differences can be seen in extreme test conditions like this, for real photos of real subjects, other factors may completely obliviate the difference. 

1 hour ago, Architeuthis said:

I am trying to find out how zero extension on Nauticam RF FF housing (with the Laowa lens in RF version) compares to Nauticam Sony FF housing with 35.5mm N100/N120 adapter (that restores the right distance for Canon EF mount, when a e.g. Metabones adapter is used) for the Laowa lens in Sony FE version. Did someone make the exact comparison?

 

 

Wolfgang

 

No, but I would assume you end up with the exact same distance from the sensor to the front of the housing with the N120 housings as you would from the sensor to the front of the 35.5mm n100/n120 adapter on the Nauticam Sony housings. Phil's tests with the Marelux housing seem to confirm that, as the extensions needed on Marelux Sony housings for the Laowa 10mm line up with the 0-5mm extension I think is optimal on the Nauticam N120 housings when you account for the Marelux Sony housing being about 20mm deeper than the Nauticam Sony Housing or 15mm shallower than the Nauticam RF housings.

Edited July 8 by DreiFish

[Phil Rudin]

13 hours ago, DreiFish said:

 

I'm curious about the way the Sony FE WA zoom lenses perform also. Especially from the perspective of getting a lens that works well with a 180mm dome -- Interceptor 121's tests suggested that both the 16-35F2.8 GM and Tamron 17-28 III do fine in that configuration. Probably helped by the 16/17mm wide end. On RF mount, I'm struggling to find a WA lens that performs great in a 140mm or 180mm dome. My hope was that the RF 15-30 might be that lens because of its shorter MFD.. but.. if anything, I guess my tests have shown me that they definitely perform better with a bigger dome. I guess the grass is always greener on the other side. I'm contemplating a side-grade to a Sony A1 system in part because of access to the 16-35F2.8 GM lens (also for access to the Nikonos 13 conversion, an AF-capable Laowa 10mm prime -- which works well enough with the 140mm dome -- and 1/400s flash sync speed). So stay tuned.. maybe I'll do these tests with the FE WA zooms in the future. I hope the results in that case won't be that the RF WA lenses were better after all 😄

Regarding Sony FE  rectilinear lenses in a 180mm dome port you need to be careful about lens choice. 

 

Sony FE 16-35mm F/2.8 GM minimum focus is 28cm.

Sony FE 16-35mm F/2.8 GM II is 22.1cm

Sony FE 16-35mm F/4 PZ is 24cm

Tamron 17-28mm F/2.8 is 19cm

Sony FE 16-25mm F/2.8 is 18cm

 

For best results in the 180mm dome those with a minimum focus distance of 20cm or less work best with the GM II working pretty well also. I recently moved from the Tamron 17-28 F/2.8 to the Sony FE 16-25mm F/2.8 G. Image quality is every bit as good as the GM II underwater in the 180mm dome at half the cost. Looking back over more than thirty years of using 16-35mm lenses U/W I used the 16-24mm range over 95% of the time so will not be missing the 35mm end.

 

I also used the Nikon's RS as my only U/W system for sixteen years and at best used the 13mm fisheye about 10% of the dives I made. I just don't see the big upside over housing the Canon 8-15mm in 140 and 230mm ports. While I love many of the A1 features I have been using the A7R V almost exclusively since adding the UW Technics trigger and Marelux strobes with HSS. I rarely shoot above 1/800th so the power falloff is not that great V the 1/400th with the A1.  

 

13 hours ago, DreiFish said:

 

Phil's tests with the Marelux housing seem to confirm that, as the extensions needed on Marelux Sony housings for the Laowa 10mm line up with the 0-5mm extension I think is optimal on the Nauticam N120 housings when you account for the Marelux Sony housing being about 20mm deeper than the Nauticam Sony Housing or 15mm shallower than the Nauticam RF housings.

Regarding the Marelux housing V. Nauticam N100 housing for Sony FF cameras the conversion is about 17mm difference. So with WACP-1 you use the N100-N130 35.5 port adapter for 28-60 with Nauticam. With Marelux I use the 20mm NA to MX extension for WACP-1 and the custom 17mm N100 to MX extension for WACP-C. With WACP-C using 17mm the image is noticeably wider (10 degrees or so) V the Nauticam setup.

 

For the Laowa 10mm I have been using  Marelux 20mm extension for the 230mm and 12 inch Matty Smith. If Marelux releases a 25mm extension I think that would be the best option but you begin to split hairs when getting down to 5mm increments.  With the 140mm dome I use 35mm (20mm+15mm) with the sun shade removed. At 40mm the system will vignette. SAGADIVE.com makes custom port extensions for Nauticam down to about 12/13mm in N120. Not sure about N100.  

