Wulf Koehler started his business in 1965 as a single engineer and named his products:

WKD - Wulf Koehler Darmstadt

In 1972 he founded his company :

„OceanOptics Germany",

dedicated to design and manufacture under water camera housings for various companies companies such as Arriflex, Hasselblad, JVC-Video-Systems, Leitz, Nikon and Rollei. In the spring of 1976, Wulf received a package containing a letter, together with a box of blueprints, from Rolleiwerke in which the management asked him to continue the Hans Hass-Rolleimarin series and produce 100 units of this housing body.
Wulf thanked Rolleiwerke for the trust they had placed in him, but declined the order.

Instead, he proposed to develop and produce a new housing specifically for the Rolleiflex SL66 camera system.
This camera had the ideal prerequisites to satisfy all serious underwater photographers to the highest degree.

The management agreed and sent Wulf a camera together with three different lenses for his design work.
Exactly nine months later, Wulf's new "baby" was born. He presented his new design, which met with the full approval of Rollei's engineers.
From that day on, both parties became business partners.

His first design was the uw-housing for the Rolleiflex SL66, the: AQUAMARIN WDK-SL66

which became very famous for serious photographers around the world.

The story of

Rolleimarin UW-Housings

The Prototype of the very first underwater housing for the Rolleiflex twin lens camera was never

published, it was a design of some engineers working at the

„Rolleiwerke Franke & Heidecke in Braunschweig-Germany“ during 1952-53.

Dr. Hans Hass ( the dive pioneer ) had sent a request to the

company to build an uw-housing for his twin lens Rolleilfex,

which he used for his photography on land.

Prototype of the very first model

This photo shows John Wild holding the prototype. It was taken during a visit in Brunswik in May 2018 by Wulf H. Koehler.

When Hass saw this first prototype, he had many comments for improvements and from then on, he worked with the engineers in order to develop an acceptable unit that fulfilled all his wishes and requirements.

For instance, the control knobs to adjust f-stop and shutter speed where placed on top of the new housing rather than having them underneath.

Todays look of the latest Rolleimarin-IV housing

In 1954 Hass was happy with the first copy of the uw-housing,

which did not have the name Rolleimarin on the front ring at that time, but the company started building this model also for the public market.

During the years, the design was improved several times.

The last models of the Rolleimarin-IV were built until the mid 70ies.

"In honour of your induction into the International Scuba Hall of Fame".

For more than 30 years Wulf had designed special underwater housings for each Rolleiflex SLR that

came on the market.

In September 2018 Wulf received the award for his life's work:

In 1976 Wulf started a close business relationship with the Rollei Company in Germany

In 2002 Wulf moved to Sao Miguel-Azores / Portugal and started his new company together with a small machine-shop.