The Nauticam EMWL for “Bugeye” Pictures

The writer wish to thank Nauticam for supplying their NA-Z9 housing for the Nikon Z9 and the 160° goal lens for the Extended Macro Wide Lens (EMWL), and Nikon Australia for offering the Z9 mirrorless camera used on this assessment.

Weedy seadragon (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 160° goal lens, f/20, 1/25s, ISO 800, 25% crop)

Do you like macro or Slot Online wide-angle images? My vote goes to shut focus extensive angle (CFWA), a way that produces participating, color-rich photos the place the primary topic seems giant and detailed. These are elements for gorgeous images, which look nice on journal covers and frequently place in competitions.

As a CFWA shooter, you at all times wish to get nearer to your topic, as a result of you understand it will amplify all of the aforementioned benefits of that approach. For years, the limiting issue was the scale of your dome port, with the very best CFWA setups counting on 100mm mini-domes (round 4 inches in diameter). Then, alongside got here the Nauticam Extended Macro Wide Lens, or EMWL, a brand new means of pushing by means of the boundaries of CFWA, with a set of “bugeye” moist lenses.

On this article, I’ll briefly introduce the assorted parts that make up the EMWL, earlier than concentrating on the 2 entrance components that I’ve used extensively on account of their increased bugeye potential—the 160° objective lens and the 100° objective lens. I’ll have a look at how these goal lenses differ, the number of photos you may create with them, and the restrictions of the EMWL system as a complete when used with each DSLR and mirrorless cameras.

A “bugeye” picture of a sabertooth blenny, guarding its eggs in a discarded bottle (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/22, 1/250s, ISO 640, 15% crop)

So What Is a Bugeye Lens?

A bugeye lens permits your digicam to see the world from the attitude of a tiny creature—a bug, an anemonefish, a smurf—by combining a small entrance ingredient, a large area of view, and shut focusing capabilities. In a nutshell, this can be a device for excessive CFWA.

For land images, the Laowa 24mm “probe lens” might be probably the most well-known bugeye possibility. That is the lens behind Karine Aigner’s now-famous bee mating ball picture, which gained not solely the 2022 Wildlife Photographer of the 12 months contest, but in addition the Massive Image 2022 grand prize.

Within the underwater realm, Inon has been providing bugeye lenses for greater than a decade, however these have remained area of interest, specialist instruments. I haven’t used these myself, however I’ve heard that picture high quality and focusing challenges have gotten in the best way of a broader adoption.

Saddleback anemonefish, buzzing round their host anemone. That is most likely how you’ll see the scene when you had been their dimension (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/80s, ISO 640, crop to 16/9 ratio)

In the event you had been a kind of small anemonefish, that is how massive and intimidating this two-inch-long flamboyant cuttlefish would seem (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/250s, ISO 640, 10% crop)

The Nauticam EMWL System

When absolutely assembled, the EMWL system attaches in entrance of a flat port, utilizing a bayonet mount (through an adapter on the port’s 67mm thread). Behind the port sits your macro lens, whose slim area of view might be transformed right into a a lot wider one by the EMWL.

The EMWL system is made up of three components:

• • the focusing unit

 

• • the relay lens

 

• • the target lens

 

They’re all “moist optics” and join to 1 one other through bayonet mounts, so you may assemble/disassemble them within the water.

The EMWL, seen from the critters’ perspective. The small goal lens is much less intimidating than a whole housing, making the strategy simpler

The main focus unit is the bottom ingredient that mounts onto the flat port. Nauticam has three variations of this focus unit overlaying Canon RF- and EF-mounts, Nikon F- and Z-mounts, Sony E-mount, Panasonic L-mount, Fujifilm G-mount, and the Micro 4 Thirds mount. Discuss with the Nauticam port chart to seek out out which one is suited to the macro lens that you simply intend on utilizing.

The relay lens is a 150mm (6in) tube, which is put in between the main focus unit and the entrance lens. Its function is simply to invert the picture: With out it, the scene will seem upside-down on a DSLR viewfinder. If you’re a mirrorless consumer, you may have the ability to invert the show in your digicam menus, which provides you the choice of doing with out this part.

