FanTasea housings

[peteroadie]

I am about to become the proud owner of an Olympus E-330 and have a couple of choices for housings but sticking out from the crowd is the offering from FanTasea, :eek: click this link for details: -

http://www.fantasea.com/product_details.asp?id=225

Now it does not take Einstein to work out that a 90m rating coupled with that price and a years flood insurance is not the accepted norm.

So is it any good?

Do you have one or another FanTasea product?

Please before I leap into the abyss let me know I am doing right.

[Ben Panter]

Hi Pete,

I've looked at them for my D70 - but wasn't sure regarding the quality. They had something a bit strange with some of the controls quadded up with one button and a dial. They also had a more limited set of ports than the equivalent ikelite.

Depends how far you want to go with it though - might be the right thing if you have a fixed lense camera (don't know what the E-330 is).

Cheers,

Ben

[Steve Grrr]

I must admit Ben, I'm less than impressed with Ikelite customer service, which is terse to the point of monosyllabity.

Folks may remember I sold my video housing on eBay recently and the winner pointed out some cracks I hadn't noticed around the mounting bolts. So I contacted Ikelite, sent them some photos and they said "send it back for warranty repair".

So off it went to Indianapolis courtesy of FedEx and I heard nothing. Checked it had been delivered and emailed them and they said they hadn't received any contact details with it and had written to me, although docs were enclosed.

Letter turned up a few days later quoting me $150 + shipping for the repair. I agreed to this and provided credit card details, then had to chase again after a further ten days went by. Apparently they are waiting for a part.

So a lot of hassle and expense for a failure that really shouldn't have happened after 40 dives.

Steve

[peteroadie]

So price is no guide then :rolleyes:

The E-330 has interchangeable lens but I must admit it will be a while before I can afford another lens and as that will be a fisheye fanTasea have that covered.

The Olympus dome port costs over a grand :( when you add the required zoom gear and extension tube. Not to mention the caost of the PT-E02.

Ikelite are cheaper but their site is confusing if you don't have a Nikon.

Still I could always get a Ewa-marine and stick to less than 20m :p
http://www.camerasunderwater.co.uk/ewa_marine/slr/pix/ua_fr.jpg Sexy or what?????

[peteroadie]

Had a look at the Fantasea manual and it operates all the controls but instead of using one button per control a lot of the buttons do double duty.

Now whether this means you have to go right to go left; etc I don't know. :(

I suppose the theory is that though it adds lateral movement there are less holes in the case. :rolleyes:

Anyhow, I have been offered the camera housing, flash housing, arms and cables for $1409 shipped against an Ikelite housing of $1400 plus shipping.

So I guess I will go that way and let every one in on the product once I've tried it a few times.

Pete

[Steve Grrr]

I will be interested to know how it goes and also how much UK customs sting you for.

Steve

[peteroadie]

Therein lies lifes little rub.

[ChristianG]

Still I could always get a Ewa-marine and stick to less than 20m :p [Sexy or what?????
:eek: :eek: :eek: :eek: :eek:

Christian

[ChristianG]

I am about to become the proud owner of an Olympus E-330 and have a couple of choices for housings but sticking out from the crowd is the offering from FanTasea
Peter,

You have bought/are buying a pretty good camera, especially when it comes to u/w photography when it gives a continuous picture on the camera back of what you're trying to shoot. Most SLRs can't do that, including those which happen to be my preference.:)

So don't stint on the rest of it, you are likely to live to regret it. Given that you have the ability to change lenses your first consideration should be the availability, and quality, of ports - after all, it's the glass that counts, not the box. Unfortunately, u/w you have a doubling up of glass.

There's been a rather detrimental post on this thread on Ikelite. In my not inconsiderable experience, and years in this game, Ike's service is about as good as it gets and this is the very first time I've seen something detrimental in that regard - anywhere.

The poster mentioned "cracks around the mounting bolts". My immediate question would be "just how much did you tighten these bolts?" I'm not, in the least, trying to make an issue of this but "overtightening" is often a common fault. More is not necessarily better than less, in this instance.

I've known Ike, electronically, for more years than I care to remember and, yes, he can be terse but knowing him I also know that he's that way because he doesn't want to throw his weight around. I could tell you many stories of when he's saved some photographers proverbial bacon, I can also tell you that I've never myself used an Ikelite product. If there's bias, the fact that I use a product of his is not one.

Personally I would always recommend Ikelite as a quality vendor - for that price range.

Cheers,

Christian

[Steve Grrr]

There's been a rather detrimental post on this thread on Ikelite. In my not inconsiderable experience, and years in this game, Ike's service is about as good as it gets and this is the very first time I've seen something detrimental in that regard - anywhere.

Let me elaborate then Christian - I didn't have any communication with "Ike" as far as I know. That's the first problem, the majority of the messages were not signed so it was difficult to know if I was dealing with the same person.

