Wet Macro Lens?

There was a mod at some point by Ikelite to improve performance of these wide angle lenses with the HC1/HC3. I think it moved the lens closer the the camera. Before the mod the footage was pretty much unusable. But I heard people still had trouble because of the small plastic thread wearing out.

My Ike housing is a fairly new model, having come out just last November (one year ago), but I don't know if they made any "modifications" WRT the port and W/A stuff. I'm going to the pool for a practice session in early January. I'll try to get a card or something that will show sharpness around the edges (if anyone has a suggestion as to what to use and where to get it I'd appreciate thoughts on that) - or fuzziness as the case may be. I'll do some shots with and without the Ike W-20 W/A, then add the Inon closeup filter to the W/A lens and shoot again. Then I can post here and all can see what I get. (I'm shooting HD with a Sony SR1.)

The mod I'm thinking of was done at least 18 months ago.

Scott,

I have used a Inon UWL 100 W/A lens with my Ikelite and Sony HC 1, the softening was around the edges I found awful. I actually don't bother with that lens any more.

 

Jon

Jon,

Have you found something that works for W/A on Ikelites without the awful softening? I am shooting the Canon HV20 the cam puts out great footage but needs a good lens anyone have any thoughts?

Scott

Unfortunately no I haven't. I am in fact going to upgrade to a Canon XH A1 with Gates and sell my Ikelite housing.

Jon

I can't help with the Ikelite housing but HDVSEATEK have just released a glass 110 degree super wide lens for compact Gates housings (for Amphibico in early 2008) that does not require an additional macro lens.

It focuses to 25mm and using the zoom will allow excellent, razor sharp macro. There are some still frame captures off HDV to show what this lens can do on the web site (Gallery).

Cheers,

George

Here's an update. I finally got the pieces (including one of those nifty small tripods everyone has been talking about here and getting a custom milled piece to mount it on my main horizontal housing bracket).

Unfortunately, due to schedule and other factors I wasn't able to run tests in the pool itself.

I did run some tests on dry land though (in my house, i.e.). Here's the list of components used:

- Sony SR1 AVCHD Camera

- Ikelite SR1 Housing (#6038.90)

- Ikelite W-20 W/A Lens

- Inon UCL-330 Closeup Lens

1 - I tested with just the Ikelite W-20 W/S lens on the housing, and saw no vignetting or edge distortion - which is the same I observed on my last dive trip where I first used the rig (all U/W shots were taken with the W/A lens). So the Ike W/A W-20 lens works well with this housing and camera combination, for any that are interested in knowing that. It does have the usual W/A distortion from the middle outwards - so if you test like I did with a square sign you see the difference, but that's what I'd expect from any W/A lens.

2 - I then tested with just the Inon UCL-330 closeup lens. That looked good at full wide, and zoomed in as far as I could go I could get focus around 6-8 inches from the lens. I saw no vignetting - even at full wide.

3 - Then I screwed the Ike W-20 W/A lens onto the Inon C/U lens. With that combination I got vignetting like crazy at full wide and quite a ways down into C/U zoom. However, I could zoom in tight and really get a monstrous magnification of something v-e-r-y small only 3 inches away! So that's something to remember if I were to come across a need for it.

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I have a big question for those with more experience: what might I expect to have seen different if I were to have run these same tests underwater?

Still wondering if some of you experts could mention what differences, if any, I might expect to see in vignetting and W/A imaging underwater v. the on-land tests I mentioned in the previous message.

Hi Pablo,

When I used my WA and Ikelite, it was fine on surface with no distortion but the distortion appeared with U/W footage. The only real way of knowing is getting it in the water an shooting. The funny thing that I noticed was that in a pool I'm sure the distortion wasn't as bad... must be my eyes though as I can't explain why it would be different.

Give it a go and fingers crossed for you.

Jon

Well thanks for the input. I'll be finding out here in about 3 weeks. It will be interesting to see.

Pablo if you didn't do this on your test then you also need to actually capture some of the footage to your NLE and have a look at it there. The edge softening and vignetting that I've come across before was only noticeable once in the NLE and wasn't seen at all in the viewfinder or on the LCD screen.

Hope this helps.

Cheers, Simon

I put it all in the NLE and looked at it. I couldn't detect any except with the Ike W/A W-20 on top of the Inon 330 C/U lens.