missing a shot UW because of not having the right lens

[Ahmed Yahya]

i shoot with Nikon D7000 - on land only - and I am planning to get a housing and strobe set to start shooting underwater. my other choice would be a new mirrorless and housing set. however, one frustrating fact i became aware of is the inability to change lenses underwater. i have to get out and change lenses on the surface. that means once i put the wide angle lens I'll shoot wides all the dive and the same for macro or normal focal length.
how could you overcome that ? do you plan your shooting to use one lens every dive ? what if you saw a big animal like turtle or shark or any big fish while you were putting the macro lens ? do you simply let it go ?
i understood the wide angle wet lenses are only applicable with compact camera and couldn't be used with dslr's or mirrorless. but on the other hand, with the compact's small sensor, image quality and controls are much better with mirror less or dslr.

can you share you experience and techniques ?

 

[dimac]

it's either you choose macro or wide angle to get shots because of the dedicated system, or use a lens that can pass for some macro and some WA but not particularly great at both. some use 2 systems, but thats truly expensive and hard to wield unless you have a trusted assistant carrying the 2nd rig for you (and willing to stay with you underwater while shooting). I know several people who were using their 105s when a whale shark appeared, nothing they can do about it but just enjoy the sight... and hope another swings by when they have their FE on.

 

[fisheater]

You CAN use wet wide angle and macro lenses with mirrorless, at least with Olympus.

 

[Ahmed Yahya]

i always try to never miss a shot with my D7K setup, that's why I carry the basic gear with me (18-105, 10-20, extension tubes & SB-900)
but with UW it's frustrating with all the amazing corals and creatures and having only one lens to live with.
i guess i'll have to make the compromise and get a mirrorless and try to rig something together to use the wet lens & diopters

 

[dimac]

you can use a 14-42 and mate it with both the WA and closeup lenses. Over time, you may want to be more specific in what you want to shoot. That's what happened to me, I snapped at everything at first, then as I progressed, I leaned in to macro.

you can also bring a compact with your dslr. DSLR covers what you'll be expecting to see, and the compact would be backup just in case you see a once in a lifetime event that the DSLR rig cant handle.

Or dive frequently so those rare moments arent as rare as before

 

[PatW]

I shoot with a D7000. Any DSLR has the limitation of not having a one size fits all lens. However, you have the ability to get better images than you can with any other photo system.

Sure you will miss shots. You can not get a shot of a turtle with a 60 mm macro. That is part of the deal. You will just not be able to get all of the shots.

My choice is to go with the DSLR.

 

[weeksd]

I use the nikon 16-85mm lens in my aquatica housing with the 6 inch port. I shoot wide angle to 1:2 macro without changing lens. Its not super wide angle but i do reef scenics quite good. To shoot 1:1 macro i add a +4 diopter to shoot 1:1 macro. Works very good. Your camera is a cropped nikon sensor so the 16-85mm lens would work. The sigma 17-70 lens is another favourite which works very good also. The zoom gear in the aquatica housing works very good. When choosing a housing make sure the zoom gear is easy to use as some housings the gear is not so easy to mount on lens. To see samples of my work all the thailand and indonesia sections on my website where done with my aquatica housing.
reefscenics' Photos | SmugMug

 

[Tigerman]

I shoot with a D7000. Any DSLR has the limitation of not having a one size fits all lens. However, you have the ability to get better images than you can with any other photo system.

Sure you will miss shots. You can not get a shot of a turtle with a 60 mm macro. That is part of the deal. You will just not be able to get all of the shots.

My choice is to go with the DSLR.

Yes, you can. Its just gonna be a different type of shot..

Exif | IMG_4547 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
Not technically my best shot, but an example of what you can/need to do if you have the "wrong" lens for the job. This one was a result of my WA port leaking due to a manufacturing issue, so I had to use the macro instead...

 

[fdog]

My lovely wife, Janet, has an Olympus E-PL2 (a mirrorless 4/3rds camera) in the Olympus housing She graciously let me use it for a dive on our last trip.

I shot these two images on the same dive:

A Black-Spotted Nudibranch. This little guy was the size of a nickel.

This sponge is about the size of a wheelbarrow. Shot @ 9mm with a 9-18mm zoom lens.



So there it is, decent macro and wide angle on the same dive.



Here's how it works:

Janet has the Olympus E-PL2 in the stock Olympus housing. It is a 4/3rds system camera so there's many lens choices.

This is an amazing bargain, BTW, the camera + lens + housing retails for a measly $1200 or so.

The housing assembled




One of the things you can get is an accessory wet-lens mount:

This accepts the Olympus wet lens for macro:

The lens screws into the ring:

The ring snaps onto the front of the port, so it's easy to switch between macro and wide angle on the same dive.

The system isn't perfect; you are shooting very wide angle (9mm) behind a flat port, so there's some aberration in the corners. Still, it works quite well.


All the best, james