Edited July 8 by Phil Rudin

[Chris Ross]

I don't know enough about optics to give a 100% accurate explanation on the ability of some lenses to work well in small domes.  However the basic premise seems quite straight forward which is the ability of the lens to render the curved virtual image and have it all sharp and in focus across a flat sensor plane.  We have seen that some close focusing lenses do a particularly good job at this.

 

Certainly a lens being able to focus close it seems helps in this situation, but as I understand things most WA lenses don't have a perfectly flat focal plane and rely somewhat upon depth of field to render images sharp across the sensor plane.  I notice that the newer Sony lenses are particularly good in smaller domes, while it seems the RF 15-35 isn't as good even though it focuses close.  The amount of curvature of the focal plane may interact with the curved virtual images in ways that are more or less beneficial.  A lens may have a flat field at infinity and develop field curvature as it focuses closer and the direction of curvature can reverse as well. 

 

The shape of the focal surface can be found on Photons to Photos optical bench.  For zooms it is only available at infinity, some primes allow you to adjust focus and observe how it impacts the shape of the focal plane.

 

If you look at optical diagrams for the lens elements you can see that the zooms within a given manufacturer have similar layouts.  If you compare the Sony 16-35 f2.8 GMII to the Canon equivalent the lens element layout if quite different and seems to be different to earlier Sony 16-35 zooms.

 

On the issue of microcontrast, you could of course test that by taking shots with the 140mm dome a little closer.  Not sure why it would be less in the 140mm dome.

[Phil Rudin]

13 hours ago, Chris Ross said:

 

 

"I notice that the newer Sony lenses are particularly good in smaller domes, while it seems the RF 15-35 isn't as good even though it focuses close.  The amount of curvature of the focal plane may interact with the curved virtual images in ways that are more or less beneficial.  A lens may have a flat field at infinity and develop field curvature as it focuses closer and the direction of curvature can reverse as well"

 

Chris, I think you may have may have mixed up lenses. The Canon RF 15-35mm an F/2.8 lens only focuses to 28cm not at all well suited to a 180mm dome. The Canon 15-30mm F/4.5-F/6.3 focuses to only 13cm which would seem to be a much better fit for the 180mm dome. This is a highly rated lens that is about 1/6th the price of the 16-35 F/2.8 in the US, $2100.00 v $350.00.

 

 

[Chris Ross]

8 hours ago, Phil Rudin said:

Chris, I think you may have may have mixed up lenses. The Canon RF 15-35mm an F/2.8 lens only focuses to 28cm not at all well suited to a 180mm dome. The Canon 15-30mm F/4.5-F/6.3 focuses to only 13cm which would seem to be a much better fit for the 180mm dome. This is a highly rated lens that is about 1/6th the price of the 16-35 F/2.8 in the US, $2100.00 v $350.00.

 

 

You are right, I got lost in all the tests😂.  Even so in the tests above it suggests it doesn't do so well even though it focuses close.

[Adventurer]

Glad to see my suggested test setup reproduced and utilized.

 

useful to get your optimized extension for your lens 

[DreiFish]

On 7/8/2024 at 4:39 PM, Phil Rudin said:

Regarding Sony FE  rectilinear lenses in a 180mm dome port you need to be careful about lens choice. 

 

Sony FE 16-35mm F/2.8 GM minimum focus is 28cm.

Sony FE 16-35mm F/2.8 GM II is 22.1cm

Sony FE 16-35mm F/4 PZ is 24cm

Tamron 17-28mm F/2.8 is 19cm

Sony FE 16-25mm F/2.8 is 18cm

 

For best results in the 180mm dome those with a minimum focus distance of 20cm or less work best with the GM II working pretty well also. I recently moved from the Tamron 17-28 F/2.8 to the Sony FE 16-25mm F/2.8 G. Image quality is every bit as good as the GM II underwater in the 180mm dome at half the cost. Looking back over more than thirty years of using 16-35mm lenses U/W I used the 16-24mm range over 95% of the time so will not be missing the 35mm end.

 

Cool, I didn't know about the Sony 16-25 F/2.8 G! That looks like a great lens for underwater rectilinear use, and cheaper too! The matching Sony 24-50 F/2.8G also looks very promising for use with the Nauticam WWL-C and dry water contact optics. Unfortunately, none of this is helping my gear acquisition itch... 😄

 

On 7/8/2024 at 4:39 PM, Phil Rudin said:

 

I also used the Nikon's RS as my only U/W system for sixteen years and at best used the 13mm fisheye about 10% of the dives I made. I just don't see the big upside over housing the Canon 8-15mm in 140 and 230mm ports. While I love many of the A1 features I have been using the A7R V almost exclusively since adding the UW Technics trigger and Marelux strobes with HSS. I rarely shoot above 1/800th so the power falloff is not that great V the 1/400th with the A1.  

