Nauticam WACP tech notes & observations

Kevin Palmer · Issue 106, Jan/Feb 2019 · pp. 53–57

Products mentioned: Nauticam WACP, Nauticam NA-D850 housing, Tokina 10-17mm, Canon 11-24mm, Nikon 28-70mm f3.5-4.5, Nikonos 15mm, Nikonos RS 13mm, 16-35mm zoom

Since underwater photography went digital so many years ago, there has been a love/hate relationship with wide angle rectilinear lenses behind domes – particularly with full frame cameras. A lot of the WA lenses from the film days just did not perform that well behind a dome port with digital sensors. Edges and corners were mushy and distorted and largely unusable unless in blue water. People resorted to diopters to reduce this effect (many manufactures of housings still frequently recommend these today), but diopters impart pin cushion distortion, reduce the angle of coverage and generally add a piece of glass that lessens optimal quality. The other solution seemed to be ever increasing diameters of dome ports to try and replicate “in air” performance. The “super-dome” craze lead to people using (or at least claiming to use) domes of 12” diameter and larger. This helped image quality so…