Go Shopping Cart Site Map User Panel and Admin English Home

Home > Easypano Forum    Easypano Forum has been upgraded.

Easypano Forum


Welcome Guest Register Login Search The Forum Display List of Forum Members
 All Forums
  Panoweaver
       Forum Search Results
 
Subject Topic: Best lens and head for D70 360 panos?? Post Reply Post New Topic
Message posted by rculwell2 on November-17-2004 at 4:59am
View rculwell2's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by rculwell2 Search   Quote rculwell2 Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
rculwell2
Standard Member
Standard Member
United States
November-17-2004
1 Posts
I have a D70 that I would like to use to make some panoramic (QTVR) 360 images with. A couple of questions...

What is the best quality yet somewhat affordable lens for me to buy?
What rotator head is best for the recommended lens with a D70?

I am doing this as a hobby. NOT for a business. Although I would like nice full screen quality images, I dont have $1000's to spend on equipment.

Your recommendations are appreciated! Thanks!

Message posted by jeantet on November-17-2004 at 12:16pm
View jeantet's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by jeantet Search   Visit jeantet's Homepage www   Quote jeantet Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
jeantet
Avatar
Standard Member
Standard Member
France
March-29-2003
59 Posts
I too have a D70; I have the $500 Sigma fisheye which, for the time being, does not allow me to make spherical images: hopefully the next version of Panoweaver (due in the spring) will remedy that shortcoming. It is reported that Panoweaver 4 will allow four photos around the axis plus one apex and one nadir image to be combined automatically. I have a pricey Kaidan rotator which allows me to use pretty much any lens, so that this will probably be a good solution for me. In the meantime I'm using my Coolpix 5000 and FC-E8 with an Agnos mRotator; it's very convenient and relatively small and portable, but the quality is not good enough for full screen images.

For someone on a limited budget (who isn't !), apparently there is a solution from Agnos which allows you to use your D70 with a Nikon 24mm lens in conjunction with the FC-E9 fisheye adapter and one of the mRotator heads... I've seen somewhere that other wide-angle lenses may be used but I can't remember where I saw that... so you'll have to do some research on our own. Be sure to look through all the messages of the past few months in this forum, they will probably help you to make the right choice for you.

-------------
Robert Jeantet
www.sav.org
www.alpage.net
www.spherivue.com
www.webalpa.net/spheres
etc...

Message posted by eagle on November-17-2004 at 10:25pm
View eagle's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by eagle Search   Quote eagle Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
eagle
Platinum Member
Platinum Member

April-14-2004
382 Posts
Hi guys,

I too have a D70 with the lens kit. I use it primarily for taking regular stills. I have a dedicated Nikon 4300 and gear for pano shots.

What zoom lens do you recommend for the D70?

r,
eagle

Message posted by knotty on November-19-2004 at 11:25pm
View knotty's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by knotty Search   Visit knotty's Homepage www   Quote knotty Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
knotty
Standard Member
Standard Member
United Kingdom
November-10-2004
8 Posts

These are the lenses and converters I would consider for spherical QTVR production on a D70, in order of price.

Peleng 8mm

  • Pros: Cheap, Sharp
  • Cons: Manual focus, Have to import, some lens flare issues, vignetting, cropped slightly

Nikon FC E9 Fisheye Converter

  • Pros: Non cropped full circular image on D70 (less photos required, big advantage)
  • Cons: Needs adapter. Not as good optically as 'proper' lens, vignetting

Sigma 8mm

  • Pros: Fully Auto, Feels more expensive than the Peleng (and is), lack of lens flare
  • Cons: maybe not quite as sharp as the Peleng, vignetting

Nikon 8mm

  • Pros: Very sharp, low disortion
  • Cons: Expensive, rare

Coastal Optical 4.88mm

  • Pros: Non cropped full circular image on D70 (less photos required, big advantage) , sharp, low distortion, low light falloff, lack of flare
  • Cons: Expensive, rare

I used a Peleng 8mm till very recently with no problems and was very satisfied with it's performance given the price(?100 on ebay brand new). I couldn't use PanoWeaver with this lens so I had to use panorama tools. In the new version of panoweaver (4.0) apparantly this is going to change. This is scheduled for release in March 2005.

I upgraded to a Coastal Optical digital fisheye lens after finding one on ebay and couldn't be happier. This lens creates a full circular fisheye image on my 1.5x multiplier D70 which allows me to use panoweaver with either 2 or 3 shots to create a full spherical panorama. This lens is very expensive to buy new, but you might get lucky, like I did.

 

Cheers, John

 


Message posted by 360texas on November-20-2004 at 12:57am
View 360texas's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by 360texas Search   Visit 360texas's Homepage www   Quote 360texas Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
360texas
Avatar
Forum Moderator
Forum Moderator
United States
June-12-2002
2240 Posts

Hi John,  Thank you for this information.  It is useful.

Would you please annotate your post to include if the lens if a FULL frame (measured 180° diagonal) or FULL circular flavor information.

I think the D70 has a 1.56 crop factor when determining the 35mm equivalant focal length.

