Fisheye lens for Lumix and Olympus cameras

In this video I show you how to use the Olympus 9mm Fisheye lens, some sample photos, and my opinion of it.

This fisheye lens works on Lumix and Olympus M4/3 mirrorless cameras.

• This lens is a body cap lens. A body cap lens is not connected to the electronics of the camera.
• This all-glass fisheye lens is manual focus, and has a fixed f/stop of f/8.0. At f/8.0 you’re better off using this outdoors, on a bright day.
• The 9mm focal length is equivalent to 18mm field of view on the Lumix or Olympus mirrorless cameras
• It can focus from 20cm – 7.9 inches to infinity.

If you know anything about depth of field, you’ll know that a wide angle lens has very deep depth of field, so everything is in focus all the time. That makes this lens very easy to use. In general I keep the focus set right in the middle here…. show the middle. Unless working with close up subjects that are less than a foot away from the camera.

I do have a 7-14mm wide angle lens that I use 90% of the time when shooting skateboarding with my Lumix G9.

But, I like to use small cameras too. My current one is the Lumix GM5, but the Lumix GX85 and Lumix GX9 are really small too. It’s the type of camera I take on holidays, or to keep on hand at the skatepark in case I do a new trick and I need my friends to film or take photos of me.

A small camera is unobtrusive. It’s not flashy and doesn’t attract attention of security guards or thieves.

The GM5 is a great all around carry-with-you camera. And much better than your average cell phone. I don’t know about you, but when I have a cell phone, it’s like the pictures don’t matter. When I have a real camera, I take more care when shooting and I take pictures that do matter.

Here’s how I use this 9mm fisheye lens with my Lumix GM5:

• First step is to put the camera body in “shoot without lens” setting.
• Because the f/stop is fixed at f/8 I use Aperture Priority mode.
• It will also work well in iA or Program mode.
• For skateboarding and outdoor action photos I typically like a fast shutter speed so that I can freeze the action. 1/1000 second or faster.
• So I use my ISO to control exposure too. If it’s sunny, 200 ISO is perfect. When the clouds rolled in I set it to 400 or 800 ISO — this is to keep the shutter speed high enough to freeze the motion
• I make sure focus peaking is enabled so that I can see what parts of the image are in focus. If you’re not familiar with focus peaking, this is what it looks like…. the blue areas of the frame are in focus. [show]
• Next, you need to set the focus.
• As I mentioned, the middle setting gives me the best results. [show]
• The great thing is that because it’s in manual focus, you don’t have to worry about your camera “hunting” to find your subject. I found I could concentrate on composition better, when not worrying about my subject moving all around the frame. When a subject is moving all around it’s hard not to try and follow it.
• This photo of Olivia, below, was purposefully set up in this symmetrical composition and I just waited for the decisive moment of peak action.

My opinion of this lens

• This is a very fun lens, especially for a small camera.
• A great extra lens to pack on a holiday and adds that extra focal length missing from the kit lens of my GM5
• The price is right! Under $100 USD
• You definitely need a lot of light to work with this lens. Outdoor use on a sunny day is recommended
• I love the dramatic effect of the fisheye distortion, but with fisheye lenses that’s the look you’re going for.
• I would never try to correct that distortion, rather I’d use it creatively.
• It’s not super sharp, but it will do. I think we are so used to super sharp imagery these days. When I think of scanning film back in the day, it never seemed that sharp, even compared to my first digital cameras and lenses.
• When focussed properly, this lens is sharp enough for me, especially at this price.
• You can buy it here on amazon.com

Notes on post processing of the images

Photo Editing Software I use:

• Adobe Lightroom CC
• Luminar 2018 for Mac

Use this link to download a trial version of Luminar 2018

Want a discount? Use the link above with my Coupon Code: imagemaven