Lastly, there are 4 goal lenses to select from, providing totally different fields of view, focus distances and entrance ingredient diameters. My curiosity is creating probably the most excessive CFWA impact, so I’m going to deal with the entrance optics which I really feel serve that function finest: the 100° and 160° goal lenses.

Juvenile sharks under a desk coral. The relay lens makes the EMWL longer, which is helpful for squeezing into tight areas the place a housing and a mini-dome can not match (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/14, 1/80s, ISO 640, 30% crop to 16/9 ratio)

There are two explanation why the 100° and 160° goal lenses are going to provide probably the most excessive bugeye impact: (i) They each focus proper on the entrance glass, and (ii) their entrance glass could be very small—respectively, 21mm and 20mm in diameter (about 0.8in). See the 100° lens subsequent to my son’s toy dinosaur? The toy is simply 70mm tall (2.75in), however the entrance optic is even smaller, making the dinosaur look big.

The 100° goal lens subsequent to a 7cm (2.75in) tall toy

Earlier than the EMWL appeared, my favourite CFWA setup was the Tokina 10–17mm fisheye zoom, producing diagonal fields of views from 100° to 180°, behind a Zen 100mm (4in) mini-dome port. The diameter of that dome is about 5 instances bigger than that of the 100° or 160° goal lens. To place it one other means, with the EMWL, I can produce photos that I might take with my Tokina/Zen setup if I used to be in a position to shrink the entire housing 5 instances—whereas retaining my strobes at their regular dimension. Fairly cool, eh?

This bushy frogfish was about 15cm (6in), but it surely seems 5 instances bigger when shot with the EMWL, in comparison with a CFWA fisheye setup (Nikon Z9, Nikon Z 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL 160°, f/20, 1/200s, ISO 640)

Picture High quality

Contemplating the small dimension of the entrance ingredient of the EMWL and the acute enlargement of the sector of view, I used to be uncertain what to anticipate by way of picture high quality. Within the following, I’ll element my observations based mostly on greater than 70 hours of diving utilizing the EMWL with my Nikon D810 DSLR, and round 17 hours with the Nikon Z9 mirrorless digicam. Additionally, I’ve owned the 100° goal lens for for much longer, which is why there are extra photos shot with the 100° somewhat than 160° on this assessment.

Mild Transmission and Digital Noise

The very first thing I seen is how a lot mild the entire system cuts down. There are a number of lenses concerned within the EMWL, and as soon as I hooked up it onto the flat port, my DSLR viewfinder appeared noticeably darker. With the Z9, this wasn’t noticeable, because the digital viewfinder compensates by brightening the show.

After all, this impacts ambient mild and strobe mild in the identical means, so I handled this by working at increased ISO values. Below vibrant daylight, I sometimes shot at ISO 400 or 500, and underneath darker circumstances, I discovered ISO 640 to 800 to be mandatory.

Utilizing a full-frame digicam is certainly a bonus right here, as digital noise stays low at these reasonable ISO values. With my nine-year-old 36MP D810, I used to be completely satisfied utilizing the EMWL at ISO 800. With the Z9’s extra fashionable sensor, I didn’t suppose twice about working at ISO 1000 and even ISO 1250 when steady lights had been concerned.

A typical octopus exhibiting off in a sponge backyard. I needed to bump up the ISO to seize the small quantity of ambient mild that remained at nightfall (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 160° goal lens, f/16, 1/25s, ISO 1000, 10% crop)

A black frogfish on the sand is kind of a difficult topic by way of dynamic vary for any digicam sensor. At ISO 640 on my venerable D810, I used to be nonetheless in a position to get well shadows and many of the highlights (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 160° goal lens, f/16, 1/250s, ISO 640, 10% crop)

Coloration

Apparently, the EMWL provides photos a green-yellow coloration solid. That is simply mounted in post-processing with a white stability adjustment, however I’ll state the apparent: To get the very best picture high quality out of the EMWL, it’s good to shoot in RAW format. I seen the Z9’s auto white stability handles that coloration solid higher than the D810, however nonetheless, it deserves a last contact in enhancing software program.

