10Bar LX3 Housing

This is very interesting. I had a couple of questions, if anyone has answers:

1 - Does it have a mounting hole on the bottom (tripod type) for attaching bases and arms?

2 - Has anyone tried it with 67mm Inon wide angle lenses or macro lenses? What kind of vignetting happens with the standard port.

3 - How does one connect a fiber optic connection, for use with Inon (S-TTL).

4 - Is there a US distributor yet?

Regards,

tdc

LERF great that you got a response. I have sent two emails to 10bar over the past two months without hearing anything back. Rather disappointing. I guess they are not interested in consumers in the USA.

1 - Does it have a mounting hole on the bottom (tripod type) for attaching bases and arms?

Some where I believe I saw it does.

2 - Has anyone tried it with 67mm Inon wide angle lenses or macro lenses?

See the first image shown in LERF's post where he used a UNCU-02 macro lens.

What kind of vignetting happens with the standard port.

See the second image shown in LERF's post.

3 - How does one connect a fiber optic connection, for use with Inon (S-TTL).

With an adapter that goes over the small port for the flash.

4 - Is there a US distributor yet?

No, does not sound like anyone wants to be.

My response was quick because I phoned them. I'm getting a few units of the new batch LX3 housing this week and will post pics and details of the improvement.

My response was quick because I phoned them. I'm getting a few units of the new batch LX3 housing this week and will post pics and details of the improvement.

10Bar has a dome port for this housing. Can you get those, too?

LERF great that you got a response. I have sent two emails to 10bar over the past two months without hearing anything back. Rather disappointing. I guess they are not interested in consumers in the USA.

 

 

 

Some where I believe I saw it does.

 

 

See the first image shown in LERF's post where he used a UNCU-02 macro lens.

 

 

See the second image shown in LERF's post.

 

 

With an adapter that goes over the small port for the flash.

 

 

No, does not sound like anyone wants to be.

Hi All

US people for the LX3 housing try:

Ann Babarovich

Digital Diver

PH + 61 7 4031 9266

www.digitaldiver.com.au

For once the exchange rate is heavily in your favour now and digital diver have always provided me with good service. The housing is about $1000 AUD ($636 USD) and the dome port and extension around another $780 AUD ($496 USD). Not sure whether you guys pay import duty or not but it would probably be worth asking if digital diver can sell it to you without Australian GST (sales tax) which would save 10%.

hope this helps, I have always found digital diver to be really helpful

regards

Roger

Hi, I have been in contact with Ada from 10Bar during the coarse of last week and he supplied me the following information.

 

Their housing for the Panasonic LX3 is now up for sale.

Price = US$630

 

Some details on the housing:

External lenses with a M67 thread can be used with the housing.

Options for optical strobe firing as well as hard wiring exist.

It uses two key hole latches for locking, and with double main o-rings for closure.

A target light can be fixed to the top of the housing.

The joystick can be used only for the central downward position.

 

The housing looks rather nice IMHO. Also keeping in mind that the LX3 is getting great reviews, the the latest DPreview it made the top of the list in its category.

Personally I would loved to have seen it in a black finish, not just for the shake of it, but shine things attract the attention of certain types of fish:)

I would have loved a different solution for the shutter button, either a trigger on the side or front of the housing with a pull back action.

 

I will upload the images of the housing shortly.

Friends

I thought it was about time that I posted a quick overview of my thoughts on my experiences with the 10 bar housing so far:

I have been using my 10 bar housing for a little while now and on some fronts I am very impressed - build quality is excellent, the controls once you get used to them are quite well designed with a couple of reservations (old joystick control and the menu / ok selector). The housing came with a bag and maintenance kit that highlights 10 bars intention to provide a high quality product. That said I unfortunately received one of the earlier versions of the housing despite 10 bar's assurance that the joystick issue had been resolved on all 2009 housings. They are in the process of sending out a replacement back for the housing, hence my experience to date has been without access to the quick menu functions.

