Struman Optics ProSeries Photo Extension Kit product reviews

Having tried many of the cheaper kits, trying to find a good set of add-on lenses that actually give sharp, clear images without colour-distortion, fogging or blurring, I had all but given up until I stumbled across the Struman Optics stand at Fieldays earlier in the year. The display was as good as you could expect at Fieldays, but what really grabbed me was the demonstration. I was impressed and wanted to know more, but the pricetag was a bit daunting. Having been caught up by previous purchases only to find plastic lenses, cheap lens bodies that are so thin they warp as you screw them in, fuzzy or haloed images, I wasn't keen on opening my wallet then and there. So I got the brochure and contact details, then went away to research.

Cut to the recent-past and I have some kits in hand to play with! Much joy and squee was had, at the thoughts of potential photography locations. I tried underground in a cavern system, whizzing down a zipline across a farm valley, at the world-famous Hamilton Gardens, and in my own humble back yard. Not going to lie, these lenses lived up to the hype, and went beyond my expectations. The trickiest thing is placement of the lenses. With more and more modern cameras having multiple cameras, often with 2 or more working in partnership to gather stereoscopic depth data and parallax correction, it can be a bit tricky to get the lenses fitted just right. If you have an iPhone or Sansung, there's probably a case you can order that will have the lens mounting ring built-in and located at exactly the right spot. For people with other models, it's the Universal Clip, and that's the tricky one. Take the time to practice. If you follow the on-pack instructions, it can become a bit of a chore swapping lenses because you have to reposition the clip between removing one lens and screwing in another... and I found it often needed a tweak after that stage too. In the end, it was easier to simply improvise a better solution.

Having bought many of the cheaper kits, and finding the lenses were rubbish but the clips were good, I held on to them to repurpose them at some stage. I was really happy to find 2 clips that had the same hole and thread sizes and would take these lenses, so I now have each lens on it's own clip, colour-coded for fast swaps-overs in the field. Could be worth ordering some extra clips when you buy this pack.

This kit comes with three lenses that are sure to enhance your images. The basic Wide Angle lens does just that - provides a wider field of view giving you more image width and height. Not as much as the Cinematic Wide lens but enough to fit in those stragglers on the outer edges of the group photo without you having to risk walking backwards into the bbq/wedding cake/river. The fisheye gives you a remarkably wide, 360 bubble-world effect that will turn pagodas into filigree balls and hallways into peepholes. It was a lot of fun playing with this one and I discovered that it enabled me to shoot in-camera some scenes I previously had to snap as a set of shots, stitch them together and then warp them in Photoshop.

The final lens in the kit is, for me, the highlight one. The Macro lens enables the camera to focus at an extremely short range and lock in the finest details. I have linked a sample pic of this one to the review to show what I mean. This is the one shot that I needed to move the camera to do a before/after shot. On the left is the no-lens 'before' shot, and that was as close as I could get and still have anything in focus. If you look closely, the only thing in focus is the ground just behind/below the seedcone. After putting on the Macro lens, I needed to move the camera almost right up to the cone, nearly touching, to get things in focus, and what a focus it is too. Crisp, sharp edges and points, texture and detail I could not have noticed any other way. While not worth the pricetag on its own, it's the most valuable lens in the kit as far as I am concerned.

Overall, I thought these lenses were, if anything, UNDERselling themselves. The quality is great and their durability was proven to me when I dropped one onto concrete and it was functionally undamaged. A small ding on one edge of the chassis, but no chipped optics or noticeable distortion to the resulting images. I can live with cosmetic damage to tools, so this incident alone impressed me no end. I fully expected the case to crack apart or the lens to shatter. These get my enthusiastic Thumbs Up.