 

Image quality differences vs. an adapted Canon 8-15 are probably minor, but I guess there's still a size and weight benefit. Also, since the conversion makes the RS 13 behave like a a native Sony lens, you may be able to unlock the faster 30fps shooting mode with something like the A1 or A9III. Minor advantages in the grand scheme of things, but still nice to haves. Personally, fisheye is by far my preferred choice for wide angle.

 

 

On 7/8/2024 at 4:39 PM, Phil Rudin said:

 

For the Laowa 10mm I have been using  Marelux 20mm extension for the 230mm and 12 inch Matty Smith. If Marelux releases a 25mm extension I think that would be the best option but you begin to split hairs when getting down to 5mm increments.  With the 140mm dome I use 35mm (20mm+15mm) with the sun shade removed. At 40mm the system will vignette. SAGADIVE.com makes custom port extensions for Nauticam down to about 12/13mm in N120. Not sure about N100.  

 

Thanks! Didn't know about the custom SAGADIVE extension rings either. Looks like they make a custom 10mm and 25mm extension ring for N120 that's cheaper than the nauticam version (and doesn't come with the 25% China tariff you get slapped with if importing things from Europe). I didn't see any in-between sizes like 12, 13 or 15mm listed on the site.

 

SAGADIVE also makes an adapter to be able to use Nauticam's WACP-1  with other manufacturer's housings (like Seacam) which is great. https://sagadive.com/en/product/aros-adaptadores-saga/

 

13 hours ago, Adventurer said:

Glad to see my suggested test setup reproduced and utilized.

 

useful to get your optimized extension for your lens 

 

Yes, thank you very much for the idea, Adventurer!

[DreiFish]

On 7/8/2024 at 2:06 AM, Architeuthis said:

 

 

I am trying to find out how zero extension on Nauticam RF FF housing (with the Laowa lens in RF version) compares to Nauticam Sony FF housing with 35.5mm N100/N120 adapter (that restores the right distance for Canon EF mount, when a e.g. Metabones adapter is used) for the Laowa lens in Sony FE version. Did someone make the exact comparison?

 

 

Wolfgang

 

Ok, so I just measured the distance from the Canon RF lens mount to the front of the housing on the R5C Nauticam housing (N120). It's 58.8mm. Accounting for measuring error and manufacturing tolerences, let's say 60mm. This should put the same distance on the N100 Sony housings at around 25mm. Could someone confirm? Also would be curious to get this distance measured on Marelux and Seacam housings.

 

I've updated my chart accordingly. As you can see, the Nauticam recommended extensions vary quite a bit in some cases from the calculated optimal positioning of the lens based on the Optical Bench entry pupil. Maybe that's to prevent vignetting? Or did I mess up how I calculate the optimal extension (=[@[I-P-FD (MM)]]-[@[Nauticam Camera Lens Flange to Front of Housing Distance (MM)]]. Not quite sure.

 

[Isaac Szabo]

18 minutes ago, DreiFish said:

Ok, so I just measured the distance from the Canon RF lens mount to the front of the housing on the R5C Nauticam housing (N120). It's 58.8mm. Accounting for measuring error and manufacturing tolerences, let's say 60mm. This should put the same distance on the N100 Sony housings at around 25mm. Could someone confirm?

 

On my NA-A7II housing the distance is 26mm. Someone claimed it's 27mm on newer housings, though I haven't been able to confirm that yet.

Edited July 10 by Isaac Szabo

[dentrock]

7 hours ago, Isaac Szabo said:

 

On my NA-A7II housing the distance is 26mm. Someone claimed it's 27mm on newer housings, though I haven't been able to confirm that yet.

I did a quick measurement on my Nauticam A7CR rig when I bought it and came up with 28mm. I think our erstwhile and now departed friend arrived at the same figure for whatever Sony he was using.

 

FYI any A6xxx users following this, the same measurement for my Nauticam A6400 rig was 13mm.

 

Has anyone asked Nauticam to reveal their port / ext recommendations? They should have tested the Laowa 10 by now.

[Isaac Szabo]

1 hour ago, dentrock said:

I did a quick measurement on my Nauticam A7CR rig when I bought it and came up with 28mm. I think our erstwhile and now departed friend arrived at the same figure for whatever Sony he was using.

 

FYI any A6xxx users following this, the same measurement for my Nauticam A6400 rig was 13mm.

 

Has anyone asked Nauticam to reveal their port / ext recommendations? They should have tested the Laowa 10 by now.

 

Interesting. How accurate do you think your method was (ruler, calipers, depth gauge, etc)? It would be nice to know for sure since I make N100 RS13 ports. It's unfortunate that it's not the same for all their Sony FF housings. 

 

On this thread he claimed 27mm: 

 

Edited July 11 by Isaac Szabo