New a6xxx housing from Meikon

[CanadaDan]

Thanks Dan, I do have a tray which has a dry weight of 600g, but I'm currently not planning to add anything else. I'll be mainly filming shipwrecks in fairly poor visibility and any camera-attached light will just illuminate particles right in front of the camera. My dive buddy will be handling the video light and I'm hoping that the a6300 will be able to capture any natural light there is.

I would have 1 & 2 lb weights ready to go then. I drilled out the middle of the lead to accommodate a 1/4-20 stainless steel machine bolt that I use to bolt the lead to the bottom of the tray. I also made some smaller 100g squares out of lead bar stock to add to the tray for exact buoyancy trimming.

 

[Barmaglot]

FYI, Meikon is currently running a father's day sale, 10% off everything on meikon.com.hk, valid to June 10th, input code 'otosan' at checkout. In recent days, they've added a neoprene cover for the salted line housing, sized to fit the wide flat port, and a ring that replaces the hood on dome ports to reduce drag in the water.

 

[Schwob]

As far as you (that have the housing) can tell, is this housing (the Meikon / Seafrogs one for 6000/6300/6500) set up to deal with manual lenses and a way to let one drive the focus as well as the aperture ring ... or is it pretty much AF lenses "only"?

If it can do manual lenses, is there a way to determine which port fits which lens best? e.g.for a Samyang / Rokinon 12mm

 

[Barmaglot]

I don't have it (yet - planning to get one before next liveaboard trip, which is tentatively planned for this September), only the previous-gen one (with fixed port), but I'm quite certain that it's not a good fit for use with manual lenses other than fisheyes. The zoom knob is located on the housing rather than ports, and they have only two zoom rings - one for 16-50mm and one for 10-18mm. You can fit a Samyang 8mm f/3.5 manual fisheye lens into the currently-available dome port, but you have to preset the focus and aperture before sealing the housing. A compact dome port to fit smaller fisheye lenses like 7Artisans 7.5mm f/2.8 and Samyang 8mm f/2.8 is supposed to come out next week, but I wouldn't expect focus controls on that one either. With fisheye lenses, this can work because they naturally have such a great depth of field, but with rectilinear ultrawides like the Rokinon 12mm, it won't fly. Also, Meikon doesn't offer any extension rings for their ports, which further limits lens compatibility. As for manual aperture - forget it, none of Meikon's ports have an additional knob/gear to operate it, all of them rely on camera body controls operating the aperture via electronics.

What are you trying to accomplish by using Rokinon 12mm or another manual lens anyway? If it's saving money over Sony 10-18mm then, well, you can take the Rokinon underwater, but it will take a much more expensive housing, which would defeat the whole purpose of the exercise, and besides, taking photographs underwater is challenging enough with good autofocus - bringing manual focus into the picture will only increase the challenge, for no clear benefit.

 

[Schwob]

What I am trying to accomplish first is to learn what kind of housing with what kind of options this is... and what it is not.
That's all for the moment and you helped with that quite a bit. Thanks.

Then I have to decide if I invest more money into our outdated APSC based gear... well the Nex5N and 3N we have (none with UW housing) are a bit long in the tooth and a newer camera would be nice...
(I "only have a TG4 + housing + light and a rather old gopro for UW right now)

And if I go the newer camera route I need to find an UW housing that I either can use lenses I have with (e.g. the 7.5mm and 12mm Rokinons) or am willing to invest more...

By time I buy e.g. a 10-18 lens and a camera and maybe an e-macro (as opposed to manual adapterd on one I have) ... and a housing and ports....
I am pretty close to a whole system decision from scratch...

And by your reasoning (which makes some sense) and maybe by my reasoning too, dreaded as is, that's where I am at...

Which of course then causes me to need to work up the whole decision on APSC or full frame or micro 4/3 or possibly just a decent 1" sensor camera all over again, updated to "these days".... which I don't really want to entertain right now, but may have to eventually.

If the Meikon housing had allowed manual focus and aperture setting and had ports that worked with my lenses, I would have needed that & an a6k or 6k3 or 6k5 and not much bigger decision and the system coudd & would grow as it will when I learn how I like to use it.... as is, I fear I need to at least also consider the bigger decision....That's it...(in terms of what I am trying to work out) no particular hurry or time pressure...

In other words, "still fishing"...

 

[Barmaglot]

Basically, Meikon is targeting a few specific use cases:

• Sony 16-50mm with or without wet lenses, optionally behind dome
  
• Sony 10-18mm with flat or dome port
• Sigma 16mm f/1.4 with dome
• Sony 30mm macro
• Sony 90mm macro

Note that manual focus is possible only with the Sony 16-50mm, everything else is AF-only. Nauticam targets a great deal more use cases, but at an order of magnitude higher price - and even they don't bother targeting manual lenses, besides the old water-contact Nikkors. A Meikon small dome for fisheye lenses is supposed to come out next week, and it'll likely work with your 7.5mm Rokinon, but as I mentioned, it's very unlikely to offer any lens controls at all. It may be possible to DIY a lens gear to control either focus or aperture, but definitely not both.

Also, Meikon reps have mentioned that they're working on an A7III housing, currently in prototype stage - it may come out in September, though if past promises are any indication, this is likely to slip by 3-6 months.

Edit: As far as costs for a new system go, assuming you're willing to buy used - An A6300 body is about $700, 10-18mm is ~$500-600, 90mm macro is ~$700-800, Meikon housing with ports is currently $550, tray with a pair of arms and four clamps is $140, pair of ST-100 strobes is $510 - total about $3200; add a few hundred more for memory cards, batteries, bags, protective covers, spare o-rings, etc.

 

[krvjzz]

Thanks Dan, I do have a tray which has a dry weight of 600g, but I'm currently not planning to add anything else. I'll be mainly filming shipwrecks in fairly poor visibility and any camera-attached light will just illuminate particles right in front of the camera. My dive buddy will be handling the video light and I'm hoping that the a6300 will be able to capture any natural light there is.

I have ~600g of packed lead shot in a rubber tube attached to the edge of the dry dome to correct it's extrem forward-lift (in addition to a 525g tray, using the sel1018, no flashes or lights) It's still a bit positive in salty water. It's not a pleasant thing to do duckdives while freediving with
Planning to get the vacuum system when it's released..

 

[West Indiaman]

I have ~600g of packed lead shot in a rubber tube attached to the edge of the dry dome to correct it's extrem forward-lift (in addition to a 525g tray, using the sel1018, no flashes or lights) It's still a bit positive in salty water. It's not a pleasant thing to do duckdives while freediving with
Planning to get the vacuum system when it's released..

I zip tied a 0.75 kg vinyl coated bumper plate to the forward edge of the tray and it's now slightly negative in fresh water. Your system sounds better though, as mine still has some forward lift.

 

[Barmaglot]

The new macro port they promised is out, and... it's not at all what I expected. Instead of a 16-50mm port with 67mm threading, it's the same KitDive port for 90mm, except with 67mm threading so that it doesn't need a flip diopter holder anymore, if you're that far into super-macro land. It also lists Sony 50mm FE macro as compatible, although with that lens extending to focus, I have no idea how well it will behave inside a port.

I think I'll finally order the dome bundle, and get the macro port after I manage to find a good deal on a used 90mm macro lens.

 

[LeeParrish]

I think on the meikon site they must have listed the wrong port, or at least not the same one that they put on the seafrogs site. The seafrogs site shows this: Macro port for A6xxx Salted Line with 67mm thread available in a couple weeks, which makes much more sense and would be a lot closer to what they announced.