Hi,

II'm going to the Great Barrier Reef in January and need a professional
level dual strobe underwater system for my D200.

Current hardware:
=============
Nikon D200 camera
Nikon 18-200 mm VR zoom lens
Dual Nikon SB-800 strobes
8 GB Lexar 133x compact flash memory

I have been told that the 18-200 is not a good underwater lens and the
dome makers don't officially support it. However, they do support the
venerable 17-35 F2.8 zoom. The 18-200 is almost the same size only
smaller in both length with not quite as wide an angle. If I left it at
18mm, it should fit.

Is there some reason this lens would not work well? At 18mm, it is
rated at F/3.5, just slightly slower than the F/2.8 of the 17-35. The
Vibration Reduction, "VR" works amazingly well allowing a shutter
speed up to 4 stops slower than without VR. It gives amazingly sharp
pictures, even hand held at 200mm in dim light.

Strobes:
========
Fantasea makes a housing for the SB-800
strobes:http://www.fantasea.com/product_details.asp?id=89
It's rated to 80 M and supports iTTL balanced fill flash and accepts a
5 Pin Nikonos Style Sync Cord.
I sure would like to use these superb flashes rather than buying 2,
$800 dedicated underwater strobes which would be of little use above
water.

Does anybody have any success/horror stories about the 18-200 with
SB-800s and any of these housings?

Sealux CD200.         $2183.
Sea&Sea DX-D200      $2496
Ikelite 6812 iTTL      $1379

    Thank you,

        Brian.