R6 housing and lens questions

Hey there! 
 

I just picked up the canon R6 and would love to get it underwater on my shark dive coming up in august. I currently used the 7d mark ii in an ikelite so I’m familiar with that brand but I’m curious what the thoughts are for Nimar and others that are available. 
 

What is the best RF lens for underwater right now? Should I stick with EF and use an adapter?

Thanks for the help in advance!

Depends on what you want to shoot - which sharks and how close will you be?  At feeding dives you will might be close enough to use a fisheye, others you may want something with a touch more reach if they don't come in close.

Ikelite does the job but there are compromises sometimes - read the fine print for dome port choices, they also don't have a mini dome on offer for fisheye lenses.  Be aware that their TTL module is now external (used to be internal) and I am aware of at least one diver who is on their second module and was busy swearing about it as it had ongoing issues with water penetration leading to erratic flash firing. 

9 hours ago, sharkbytesmatt said:

Hey there! 
 

I just picked up the canon R6 and would love to get it underwater on my shark dive coming up in august. I currently used the 7d mark ii in an ikelite so I’m familiar with that brand but I’m curious what the thoughts are for Nimar and others that are available. 
 

What is the best RF lens for underwater right now? Should I stick with EF and use an adapter?

 

Thanks for the help in advance!

I cannot contribute much - Since  I am considering to acquire an additional system, I read posts in different photography forums on the new mirrorless cameras and  the performance of adopted lenses of the old systems (no new mirrorless system has, at the moment, enough lens choice of native lenses):

Normally adopting lenses with adapter, even from the same company, slows down AF. This is the case with Sony and especially Nikon (there is a tread in this forum that the Tokina 10-17mm fisheye does even not work with the new Z bodies). Generally the slowed down AF (in case it works) is not so much a problem with WA(?) and fisheye lenses, but becomes a real problem with longer focal ranges macro lenses...

Adopting Canon EF lenses to RF mount cameras seems to be an exception, there are many, many treads and tests in the internet where users state that their (modern) EF-lenses work better and focus faster on the new RF bodies, especially R6 and R5, when compared to performance on the original DSLR bodies for which the lenses have been designed for (the dual pixel AF system of Canon seems to be the most advanved technology at present; The CAF systems of Panasonic or Nikon cannot compete). Look here, just as an example, there are many more similar treads/reports in the internet:

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4547484

As far as I am concernded, I think I will go with Canon and use the EF lenses I already have (8-15mm fisheye; 100mm Macro IS L). I expect them to work at least as good as if they were native on a EF DSLR body, but this still has to be shown...

Wolfgang

The Canon RF 15-35mm is probably the lens you want to first consider if looking native.  From some tests I've seen its sharper than the EF 16-35mm II.   I'm not sure the Ikelite 8' dome would do it justice though.  You might want to upgrade to one of the higher end housings to get a glass dome.  However the cost of the RF 15-35mm plus a nice glass dome port would put you in the price range of a WACP-1.

I have the Nauticam R6 housing and it was almost like a research project deciding on all the settings I wanted.  Not all the buttons and controls are necessary underwater.  Beyond the choice of optics, things to consider on a new housing is how easy it is to change batteries, SD cards, ports and lenses.  It makes a difference when doing 4 dives a day on a long trip.

4 hours ago, helgromite said:

The Canon RF 15-35mm is probably the lens you want to first consider if looking native.  From some tests I've seen its sharper than the EF 16-35mm II.   I'm not sure the Ikelite 8' dome would do it justice though.  You might want to upgrade to one of the higher end housings to get a glass dome.  However the cost of the RF 15-35mm plus a nice glass dome port would put you in the price range of a WACP-1.

I have the Nauticam R6 housing and it was almost like a research project deciding on all the settings I wanted.  Not all the buttons and controls are necessary underwater.  Beyond the choice of optics, things to consider on a new housing is how easy it is to change batteries, SD cards, ports and lenses.  It makes a difference when doing 4 dives a day on a long trip.

Thanks for the info! What lenses are you using on the R6 and how do you have your housing set up for them? How does glass make a difference versus the ikelite dome? Sorry if that’s a dumb question. 
 

Another dumb question. What is WACP-1?
 

I’m going cage diving at Guadalupe in august so I will be using natural light at the surface. 

The problem with the ikelite dome is that it is too small, 8"is the biggest they make.  Rectilinear wide lenses are very demanding if you want nice corners - the general formula as a minimum is a 230mm or 9"dome and shooting f11-16, even then the corners are not perfect and people will use the S&S correction lens to improve them further.   This can be relaxed a bit shooting creatures in blue water

Cage diving I'm guessing has its unique challenges including if the gap in the cage is big enough to deal with the big domes..

The WACP is the Nauticam wide angle correction port.  It is a water contact optic with full zoom through and you use it in place of a port with a lens like a kit 28-70 behind it.  It is sharp to the corners even at wider apertures.  Expensive though.  Field of view is roughly  equivalent to a 10-25mm rectilinear but with barrel distortion so a semi fisheye.