Sea & Sea Universal Dome Port 210 AR II

I would like to find out if anyone has had more experience with this new dome port from Sea & Sea - especially with regards to shooting into the sun and reflections on the inside of the dome.

I have the fisheye dome port 240, and cannot shoot into the sun as I always get reflections from the inside of the dome. Also cost of glass, and the weight for travel, is a problem for me.

So keen to hear if this is a good alternative.

Thanks

Anthony

18 hours ago, wildafrica said:

I would like to find out if anyone has had more experience with this new dome port from Sea & Sea - especially with regards to shooting into the sun and reflections on the inside of the dome.

I have the fisheye dome port 240, and cannot shoot into the sun as I always get reflections from the inside of the dome. Also cost of glass, and the weight for travel, is a problem for me.

So keen to hear if this is a good alternative.

Thanks

Anthony

It may depend on what lens you shoot with - a 210mm dome might be a bit small for 14-16mm rectilinear lens, while a fisheye would be fine it that size or smaller dome.  What is reflecting in the dome - is it the lens or some labeling on the lens ?

Hi Chris,

I use the dome with my Sigma 15mm f2.8, and the Nikon 16-35mm F 4. Previously used the Nikon 16mm.

It seems like evreything reflects - the lens hood and the interior scurting of the dome port. I normally have several rings in all my images when at a particular angle to the sun.

Regards being too small, I just go according to manufacturers port charts, and the 210 is suitable for those lenses. Obviosuly extensions are applied according to manufacturers recommendations for the rectilinear lens. But dont think that has any bearing on the reflections, think it is a function of the dome. Hence the lateste domes having the anti-reflective coatings - but would like to know if the anti-reflective coatings on this dome actually work because it has always been recommended to go glass to get rid of the internal reflections. This port is not glass, but has the anti-reflective coatings applied, and seems to be the only plastic port with it. So keen to know if the problem has been solved as the port is a lot cheaper than glass.

Hi Antony

Those reflections can be a right pain!

I've come across two ways of sorting this out. One is to black out all the markings on the lens using a permanent marker or paint stick: all a bit drastic and it sounds like this might not do the trick for you.

The other method is a matt black light baffle, made of material, that slides on to the lens - it looks rather like an umbrella with a hole in the middle for the lens. Amphibico used to make one but bandhphoto list this as no longer available.

Here's a pic of, essentially, what they look like:

The port chart may list it as an option and again it will certainly form decent images but the corners won't be as good as with the 240mm dome with the 16-35.  The Sigma 15mm f2.8 will be fine - fisheyes are not so sensitive to port size.  This is just basic dome port optics - people will use smaller domes for travel or cost and accept the softer corners - or be surprised by them.  Whether that is a problem for you is subjective.

Reflections are mentioned as a problem for some lenses particularly if there are lighter parts facing the dome, the normal solution is cover or blacken text.  Perhaps you could post an example of the problem you are seeing?

Hi Chris,

See image attached fore examples! This was taken with the Sigma 15mm - the middle mark is from the edge of the lens hood (this is a relatively new lens so not even scuffed, still blacked out), and then the marks on the bottom left edge are from the riffles/baffles on the inside of the port opposite the port dome, bascially the part facing the dome. From what I understand, the new port as anti-reflective layers added, as what has been done with glass, to hopefully remove this painful reflections, this is what I am trying to get feedback from people that have used it. The fact that it is 210mm, can't do much about. I cannot afford a glass dome, so trying to determine the best alternative, and unfortunately "plastic domes" don't come in bigger sizes, especially with this "anti-reflective" layer added.

These marks can be cleaned from photos (but still painful and hopefully avoidable - dont like spending hours in photoshop after a shoot), but the main problem comes when shooting video!! These reflections have destroyed awesome footage I took on the same shoot.

I can't offer direct experience, but I'd make two suggestions, first I'd suggest obtaining some black velvet or similar to cover your lens hood. You might be able to find black flocking paper which has an anti reflective surface?  The reflections from the dome it self may be harder to deal with, you might be able insert some sort of anti reflective material there as well?

As for glass vs acrylic, my understanding is that glass is better in this situation as glass domes are generally anti-reflection coated and this 210mm dome has anti reflection coatings as well, so the performance would be equivalent to a glass port

Do you use the fisheye lens most or the the 16-35?  If it's the fisheye another option might be the Nauticam 140mm dome port it's about $200 more than the the 210mm AR-II port from S&S and can be converted to S&S by changing out the lug ring.  The 140mm dome would be way too small for the 16-35 lens , but perfectly fine for the fisheye lens and would have advantages for handling in the water.  Whether that's an option depends on your usage.

