Sigma 8mm fisheye

Anyone used this lens successfully in an ikelite housing?

judging by the focusing distance and physical dimensions of the lens it sounds like it should work behind a 5503 standard dome port.

Its closer focusing than the 15mm, slightly lower magnification, but a fair bit cheaper - so perhaps a worthy compromise.

any comments / advice ?

anyone tried it out?

i'm skeptical about the application of the 8mm for underwater because it is a circular fisheye designed for full frame (35mm) cameras. This means that on film, it creates a 180 degree view *circle* in the middle of the frame.

on a cropped sensor, i'm not sure if you'd get a full frame image but likely still get some vignetting.

I'm not sure what camera you have, but i'd suggest if you have a full frame camera (film/ canon 5D) get the 15mm (canon, sigma) or 16mm (nikon) fisheye. If you have digital get the tokina 10-17 for canon, or 10.5mm for nikon.

For the cameras, these lenses give you the widest view possible without vignetting, meaning they see a rectangular crop out of that 180 degree circle (so they see 180 degrees diagonally from corner to corner).

I apologise if you know all this already, but personally i don't dig the circle images produced by the 8mm. they're kinda cool at first, but limited in application. hope this helps,

Chris

As Chris said above, you need to know what you are getting into with this lens.

First and foremost, what camera are you planning to use it on? I would not recommend it unless its on a full-frame camera. For Ikelite housings that means a Canon 5-D.

Check out: http://www.ephotozine.com/equipment/tests/...cfm?test_id=475 to learn more about this lens and also to see what the chopped circular image looks like on a cropped sensor camera like the Nikon DSLRs and Canon 10, 20, 30Ds. While I can see the artistic value of the circular image (in limited applications) I don't like the cropped view. I think for most applications you are better off with a 10.5mm for Nikon or the Sigma 15mm, or the Tokina 10-17mm for Nikon or Canon.

Now on a full-frame sensor like a 5-D in limited applications this lens can yield some very artistic and unique images --the inside of a sponge, a nautilus shell come to mind. If you get it do post some of your creations here.

http://www.pbase.com/cameras/sigma/8_4_ex_circular_fisheye

I would guess that the 8" dome port with the fisheye extension would work fine or the standard fisheye dome port. The dimensions look fine. But to find out for sure check:

http://michel.thoby.free.fr/SIGMA8mm/Alpha...IGMA%208mm.html

and

http://wetpixel.com/i.php/full/dome-theory/

Cheers!

It works great with a camera with a crop sensor. You will have to crop the images to get rid of a partial circle. Sometimes you wind up with a square photo. Lighting is tricky. Best to place the strobes very close to the camera body. So the water has to be pretty clear. Its a fun lens for sure.

Best,

TR