When I’m house and I’ve completed importing the RAW recordsdata into Adobe Lightroom, I take a white stability measurement, and apply it to all of the images from that final dive. Then I sit again, chill out, and watch the pictures come to life, with vibrant and contrasty colours revealing themselves. Total, I’m very happy with the colours I can get out of the EMWL, particularly when working near the topic—which is what the lens is supposed for.

Leafy seadragon in Fast Bay, South Australia. The colours look pretty much as good as one would anticipate from a fisheye lens (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/16, 1/250s, ISO 400)

Lens Flare

After dozens of dives with the 100° goal lens, I need to say it’s fairly vulnerable to flare. Below daylight circumstances, be it underneath a jetty or within the open, whether or not or not the solar is within the body, I skilled flare as a rule.

To resolve this, I usually hooked up my lens hood over the entrance ingredient, however this restricted how shut I might get to the topic by an inch or so. In lots of circumstances, this didn’t restrict my photographic alternatives, besides when I discovered a small topic that tolerated the lens up shut. In such circumstances, to maximise the bugeye impact, I’d take off the hood and flare would return. In these situations, I resolved the problem by chopping off the ambient mild utterly: I elevated the shutter pace till the background was black, which additionally masked the flare. This is the reason my most excessive CFWA pictures taken with the 100° goal lens are likely to have a black background.

In contrast, with the 160° goal lens, I didn’t discover any flare, regardless of utilizing it for round 14 hours. I would want to dive that lens longer to confidently say that it by no means displays flare, however I already developed the behavior of utilizing that lens with out a hood.

To get the magnification I needed with this small coconut octopus, I needed to take off the lens hood, which resulted in seen flare (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/16, 1/20s, ISO 640)

Sharpness

I’ve to admit that I’m not a lot of a pixel peeper, so I haven’t photographed pool partitions to resolve if I favored the EMWL’s capacity to resolve particulars. My qualitative opinion is that it’s wonderful: When working at an in depth focus distance (lower than a foot or 30cm), which is what this technique is optimized for, I discovered the extent of element nearer to my macro lens than to my fisheye lens.

Once more, it’s a qualitative assertion, but it surely’s value mentioning that a few of my EMWL photos have gained worldwide awards, have been revealed in magazines, and look good when printed giant, so for me, they tick all the precise bins with regard to picture high quality. This is applicable additionally after cropping: Not all critters allow you to get shut sufficient to fill the body, and I’ve cropped a lot of my 36MP D810 recordsdata by as a lot as 33%, to 24MP. I’m very happy with the extent of element captured even with such substantial cropping.

The uncommon noticed handfish is tough to strategy, and I needed to crop this shot to fill the body. Nonetheless, the element within the resultant 27MP picture is spectacular (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/200s, ISO 640, 25% crop)

The sharpness of that crocodilefish’s eye feels just about “macro grade” to me (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/250s, ISO 640)

Depth of Subject

When the topic is a foot (30cm) or additional away from the entrance ingredient, I discovered that f/11 to f/14 gave me enough depth of area on both of the full-frame cameras I used. As I get nearer to the topic, I sometimes labored between f/18 and f/22 when chasing probably the most excessive bugeye results.

A male weedy seadragon, whose lengthy snout begs for a significantly stopped-down aperture! (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/20, 1/250s, ISO 500, 5% crop)

A caramel nudibranch almost touching the lens (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/25, 1/250s, ISO 640, 10% crop)

At increased magnification ratios, when your topic almost touches the entrance ingredient, the depth of area actually shrinks and the background goes to be out of focus, even at stopped-down apertures. It is a key distinction with fisheye-based CFWA: On the highest magnification ratio, with the EMWL, you merely can not get a pointy background.

With this type of magnification—the red-fingered anglerfish was about 2in (5cm) tall—the dive mannequin goes to be out of focus (Nikon Z9, Nikon Z 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL 160°, f/16, 1/80s, ISO 640, 10% crop)

Having a pointy dive mannequin is feasible, however you must again off from the foreground and get the mannequin nearer (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/14, 1/60s, ISO 640, 10% crop)

Autofocus

When the EMWL was introduced, the pitch was an underwater bugeye lens with “usable” autofocus. Earlier than making an attempt the EMWL, I used to be anticipating the expertise to be just like utilizing a moist diopter for tremendous macro, that means having to make use of a powerful focus mild to assist the digicam and resorting to handbook focus regularly.

