Panasonic GF1

[ggibson]

Thanks for the feedback, JD! Any photos or video you're willing to share?

 

[deirdre]

jd, using the fisheye underwater sounds like great fun. I'd love to see some pictures!

 

[nycjOHN170]

I haven't used it yet, and now it's storm season, but hopefully I'll get a dive in soon between the storms.

You must be near here (NE USA)

Every weekend it's a hurricane or a gale this past one had 10 ft waves.

Went shore diving last weekend off Montauk. Merely a small craft advisory. Dry Solo. Kinda wild. Didn't submit my new 10-Bar to a surf pounding. Yet.

 

[jd950]

I'll try to post some pictures or a link within the next couple of days.

 

[bing.]

hi jd, any chance you can give us a link to the images? thanks

 

[mtbrider]

So I finally took some pics with my 10bar housing, GF1, and m.Zuiko 9-18mm.


Overall it worked pretty well. The strobes worked great, along with the Heinrichs hotshoe adapter. The housing controls were pretty easy to use, except for the thumbwheel, but that's a tricky control indeed. Focus was fast and consistent. The only times the autofocus had trouble was with the fast moving sea lion, and on the "blue water" type photos. But overall it focused very well.

There are some outstanding problems with the 9-18mm lens in this housing though. The zoom gear (for external control of zoom) does not fit correctly but I fudged it to make it work. When I inquired why the gear was not working correctly, I was told it should work either way. Makes me wonder if they even tried it out...

Another problem is that the dome port causes a blurry image in the corners. From what I read this is caused by the difference in nodal points between the lens and the dome. I'm guessing the dome port was optimized for the 7-14mm lens and not the 9-18mm. Maybe some kind of spacer could fix this.
Marine Themes. Dome Spacer Theory.

You can see an example of the blurry corners here:
Blurry image

A lot of the other photos are at 18mm so they are not so blurry in the corner. Here are the rest of the photos:
Photo Gallery

 

[Marauder]

Hmm, thanks for the update, MT. The links to your images aren't working for me though. That's too bad that the 9-18mm doesn't work all that well with the 10Bar.

 

[mtbrider]

Here are the fixed links.

Blurry photo
Gallery

 

[ggibson]

Thanks for the samples! I sold my 7-14mm for the 9-18mm since I use the latter more on dry land, but this makes me regret my decision a bit (even though I don't have an UW housing... yet).

 

[ggibson]

Hmm, from what I just read on the GF1 thread at wetpixel, the 7-14mm was also giving blurry corners in the 10bar with dome port. Maybe the real issue is that the dome is designed more around the 14-45mm and not for the ultra-wides.

Anyone else have experience using these two lenses on the 10bar housing?