Anyone using digital underwater camera ?

[clive francis]

if you want to have a look at some excellent (thats what i've been told) digital photo's both below and above water check my site www.the-deep-blue.co.uk

one thing our professional digital photographer forgot to mention which is just as important as the number of pixels is the lens!!!

no point in having 4 or 5 megs if you have a crap lens, because you will get exactly the same results as a 2 meg with a good lens.

the faster and brighter the lens, the better.

i have the olympus 3040 and it has the super bright 1.8 lens .... what does this mean?

where other cameras would use a flash, mine quite happily doesn't! and underwater that is a excellent bonus.

the lens original started off on the 2040 but as the camera megs increased they stuck with the lens as it was an award winner, so much so that it went on to the 3040, 4040 and now the 5050.

if you are lucky you can still get a 4040 from jessops, my local shops in watford have loads a month ago.

buy 128Mb cards, and get at least 3, as believe me on a trip to the red sea for 1 week on SHQ you WILL fill them.

the oly cases are rated to 30m, but i have used mine to 40m (a couple of times).

the ike ds range of strobes follow the oly flash exactly and give you full ttl control (but these are expensive!) the s&s ds90 is manual and requires practice to set up, but look on the good side you don't pay for developing!

another big must with any digital underwater camera is FULL functionality underwater, no point not being able to delete the pictures unless you take it out of the case, as was the case with my first oly C920, tends to flood it!  

so that is my 2p's worth and if you want advice from some one who is not trying to sell you something then just ask.

[Duiker]

Hi,

As a Canon employee I'm appalled to see all this talk of "the others" in this thread. Makes my blood run cold!

I'm using an S45 at the moment with the underwater housing (also from Canon). At over 4 meg the quality is sound and, to be honset, lighting isnt much of a problem most of the time. My dive lamp is usually enough for the closer stuff.

You are limited to 30M with the case too but it will stand up to more if you grease it well   . You can see one of the pictures I took in the avatar section under download_slug if you like ( i decided I didnt want a girly slug after all).

Let me know if you need more info...

[clive francis]

the others as you put it are the most popular range/make of camera for underwater digital.

the scubaborad.com forum there is a poll an Olympus come out in front for the number of users.

as the the dive light, i was told to forget them and stick with a flash.

[CotoChris]

<font color='#0000FF'>Used my cannon S40 today with the new camera case. As it was the first 'fotographic' dive I choose did a shallow dive (&lt;10m) and got used to the set out underwater, although the buttons are in the same place it takes some practice to comfortably work with the camera. &nbsp;Anyway I was really happy with the results. &nbsp;The camera just fits into my bcd pocket wich is handy.
It's a great camera, it is also a good idea to have a spare battery as well (in &nbsp;case you need to change between dives)

A quick questions- how often should you grease to seal, at the end of the day after a dive?

[Andy Phillips]

Felt like putting a bit more, so;

Lenses, the faster the lens, the more light it lets through (F number) this is usually quoted on the outside of the lens, with zoom lenses the F number will vary with zoom, the longer the focal length the higher the F number. Effectivly this means the more you zoom in the less light the lens will allow through. Hence the reason why digital cameras are generally better for close up / macro photography. The big disadvantage with low F number lenses is when they are at there lowest setting i.e. F1.8 or in the case of most compact cameras F3.5 they have a fairly poor depth of field (only the subject is in focus). Again a reason why automatic digital cameras are better for lose up work.

Flash guns (strobes) versus video lights
my reason for disliking flash guns for digital cameras is that they tend to cause saturation in the image (the pixel becomes full to overflowing) With the strobes which are triggered by the cameras own flash (where there is no electrical connection) the camera takes the image with a &quot;standard&quot; set of flash settings, the strobe will provde more light than the camera expects, again saturating the image. Having said this the camera fires slightly before the flash, in the testing I have done there is an optimum distance from the subject, the &quot;strobes&quot;are great for static subjects about 3 - 4 feet away.

The reason why I prefer a video light is that the camera will compensate for the amount of light it is receiving and adjust its gain, shutter speed and apature (F stop) to give the best possible picture.

Just a few thoughts for you all to chew on.

Andrew

[JohnK]

Agreed - the Ike can oversaturate on TTL so you need to experiment with location (move the strobe) or go to manual which fires with the preflash only - this can give good results, ecspecially as the light is emitted just before the shutter fires.

I like the Ikelite bit the YS90DX is also a good (if only manual) strobe as well.

One final good thing about digital (and this is where I get totally slated) is that even average pics/focus/lighting etc can be remedied with a little tweaking of the photo software. Dont thingk all those expert pics were taken on spec - some people spend hours cloning out backscatter etc just to get that perfect pic &nbsp;- not me of course LOL

[steve-k]

kirky
got an olympus 4040 and looked at an housing for it, the only one i could find was rated to max 30m, is this the same as yous? it was 240.00

[Dr Stevil]

<font color='#0000FF'>Having chatted with Andy P about digicams, I'm going to wait till the summer to get mine as it seems the next technological step is almost upon us and there is likely to be some pricewise benefits for would be purchasers
Gives me time to read up about the various models etc
Chee-az
Steve

[JohnK]

Steve - the housing is the Olympus PT010. I got mine from camerasunderwater for £220 plus P&amp;P. Its rated to 30m only (more than sufficient). Ikelite do a housing thats rated to 40m but at more cost. Check out www.camerasunderwater.co.uk for latest prices.

The Oly housing is great. They are reputedly OK to 40m BUT not guarrenteed. Deepest I`ve had mine is 28m.

[Phil Ennis]

<font color='#0000FF'>Well, after not being able to get a reasonable priced housing for my Canon digy IxusV I have just upgraded to the V3 and canon housing. It should be here in the next couple of days. I decided with my impending trip I had to stretch the credit card a bit further to get some photographic evidence.

So when I get back and you see me approaching with the laptop, my advice is, leggittt....!!