The poster mentioned "cracks around the mounting bolts". My immediate question would be "just how much did you tighten these bolts?" I'm not, in the least, trying to make an issue of this but "overtightening" is often a common fault. More is not necessarily better than less, in this instance.

I was pretty diligent about tightening finger tight plus one face of the nut. I suspect a more likely cause is that the two bolts go vertically up through the metal handle and into the case so, at worst, if the handles are held with the camera pointing down there is a twisting force on the threads.

The case also showed "stress cracks" from the time it was first pressurized. I thought these were a normal effect of pressurising a box of polycarbonate and as they were only apparently in the outer of the two lamina I didn't worry too much. The issue came when I sold the case to someone else and he was unhappy, which is what prompted me to get in touch with Ikelite.


I've known Ike, electronically, for more years than I care to remember and, yes, he can be terse but knowing him I also know that he's that way because he doesn't want to throw his weight around. I could tell you many stories of when he's saved some photographers proverbial bacon, I can also tell you that I've never myself used an Ikelite product. If there's bias, the fact that I use a product of his is not one.
Christian

As I said, I'm not sure exactly who I was dealing with, other than a couple of emails were signed "Tom". For example this is the response I got to quite a chatty email explaining the problem and enclosing photos:
Steve,

Return housing to Ikelite for warranty repair.

Regards
Ikelite Repair Dept.
So no information on where to send it, who to address it to etc. They provided an address when asked but didn't get my covering letter which was in a "documents enclosed" pouch (OK, I should have put a copy inside too).

I didn't get any acknowledgement of receipt (maybe because they didn't have the covering letter). When I chased they then told me it was out of warranty and I had to pay $150 + shipping and indemnify them for any customs charges. Again, not unreasonable but not what I expected from the sentence above.

So in summary, I'm now a bit hesitant about using Ikelite and that is a shame because I'm in the market for a Nikon D80 housing and strobes. It's also very unusual for a US operation to have anything less than gushing customer service. :)

Steve

[ChristianG]

Let me elaborate then Christian - I didn't have any communication with "Ike" as far as I know. That's the first problem, the majority of the messages were not signed so it was difficult to know if I was dealing with the same person.
I did try to contact Ike personally at the address i have for him but it doesn't work any more. My conclusion is that he has finally, as in finally, finally, retired and good luck to him - he's even older than I am. :eek:

I am going to try something else, no guarantees, but if it comes off you'll be the first to know.

I'll also eventually report back if it doesn't work, if the thread's still anywhere that I can find it. I'm still very naive as to this system.:)

Cheers,

Christian

[ChristianG]

I was pretty diligent about tightening finger tight plus one face of the nut. I suspect a more likely cause is that the two bolts go vertically up through the metal handle and into the case so, at worst, if the handles are held with the camera pointing down there is a twisting force on the threads.
Here I, entirely personally, have a problem.

In my experience you may indeed have overtightened. Whilst I'm not in the least saying that you don't know this, one of the major problems with sealing camera systems is realisation that it is the O Ring, not the camera system itself, or any other system for that matter, which provides the seal.

With aluminium housings the consequences may not be, probably are not, so great, with polycarbonate housings, that may be another matter entirely. I don't know, I'm far from an expert on polycarbonate housings but my theory seems likely.

I'd find it difficult to accept that an aluminium housing would "crack" in these circumstances, unless the casting of it was flawed from the outset.

In my experience there are a lot of people out there that don't even know that it's the O Ring, that alone, nothing else, that safeguards a system's integrity.

Tell me, can you remember whether Ikelite actually advised on how much to tighten the casing? I would have thought this to be obvious advice which simply had to be supplied given that polycarbonate is not exactly bulletproof (but it nevertheless has certain significant advantages over aluminium otherwise). 'Twas ever thus in competing system methodologies.

Cheers,

Christian

[Ben Panter]

Hi Christian,

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but I'm afraid that Ike passed away last year:

http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/headlite.html

My condolences if you knew him.

Ben

[Steve Grrr]

Here I, entirely personally, have a problem.

In my experience you may indeed have overtightened. Whilst I'm not in the least saying that you don't know this, one of the major problems with sealing camera systems is realisation that it is the O Ring, not the camera system itself, or any other system for that matter, which provides the seal.

Hi Christian - I think we may be at cross purposes. The mounting bolts have nothing whatsoever to do with the seal. The seal is provided by four spring clips which hold the back plate of the housing on - and I always fastened them on the diagonal, just like I was taught to tighten a cylinder head.

The bolts whose surrounds were cracked hold the carrying handles to the case.

Anyway, there's no need to follow up on my account because it is sold now.

Cheers, Steve

[peteroadie]

Folks

It's been a year and my finances were a little bit stretched so I could not get the case, but I have now :) :) :)

Only used it in the pool but with an 8mm lens and 5" dome it doesn't do a bad job. I'm off to the Farnes on the 14th so lets see what happens then.

The only issue I can forsee is that I am kak at taking photos out of the water ;)

Pete