After LERF's post I am now going to contact them re: the overly long port as the vignetting (even though it is slight) is annoying and it means that 67mm thread accessory lenses vignet extensively, in addition I have also seen some miss focus issues when in macro mode the camera focused on some dirt on the inside of the port rather than the subject! Just goes to show how close it will focus! At this stage I have tried adding a 67mm Ikelite wide angle lens with very poor, soft results even when zoomed into the range where vignetting is no longer a problem. It will be interesting to see what wet fit lenses work best with the housing when the shorter port is made available. Anyone?

I deliberated for quite sometime between a Sea and Sea DX 1G and the 10 bar housing and the LX3 at this stage the jury is still out. My impression having used both systems is that the ability to add the wide angle lens very easily to the DX 1G is a great advantage and much cheaper than the dome port which then means that you can only really use wide angle on a dive?! On the other side the LX3 definitely wins in terms of IQ. Overall I think that once the teething problems: joystick control and port length are resolved the 10 bar housing will live up to its full potential.

Despite these issues I can also state that the housing is a pleasure to use underwater. I will be using this mainly as a research camera for those purposes I think it is ideal. I also own a D300 and ikelite housing and that is just simply too big for most research dives but the 10 bar housing fits in my BCD pocket yet it has many of the manual controls that we all crave in an underwater set up. In addition the bright 24mm lens is a pleasure to use.

I have also managed to get my Ike DS 125 and slave sensor to fire with the housing using a fibre optic cable and slave unit cover. This appears to work on land not sure uw as yet. That said the DS125 dwarfs the 10 bar housing and doubles the weight of the rig hence I may end up getting a smaller strobe later.

I also wanted to make note of the 16:9 HD video feature. It is really pretty good and gives a maximum of 10 minutes shooting time for each file (I think this is a 2GB limit? - FAT 32?) Anyway playing it back on a large HD lcd panel is very impressive considering the size of the camera and that video is a secondary function. The ability to capture decent still 1028 x 720 off the video is a real bonus for research dives using video transects; not sure how everyone else will use it

So in summary; if you can get one with all of the updates outlined by 10bar in their response to LERF I would high recommend it. No doubt someone will have tested the dome port and various wide angle add on lens on the shorter flat port in the near future, I think that the ability to add wet fit lenses will ultimately determine whether this is 'the' uw compact or not.

cheers

Roger

Roger,

I tried to reach Digital Diver using their online form and have not received a reply. Is there another way to reach them ... do you have an email address? Calling is problematic due to the time difference (and cost!).

Roger,

 

I tried to reach Digital Diver using their online form and have not received a reply. Is there another way to reach them ... do you have an email address? Calling is problematic due to the time difference (and cost!).

You might also contract LERF as his shop Scuba Symphony also sells the housing (and their website is a wee bit more up to date than Digital Diver's).

Roger,

 

I tried to reach Digital Diver using their online form and have not received a reply. Is there another way to reach them ... do you have an email address? Calling is problematic due to the time difference (and cost!).

Hi

Sure: info@digitaldiver.com.au

Speak to Ann or Chris

I also agree that LERF might be a good option.

cheers

Roger

I think that the ability to add wet fit lenses will ultimately determine whether this is 'the' uw compact or not.

Would this solve the wet lens problem?

http://www.fun-in.com.tw/catalog/product_i...mp;osCsid=7b84r

Not sure if it adapts a 67mm thread to take an inon AD lens or replaces the inon AD lens back section to turn into a 67mm thread?

Now if I could mount an inon 165 degree fish eye that would really make my day...

M

Hi Meeper,

I'm afraid that's not gonna work! Severe vignetting occurs with WA lens attached, even with the new short port. You can attach any M67 macro lenses though, for WA the dome port for Panasonic's own wide converter DMW-LW46 with adapter DMW-LA4 is recommended.

This is LX3 at 24mm:

With Ikelite W20, a 0.56x WA lens...turns the 24mm into 13.44mm:

With Ikelite W20 zoomed in till no vignetting:

With Inon UFL165AD and 10bar ADF-M67 adapter:

Inon UFL165AD zoomed in till no vignetting:

10bar ADF-M67 adapter:

You might also contract LERF as his shop Scuba Symphony also sells the housing (and their website is a wee bit more up to date than Digital Diver's).