Dave



-------------
/s/
Dave
Forum Moderator for
EasyPano - Panoweaver
Pano2VR


Visit 360texas.com

Message posted by knotty on November-20-2004 at 1:26am
View knotty's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by knotty Search   Visit knotty's Homepage www   Quote knotty Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
knotty
Standard Member
Standard Member
United Kingdom
November-10-2004
8 Posts

Hi Dave,

Before I bought the lens I asked this same question to Coastal Optical to make sure my assumptions were correct and I wasn't wasting my money!

<Email Quote>

I have a Nikon D70 and am considering purchasing your Coastal Optical
Digital SLR fisheye lens.
Is this suitable and are there any issues regarding compatibility?
Also, does this produce a full circular fisheye image on this camera, or
is it cropped ?
Many thanks in advance
John Knott

</Email Quote>

and their response:

<Email Quote>

John,
The lens was designed for the Nikon digital format; there are no
compatibility issues.
It produces a circular image that is completely contained by the digital
chip (no cropping).
Sincerely,
-xxx

</Email Quote>


I received my lens today and can confirm that it produces full circular images with a 185° FOV.

IPIX also sell this lens as part of a high end digital SLR kit, but god knows the cost.

Here are some image samples somebody has posted using a Canon 300D which has an even higher multiplier than the D70 if I recall correctly.

http://www.virtual-scapes.com/Coastal%20Optical%20Sample%20Images.htm

If anyone is really interested I will post an image straight out of a D70 at some point.

Cheers, John

 


Message posted by 360texas on November-20-2004 at 5:33am
View 360texas's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by 360texas Search   Visit 360texas's Homepage www   Quote 360texas Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
360texas
Avatar
Forum Moderator
Forum Moderator
United States
June-12-2002
2240 Posts

ok.. I looked at this one

http://www.virtual-scapes.com/images/CRW_0257_RT8.jpg

See the blue ring 'light fall off' area typical of full circle fisheye's similar to the Nikkor FC-E8 and FC-E9 lens.  Guess that light fall off can not be helped.

I suspect the other lenses in your list are 180° full frame lenses unless you specifically called them out as 'circular'.

Dave

 



-------------
/s/
Dave
Forum Moderator for
EasyPano - Panoweaver
Pano2VR


Visit 360texas.com

Message posted by knotty on November-20-2004 at 7:29am
View knotty's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by knotty Search   Visit knotty's Homepage www   Quote knotty Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
knotty
Standard Member
Standard Member
United Kingdom
November-10-2004
8 Posts

Dave

Sorry, I misunderstood you.

All of the lenses are circular fisheyes. All of them on a regular 35mm camera would produce a full circular image. Due to the crop factors of most digital SLRs the Sigma, Peleng, and Nikon produce circular images with the tops and bottoms cropped (in landscape mode). The Coastal Optical and Nikon FC E9 converter produce full circular images despite the crop factor.

What I would class as a full frame fisheye is the Nikon 10.5mm for example with which the image covers the entire sensor but only provides 180° field of view across the diagonal, on a D70. There are other full frame fisheyes such as the sigma 15mm and the nikon 16mm but these only provide the full 180° on a camera without a multiplier factor.

And yeah,  you're right. There is a blue ring around the image. But I believe the CO lens does offer pretty uniform illumination round the edges, up until the last few degrees.

There is an interesting article here comparing Nikon, Sigma, and Peleng and CO fisheyes - no FC E9 unfortunately -  if you have any time to kill.

Cheers,  John


Message posted by Rolf on November-21-2004 at 9:01pm
View Rolf's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by Rolf Search   Visit Rolf's Homepage www   Quote Rolf Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
Rolf
Standard Member
Standard Member
Switzerland
June-27-2004
5 Posts
I use my D70 with the 18-70mm-lens for the most photos.

For the panos I started with the 18 mm, not bad but no cubic-panos.

Now I am happy to bought the Nikkor 10,5, which is specially built for use with digital SLR.
The photos are sharp and like a fisheye with a lot of distortion, but I can stich the panos without problems.

If you want I'll send you some samples.

happy panographing


www.sirflor.ch

-------------
Rolf

Greetings from the Swiss-Alps

Message posted by 360texas on November-21-2004 at 10:12pm
View 360texas's Profile Profile   Search for other posts by 360texas Search   Visit 360texas's Homepage www   Quote 360texas Quote   Send Private Message Send Msg  
360texas
Avatar
Forum Moderator
Forum Moderator
United States
June-12-2002
2240 Posts

Hi Rolf,

The D70 and Nikkor 10.5 combination. 

"The photos are sharp and like a fisheye with a lot of distortion, but I can stich the panos without problems."

How many images around?  Do you take sky and ground (zenith and nadir) images?  And what software do you stitch with ?

Its ok to mention other software here in the forum.

 

Dave



-------------
/s/
Dave
Forum Moderator for
EasyPano - Panoweaver
Pano2VR


Visit 360texas.com

If you wish to post a reply to this thread you must first Login
If you are not already registered you must first register

Forum Jump Page of 2 Post Reply Post New Topic
Printer Friendly Version Printable version

Powered by: - Web Wiz Guide Discussion Forums