Nikon DSLR

In 2021, the day lastly got here once I took the EMWL for a primary dive, and I used to be blown away by the autofocus pace and accuracy on my Nikon D810. This was surprising: I at all times thought of my D810 to be sluggish (for a DSLR), particularly in comparison with my Nikon D500 and its cousin the D850.

The main focus is tack-sharp on the attention, regardless of this 2in (5cm) toadfish swimming into the EMWL at night time, in some way mesmerized by the pink mild (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/16, 1/200s, ISO 640)

These striped catfish had been purposefully swimming throughout the bay once I noticed them. I positioned myself on their path and will take simply a few pictures earlier than they turned away (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/250s, ISO 400, 25% crop)

The magic of physics and Nauticam’s intelligent design resulted within the overwhelming majority of my pictures being good and sharp, with the main focus precisely the place I needed it. I estimate my success fee at about 90%, and that features swimming topics, daylight capturing in lower than 15 ft visibility (with out a focus mild), and night-time capturing with a pink dive mild. With out the EMWL, my D810/105mm mixture doesn’t get wherever near that success fee!

I used to be mystified how an additional piece of glass could possibly be bettering autofocus efficiency, so I went to Nauticam for an evidence. In layman phrases, the 105mm lens focuses quicker for 2 causes. First, the EMWL “compresses” the focusing distance vary, that means the lens doesn’t need to “hunt” for focus anymore. Second, the EMWL is designed to enhance distinction underwater, which additionally helps the digicam attain focus.

A bushy frogfish swallows a fortescue at night time. When the motion hots up, I’m fairly assured that autofocus will get the job carried out (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/200s, ISO 400)

Nikon Mirrorless Digicam

Autofocus accuracy points have been reported when utilizing the EMWL on some mirrorless cameras. When utilizing the Nikon Z9 and the Z-mount 105mm lens, I’ve additionally skilled these difficulties—noticeable back-focus issues on my EMWL pictures.

With out getting too technical, mirrorless cameras autofocus in numerous methods to DSLRs, every digicam model having its personal expertise. Cameras of various manufacturers will open up the aperture to numerous ranges to assist focusing (the extra mild, the simpler the job), however this will likely lead to a bodily phenomenon referred to as “focus shift,” with the chance of manufacturing back-focused images. Once more, totally different digicam producers differ of their strategy, by way of the workarounds they use to mitigate that focus-shift drawback. These workarounds are designed for particular lens constructions, and sadly, a few of them don’t appear to carry when the optical components is modified by including the EMWL system into the equation.

The EMWL focus-shift state of affairs is understood to impression Nikon mirrorless cameras (which I might verify in my testing), whereas Canon mirrorless our bodies are primarily unaffected on the stepped-down apertures that I really helpful earlier. Present Sony and Olympus mirrorless cameras look like unaffected too, however the concern was reported with older Sony our bodies (e.g., the Sony A7R III). Luckily, when capturing video with the EMWL on the Nikon Z9, I haven’t skilled any back-focus concern—which is sensible, because the aperture stays mounted whereas recording a video.

As I’m writing these traces, Nauticam are conducting intensive testing to slim down the problem and are investigating options to reinforce the expertise on affected cameras.

Regardless of the back-focus drawback, I’ve taken some nonetheless images that I’m very proud of utilizing the Nikon Z9 and EMWL mixture, however I needed to adapt the best way I shoot the system.

Specializing in the underside jaw, versus the attention, obtained the airplane of focus the place I needed it (Nikon Z9, Nikon Z 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL 160°, f/20, 1/200s, ISO 800, 20% crop)

When autofocusing constantly (AF-C 3D), I picked a spotlight level sightly in entrance of the place I needed the main focus airplane to be (sometimes the attention). Generally, I needed to disable animal recognition, as a result of the Z9 would cheekily acknowledge the attention and attempt to deal with it. When the topic wasn’t transferring a lot, I discovered that switching to handbook focus—with focus peaking turned on—was workable, too. If you considered utilizing back-button autofocus, be aware that focus peaking will show solely while you begin overriding the main focus manually, through the lens’ focus ring.

