Portland, Ore. –
said Tuesday it is now selling its Scout with Fisheye manual focus fisheye SLR
camera lens available in mounts for all popular SLR camera bodies.
Scout is the first Lensbaby lens that does not bend, allowing a
fisheye optic with an ultra-wide 12mm focal length capable of capturing a
160-degree angle of view from infinity down to 0.5-inch from the front of the
lens.
The Scout with Fisheye carries a $250 suggested retail and is
available through select specialty photo stores and from
.
The fisheye optic creates unique flare effects in an image.
“The Scout is for adventurous photographers wanting an easy to
use fisheye lens combined with the creative freedom of the Lensbaby Optic Swap
System,” stated Craig Strong, Lensbaby president and co-founder. “We chose to combine the straight-shooting,
non-bending Scout with our 12mm fisheye optic so that Lensbaby users could have
a simple, affordable and fun way to play with the fisheye’s creative flare and
eye-opening close focus.”
Due to the extremely wide angle of view of the fisheye optic,
full frame cameras will generally produce a black circle around most of the
image, while APS-sized sensor cameras will produce black at the corners of the
image.
Scout is said to situate the fisheye image in the center of the
frame.
The fisheye optic features a creative lens flare effect that
causes the edge areas that would ordinarily be black to glow with color
whenever there are bright light sources in the image, Lensbaby said.
This lens flare effect is particularly apparent when shooting
with a full frame camera though it is also noticeable when shooting with
APS-sized sensors.
The ability to focus 0.5-inch in front of the lens provides an
unusual macro photo effect. For example, a flower appears close enough to touch
while the entire garden surrounds it in the frame.
The fisheye optics include six multi-coated glass elements and a
precision, aluminum body.
The lens includes a smooth manual focus, and the Scout with
fisheye ships with the fisheye optic installed.
Photographers can also use other Lensbaby Optic Swap System
optics such as soft focus, pinhole/zone plate, double glass, single glass and plastic.
With Lensbaby’s selective focus optics (double glass, single
glass and plastic), the sweet spot of focus will always be centered in the
photo.
All Lensbaby Optic Swap System optics can be swapped in and out
of Lensbaby lenses, affording a wide range of creative effects.
Optics can be simply popped out using an optic changing tool and
replaced with a different optic.
Scout lenses are available for Canon, Nikon, Pentax, Sony and
Olympus Micro Four Thirds camera lenses.
