Compatibilty of Panasonic Lenses with Olympus Housings?

[TheTrickster]

I'm looking at 'slowly' moving to a Nauticam housing with a Panasonic GH3 (or the next one..) so while we await the GHx and nautical housings. I'm looking at getting the optically stabilised 12-35mm lens as a start.

Would it work with (the OIS) with a Olympus body (I have a E-PL3) and would it fit/work with a standard Port or any of the Zen Ports (I have the 9-18mm port) for the PT-EPxx system.

Cheers!

 

[PHIL RUDIN]

I have used the Panasonic 12-35 zoom and now own the Olympus 12-40 F/2.8 which I consider a better lens although without OIS which it is built into the Olympus camera bodies I own.

The 12-35 can be used with or without OIS turned on with the Olympus Pen and OMD cameras. To me the in-body IS of the Olympus cameras works best. Both lenses are best suited to the Nauticam six inch dome port or the ZEN Underwater 170mm optical glass dome port with extension.

Nauticam has two such ports, one has a builtin focus/zoom gear and the other does not. They use the P1235Z/36148 zoom gear driven from the housing zoom gear and the P1235F/36042 gear driven by the zoom control on the port.

Nauticam has gears coming for the 12-40 zoom.

The new Olympus 12-40 is selling for $999.00 and the much older Panasonic 12-35 range in price from about 1350.00 to 1120.00 new depending on vender.

One of the reasons I like the Olympus 12-40 lens better is the minimum focus distance of 7.87" (20cm) v. 9.84" (25cm) for the Panasonic and magnification of 0.3X across the entire range V. 0.17-0.34X with the Panasonic. This is not an issue you will see addressed in lens reviews but can be a big upside for an underwater photographer.

I have a photo of close focus with this 12-40 in the thread on the lens in this section.

Phil Rudin

 

[TheTrickster]

Thanks Phil,

I'm mainly looking at it from a video point of view. And as the Panasonic's have the edge for that over the Olympus. Hence my looking at the OIS option - as the GHxx doesn't have IBS.

Sorry to confirm. Will the 12-35 fit/work with a PT-EPxx housing? You mention Nauticam extension ports. Which obviously don't apply I don't think?


Regards

Rich.

 

[PHIL RUDIN]

Not a really good match without the larger dome, however I never tried it myself with a 100mm dome.