Total, the expertise I had when capturing the EMWL with a mirrorless digicam was nearer to what I used to be anticipating initially—having to be extra fingers on with the autofocus. It’s undoubtedly workable, and the picture high quality is superb, when following the above suggestions. Compared, utilizing the EMWL on a Nikon DSLR is ridiculously straightforward (I haven’t tried with a Canon physique), and I hope Nauticam will discover a solution to increase the bar to that very same stage for all mirrorless shooters.

With focus pre-set (handbook focus), I relied on focus peaking to know when to press the shutter, because the porcupinefish was getting nearer (Nikon Z9, Nikon Z 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL 160°, f/20, 1/200s, ISO 640)

160° vs 100° Goal Lenses: Which One?

Each the 100° and 160° goal lenses are in a position to produce excessive CFWA photos which might be merely not possible to attain with a fisheye lens, with spectacular magnification ratios. Commonplace CFWA photos are simpler to provide, too, as a result of the entrance ingredient of the EMWL is much less intimating than a mini-dome and housing to many marine creatures.

The 160° goal lens has develop into my go-to EMWL lens for day dives: It’s straightforward to fill the body with a 2–4in (5–10cm) topic, and at 160 levels, it might cowl bigger topics like turtles, gropers, and sharks. Additionally, its wider area of view makes it a lot simpler to incorporate a mannequin behind your bugeye topic. Lastly, I like with the ability to work with out flare and let ambient mild brighten up my water backgrounds, even at excessive topic magnifications.

This attitude could also be achievable with a fisheye lens, however there is no such thing as a probability this fiddler ray would have tolerated my mini-dome and housing so shut (Nikon Z9, Nikon Z 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL 160°, f/14, 1/125s, ISO 640, 10% crop)

This moray eel was fairly curious and adopted my EMWL entrance ingredient, even bumping into it every so often. The quick distance wide-angle provides this portrait its “T-Rex” really feel (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/25, 1/250s, ISO 500, 15% crop)

The 100° lens was too tight to provide an attention-grabbing bugeye shot with out lacking elements of this turtle (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/16, 1/20s, ISO 1000)

Regardless of my choice for the 160°, I nonetheless carry the 100° goal lens in a pocket and can change as quickly as the topic is somewhat too skittish to attain a great magnification ratio with the 160°. Some topics are additionally too small for the broader lens: The “slim” 100° area of view provides me a extra beneficiant working distance, which additionally makes lighting somewhat simpler—although, sure, we’re speaking a one-inch (2–3cm) distinction!

For night time dives, I choose the 100° goal lens, as a result of I’m not going so as to add a mannequin within the body, I do know that flare gained’t be an issue, and will probably be simpler to fill the body with smaller topics. I’ll take the 160° lens in a pocket in case an even bigger animal exhibits up.

This frogfish was about 1.5in (4cm) lengthy, and I think it might not have tolerated the 160° goal lens shut sufficient to permit me to fill the body (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/250s, ISO 640)

Last Ideas

The EMWL system exceeded my expectations by way of picture high quality and ease of use. I now at all times have the EMWL clipped onto a D-ring at any time when I dive with my 105mm macro lens. To place it one other means, once I go for a CFWA dive, I have a tendency to select the EMWL as a substitute of my fisheye lens, understanding I’m able to change to macro if the necessity arises. This provides me an excessive amount of flexibility and leads to more-productive dives.

A basic super-macro topic: an emperor shrimp sitting on a donut nudibranch (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam SMC-1, f/18, 1/250s, ISO 800, 15% crop)

The EMWL gives a special perspective on the very same topic, telling a narrative in regards to the surroundings it lives in (Nikon D810, Nikon AF-S 105mm f/2.8, Nauticam EMWL with 100° goal lens, f/18, 1/250s, ISO 800, 15% crop)