Squadron in Fisheye, The National WWII Museum – New Orleans, Louisiana
I’m glad I remembered to stuff the tiny Olympus Fisheye lens in the top netting of my camera bag. It’s a toy lens, really. Optically, my lowest quality. But, boy, is it fun for the right applications and at about $100, it’s hard to go wrong. I slid it out when shooting at the The US Freedom Pavilion at The National WWII Museum, like a secret unexpected weapon of image capture.
As you may recall from my post a couple of days ago, even with my Olympus 9-18mm wide-angle, I struggled to capture the entire scene. And while this fisheye is also a 18mm equivalent, it has a larger, and characteristically distorted super wide-angle view. I think it’s perfect for these kinds of fun shots, as long as you don’t expect perfection.
Olympus does have a optically fine, Pro Fisheye. A 16mm equivalent with a bright f1.8, but I’m not up for spending $1000 for the privilege. Fisheyes are fun but not that fun. I’ll take the “crappy” $100 version, which fits just about anywhere. It truly is body cap sized, albeit a slightly fat cap.
Its other big limitation, it’s a fixed f8 aperture. But as I discovered at a bar at night, it’s surprisingly usable thanks the terrific in-body image stabilization of the new Olympus cameras.
This is my last post from The National WWII Museum. I hope you got a good feel of the place. Excellent for its history and photography, as I discovered. Highly recommended.
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I have the Rokinon 7.5mm fisheye, which does a good job at capturing especially wide shots, only costs a few hundred dollars, but distorts quite a bit on the edges at the widest setting.
I guess it’s hard to have it all!
I have the Rokinon 7.5mm fisheye, which does a good job at capturing especially wide shots, only costs a few hundred dollars, but distorts quite a bit on the edges at the widest setting.
I guess it’s hard to have it all!
Peter, thank you for your suggestion. At less than $250, it looks like another excellent way to play with a fisheye without spending big bucks.
I have and use the 9 mm body cap fish eye. It is not that crap actually, except for the extreme corners of the frame. When needed I also defish the shot using a free software called undistort (hugin also works, but requires much more work). Nice shots, thanks for sharing!
Thanks Adrea, for your visit and comments. For its price, it is surely a winner. I also like that it is so small, that I can carry it around, anywhere.
I also have the 9mm body cap and used it quite a lot a couple of years ago. I liked the concept so much I bought the Rokinon 7.5mm and now consider it an essential lens in my kit. It is VERY sharp and can be convincingly defished with Imadio’s Fisheye Hemi.
I wish Olympus would create the same semi-fisheye as the body cap but with higher quality and variable aperture starting at F4. Sometimes the excellent Rokinon is a little too “fishy” and extreme.
Nice to hear your take, Stephen. Another vote for the Rokinon 7.5mm, makes it tempting indeed.
I love shooting in aircraft museums, especially from above the planes. Great work. I have one of those lenses too and I think I used it once, when I first got it. otherwise, I tend to forget I own it!
It’s easy to forget, but the fisheye body cap is so small, it’s almost worth keeping it in the bag all the time.
It just makes for fun photography for the right occasions.
Your shots always ‘pop’ with good use of light & great color.
Thank you, Randy.