Hi Allen,

Yes, we do have the new improved batch LX3 housings in stock and the fisheye dome port as well, having said that I'm not sure if commercial intentions are against this forum's regulations?

Anyway, here are the pics of the new batch:

Jogdial control for Quick Menu access:

Top, view of shorter port and hotshoe mount set towards back for more space:

New tripod mount,works well with ULCS tray and new 10bar slimm dual handle tray with quick release:

Dome port, to be combined with Panasonic's Wide Conversion Lens DMW-LW46 and adpater DMW-LA4, turns the 24mm into 18mm!

Thanks LERF for your detailed pictures.

I don't think all is lost with regards to the wide angle wet mount lenses. I have a G9 currently with the UWL-100 and you still have to zoom in a touch on the Ikelite short port. Even if I put the wet lens right against the LX3's lens in widest mode I get vignetting, so it is more about the lens than the port. But I did try comparing how far I had to zoom in (compared to the G9) and I think I am getting a better angle than with the G9 in any case. Certainly the wet lens gives a much better angle than with the standard 24mm lens.

One thing that is interesting about the LX3 vs the G9 is that the G9 lens is longest in telephoto mode while the LX3 lens is longest in wide angle mode. The LX3 starts in widest mode so you can't really make a shorter port than the one that they've sent, I guess.

From what I hear, the G10 also has a wider lens and the wide angle wet mount lenses just don't work.

So in the end, I'm very encouraged by what I'm seeing on the LX3 10Bar housing.

One additional point, I've been talking with 10Bar about the possibility of a port with a built-in AD mount as opposed to the 67 mm one. This would certainly make it easier to use underwater, although I don't know if the smaller lenses would work. I've tried (briefly) a converter ring as Allen suggested and it really didn't work. As you detach the lens, it has the tendency to detach the converter as well.

tdc

Hi Lerf, thanks for pics and samples, you're great!

Just a little question.. while using dome port with Panasonic wide lens, is it possible to zoom in and take some macro pics??

Thanks again..

Hi Lerf, thanks for pics and samples, you're great!

Just a little question.. while using dome port with Panasonic wide lens, is it possible to zoom in and take some macro pics??

Thanks again..

Yes, full zoom is possible with the dome port. I'm always standing behind the glass cabinet taking the pics, trying not to shift my position to give you a realistic view.

Here's the Panasonic DMW-LW46 at widest 18mm:

Here's zoomed in 4.5x, macro mode, uncropped, front of dome is about 2 inches from clownfish:

Hi Lerf, thanks for pics and samples, you're great!

Just a little question.. while using dome port with Panasonic wide lens, is it possible to zoom in and take some macro pics??

Thanks again..

Thanks! I have all the items here ready stock in my shop, so very easy for me to post samples.

Yes, full zoom is possible with the dome port. I'm always standing behind the glass cabinet taking the pics, trying not to shift my position to give you a realistic view.

Here's the Panasonic DMW-LW46 at widest 18mm:

Here's zoomed in 4.5x, macro mode, uncropped, front of dome about 2 inches away from clownfish:

OK, it's really a grat thing!

Thanks again LERF

LERF, do you have any pictures of a fiber optic cable connection to the housing?

I noticed that the strobe window in the pictures looks different between the different photos you have shown.

Regards,

tdc

LERF, do you have any pictures of a fiber optic cable connection to the housing?

 

I noticed that the strobe window in the pictures looks different between the different photos you have shown.

 

Regards,

 

tdc

The new batch has a clear flash window, no special adapters are needed now to attahc the fiber optic cable. Picture here with strong 3M velcro but duck tape works too!

Hi Lerf,

Do you know how the old batches worked? I saw a photo of the G9 housing and the cables came out perpendicular to the housing. The adapter that you showed has the cable horizontal to the housing and it will transmit light less efficiently, which is important when shooting TTL.

tdc