After lurking for some time as a guest, I decided to become brave enough to register and ask for help. There are some areas of technology where I have decades of experience ( Marine tech support, Macintosh computer tech support, Geophysical instrumentation design (my 1960's PhD subject)) but camera lenses? Meh....woefully sad.
I have taken some 500 GB of 1080p video of my grandson in his last hockey season. I used a fixed focus, Contour HD 1080p Helmet Cam. This is a fixed focus camera with no view finder, so what I had my nose pointed at was what I recorded.
This season I have moved up to using a tripod mounted Apple iPhone 4S with much better results in the video. Part of the improvement is in the better sensor ( 8 MP compared to 5 MP) and the other improvement, for my use, is the slightly reduced field of view.
Of course I am anxiously waiting for the 2012 model of the iPad 3 ( or what ever it will be called) for the much larger viewfinder, and the 2012 model of the iPhone 5 ( or what ever it will be called) for what may be an even better camera.
OK back to the reason for my posting.
I found a wonderfully simple snap on Macro lens for the iPhone 4
http://www.shapeways.com/model/32879...ns.html?gid=mg
that uses a small plastic insert that takes an inexpensive ($4) planoconvex L4471 lens from Surplus Shed. http://www.surplusshed.com/finder.cfm
I have ordered the plastic bit, but have no response from the macro lens designer for a suggested 12mm lens from Surplus Shed that would allow me to make a 2X lens instead of a macro lens.
After many hours of reading various searches I have tried, I have a blizzard of information but have found no clear understanding of what I am trying to do. I am still baffled by what kind of lens matches what I would like to do. based on the quality results of the single element planoconvex glass lens, I would like to use a similar diameter single element glass lens from Surplus Shed.
It seems ( though my perception may not be reality) that I am trying to specify a Prime Lens with a 1.5X or perhaps 2X and so on to experimentally determine an optimal little snap on lens for my hockey game video purposes, depending on how far from the ice surface my video vantage point is. I imagine some small single digit number of these little snap on lenses in my pocket, ready to try out, one at a time in every new hockey rink situation I come into.
If anyone has the patience to point me at a suitable tutorial to do what I am trying to do, or the technological generosity to look at the Surplus Shed Lens finder and say to me "Look here you old git, try these four little lenses and stop cluttering up our web site with such trivial questions....."
John Foster
Alameda CA on San Francisco Bay
http://nonsuch22blueberry.blogspot.com