Why is this combo for cheaper tours disliked so much even though there is more megapixels involved as opossed to the 4500 and fc-e8 or 5000 and fc-e8.  I would think stitching 3 fisheye with the 8700 gives better higher quality than the others with fc-e8.  Any suggestions.

Maybe you have already done this, but do you have a webpage with your panoramas, so we too may take a look ?

Dave

Hi all,

I thought I'd introduce myself, my name is Wayne Casey and I've been producing VT's for about two and a half years and have my own company called TrueView UK (www.trueviewuk.co.uk) based 4 miles outside of Glasgow.

I've been following these forums for a few weeks now and I thought I'd put my two penneth in regarding the FC-E9 lens.

I initially started out using the Nikon 4300 & FC-E8 combo and was pleased with the results they produced, I upgraded to the Nikon 8700 & FC-E9 about 6 months ago and the images it produced were significantly better than the previous kit. I found the E9 lens better to work with especially when it came to lens flare reduction. The quality of the VT's also improved greatly, although, with the 8700 I did find initially that there was an increased problem with fringing, I've now overcome this problem by taking extra images (where necessary) at +- 2 stops.

I must admit that I've been quite impressed at the quality of VT's posted on this forum and I hope that you like the VT's I've produced. You can see some at www.paisley.org.uk

Cheers,

Wayne.

The FC-E9 is a giant hunk of glass....I tried one out and thought oh my god. I have to carry this think around. I disliked the size and weight of the lens. Many feel the lens offers a slightly softer image than the FC-E9. I researched this whole fc-e8 vs fc-e9 lens thing and found some technical stuff about the design of the lens and why they had to redesign it to fit the newer cameras. It comes down to "diopter" size and the different sizes of the new ccd's in the newer coolpix cameras in the stock lens on them. End result is there was no way to adapt the fc-e8 lens to the new stock lenses in the new coolpix cameras. The redesign of the FC-E9 lens included an additional element and a much larger diopter size. I believe Nikon could have made the FC-E9 lens better than the FC-E8 but due to the needed dipoter size it would require the front glass element to be extremly large. Even larger than it is now. And this would have made a monster of a lens that no one would want. Not to mention a special monster rotator to use it.

I have a coolpix 5000 which is a 5mp camera. I use the fc-e8. Now, considering the delivery size of the pano, say at 400x350, 5mp is quite enough to create a very good quality pano. The problem is that if you want to display larger than that you run into quality problems.

The coolpix 5000 is the last model made that will fit to the FC-E8. This camera is out of production and hard to find. Things are moving along in technology and cameras are getting  bigger megapixels every month. So the FC-E8 is really for those who still have one.

If I were getting into panoramic photography now I would recommend you get a DSLR and the sigma 8mm. You can get this set up for about the same cost as a new coolpix/fc-e9 setup.

Some examples would be a Nikon D70 or the even cheaper and newer Nikon D50. Or the Cannon 350d.

You can shoot 4 with no top or bottom and your images will WAYYYYYYYYY better than any FC-e9 set up.

The future is with DSLR. The non DSLR cameras are becoming something for "do it yourself" people. If you want to make any money get a DSLR set up.

General Lee