Is this your dome?:  https://www.backscatter.com/Sea-and-Sea-Canon-11-24mm-F4L-USM-for-Port-Ring-Ge

I would guess the reflection come from the  chamfer just inside the port, you may be able to cover that with some sort of anti reflective material?  this link brings up a number of options:  https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=anti+reflective+flocking+paper

Hi Ross,

Great info, thanks! I will certainly look into the anti-reflective material, as there really is nothing wrong with the port itself! Also dont really have the $1200 either to spend, so may be well worth trying that material first. Will have to see if available in South Africa, wher I am based.

Yes, the link to the dome is the correct one although mine might be slightly older as I have had it for more than 10 years, and still going strong!

To be honest, I am using the 16-35mm a little more, espcially for reef shooting, as I am shooting more video, but shoot both at the same time, so need to flipf between the two! Find the fisheye not great for shooting video of reef scenes! Have the option to get an Athena 170mm optical dome for a very good price. I know the 170mm is not the best but for the price may well be worth the test, even if I can only use it for the fisheye lens.

But will certainly try the anti-reflective material you suggested.

Thanks

Anthony

I don't think there is much difference between the  quality of various glass domes on offer,  what varies is the diameter and whether or not they are a full 180° hemisphere.  A fisheye lens can only be correctly placed behind a 180° dome - that is the entrance puil is at the centre of curvature of the dome and not vignette.  Many domes are smaller sphere segments and you can correctly place a 16mm equivalent lens behind one without vignetting.  You can move a fisheye lens forward in the dome so it doesn't vignette at the cost of some chromatic abberation and a slight change in field of view to use it in the smaller segment style dome - the fisheye lenses seem to be more tolerant of this as they are more tolerant of small domes - much more so than rectilinear lenses.

For your information this link has an image taken by a 17mm behind a170mm dome and you can see what that does to the corners.

https://uwaterphoto.com/?p=839

HI Chris,

Yip, the results are not great behind a 170mm! I do note that the results behind the 200mm dome ceratinly show some improvement, so possibly this new 210mm dome may also show improvement - unfrotunately S&S dont make a bigger dome with the anti-reflective layers. Just need to clairfy whether the reflective properties have been eradicated by the anit-reflective layers they have added.

No responses from anyone that have actually used this dome! Seems like S&S not a popular brand anymore.

Thanks again for your feedback! Much appreciated.

Ikelite makes anti-reflection rings for some lenses. They have a ring for a Sigma 15mm.

While they don't list a ring for the Nikon 16-35mm, they do make a ring for the Nikon 17-35mm. Both the 16-35mm and 17-35mm have 77mm filter threads so the ring for a 17-35mm might work with a 16-35mm.

These anti-reflection rings are self-adhesive.

-Tinman

Tinman,

Those are awesome. Thanks for the info! I actually need one for the Sigma lens mostly - wonder if it fits inside the lens hood because the problem is the actual ends of the fixed lens hood that reflects, not the inside area around the glass. Have you used these?

No, I haven't used these yet. I'm not a Sigma user, but I'll be using my Nikon 17-35mm on a housed D850 system soon. I'll probably have Ikelite send me the appropriate anti-reflection ring just to reduce the possibility of potential issues with my acrylic dome port.

I've never experienced reflection issues with my Nikon D7200, D300, and D300s systems.

-Tinman

1 hour ago, Tinman said:

I've never experienced reflection issues with my Nikon D7200, D300, and D300s systems.

For what it's worth, I had reflection problems with a Sigma 15mm inside a 230 domeport on a Nikon D800. On the image you could read the details printed on the front edge of the lens as they were reflected on to the virtual image. An utter pain to remove using PS!

6 hours ago, TimG said:

For what it's worth, I had reflection problems with a Sigma 15mm inside a 230 domeport on a Nikon D800. On the image you could read the details printed on the front edge of the lens as they were reflected on to the virtual image. An utter pain to remove using PS!

Try shooting video when you have these reflections in the shot ... no editing that out, unless you have a lot of spare time!!!

This is a screen capture i took from a recent video - one can clearly see the reflection from the inside of the lens shade, and then the ruffles of the dome in the bottom right hand corner.