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Scuba Forum / Scuba Locations / November 2004Underwater cameras advice needed
Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a disposable, but perhaps just as bad). I shot 11 rolls of film and was lucky to get 3 decent photos. I really want a good underwater camera and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. > Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on > cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a > disposable, but perhaps just as bad). I shot 11 rolls of film and was > lucky to get 3 decent photos. I really want a good underwater camera > and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is > recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. I don't want this to sound like I am an A..hole (although I am), but much of the quality of the pictures has to do with the quality of the photographer. I took a cheap Ikelite systems with me to Yap to play with along with my old reliable housed 35 mm system. LOTS of the pictures from the cheapie turned out as comparable to what I shot with my "real" camera. Just get to know what your camera can do and don't expect more from it. Make sure that you have an external strobe. Plus, it would be nice if it had interchangeable lenses as well. Both Ikelite and Bonica have low end cameras with external strobes and close up/macro lenses and are in the range of only a few hundred bucks as a full package. Of course, if money is no object, then go with 35 mm and digital on a stacked system with twin strobes! That way you won't miss anything ... including the snickers from the others in your diving party! ;-) Just my $.02  SignatureRay Contreras =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Webmonkey for: http://www.ossystems.com http://www.bobs-garage.com http://www.rayzplace.com > Of course, if money is no object, then go with 35 mm and > digital on a stacked system with twin strobes! That way you > won't miss anything ... including the snickers from the > others in your diving party! ;-) Snickering dive buddies sometimes tend to find themselves the ambush subjects at the end of a dive when I have some film left. Crank in both your strobes (mine are Ikelite SS-200's), set them to full power and pop your buddy in the face from around a foot out. Later, you can innocently claim that they had this amazing cute cleaning goby on their mask's top rim and you just knew that they would want you to take a photo of it for them :-) -hh RayC <ray@rayzplace.com> pounded away at his keyboard resulting in: :I don't want this to sound like I am an A..hole (although I :am), but much of the quality of the pictures has to do with :the quality of the photographer. My version, the second most important part of the camera is the lens. Dan Bracuk Is it my imagination, or do Buffalo Wings taste like chicken? The Best of rec.scuba http://www.pathcom.com/~bracuk/RecScuba/ > RayC <ray@rayzplace.com> pounded away at his keyboard resulting in: > :I don't want this to sound like I am an A..hole (although I > :am), but much of the quality of the pictures has to do with > :the quality of the photographer. Conversely, the quality of the photographer will seldom overcome shortcomings in the quality of the equipment. If a lens isn't sharp the photographer will never overcome that. If the viewfinder is crap, the photographer is limited. If the glass is slow, the photographer has lost the ability to shoot certain situations. If the camera isn't ergonomically correct for the user it can become a great problem, particularly underwater. Ideally it is best to balance photographer capability with equipment capability, but given the cost who wants to buy new gear every time they become more proficient? I think it is better to have equipment capabilities to aspire to, rather than fight against the ceiling your camera capabilities limit you to. The old adage about a camera being nothing but a light box has become pure bunk over the past ten years. The equipment will not make you a good photographer, but it sure as heck can make you a bad one (if image results are the measure). >Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on >cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a >disposable, but perhaps just as bad). I shot 11 rolls of film and was >lucky to get 3 decent photos. I really want a good underwater camera >and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is >recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. I personally like my Sea&Sea MX-10. I've got all the lenses, etc. It's been a great camera for the last 12 years. We just bought a housing for my wife's Sony. We'll see how that works in about three weeks. Signaturedillon When I was a kid, I thought the angel's name was Hark and the horse's name was Bob. >>Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on >>cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] >We just bought a housing for my wife's Sony. We'll see how that works >in about three weeks. I don't disagree with either of you. I told my husband that perhaps I had just had trouble estimating the distance needed to really get decent photos. His attitude was if that many photos came out bad, the camera sucked. I've been shooting film more than half my life and have won some photo contests, so I do know what I'm doing. Just not underwater, yet. I was thinking of getting the strobe and the macro attachment for the camera for this trip. Maybe that will help. > His attitude was if that many photos came out bad, the > camera sucked. I've been shooting film more than half my life and > have won some photo contests, so I do know what I'm doing. Just not > underwater, yet. If you can take good photos out of the water but 95% of the UW photos suck then there's a pretty good chance that you're facing one of two problems. Maybe the camera really does suck, or perhaps you've missed some basic difference of UW shooting. Exactly what was wrong with all those shots that weren't decent? > I was thinking of getting the strobe and the macro > attachment for the camera for this trip. Maybe that will help. Macro will almost certainly help by forcing you to get close to the subject. That will allow for more light from whichever strobe you use, and cut down on the water, and everything that might be in the water, between the lens and subject. Adding the external strobe will give you more light in general, which is usually a good thing. OTOH, if the camera sucks, don't bother investing more money in it by buying a strobe that's specific to that camera. When we know what was wrong with the photos maybe we can offer better advice. SignatureSteve The above can be construed as personal opinion in the absence of a reasonable belief that it was intended as a statement of fact. If you want a reply to reach me, remove the SPAMTRAP from the address. Steve <SPAMTRAPglawackus@hvc.rr.com> pounded away at his keyboard resulting in: :When we know what was wrong with the photos maybe we can offer better advice. Or maybe we can simply assume it was the same problem the rest of us had when we started u/w photography. It's hard. Dan Bracuk Is it my imagination, or do Buffalo Wings taste like chicken? The Best of rec.scuba http://www.pathcom.com/~bracuk/RecScuba/ > Or maybe we can simply assume it was the same problem the rest of us > had when we started u/w photography. It's hard. Or not. I had some minor problems with framing on the first UW roll I shot, which I am told is a common problem with the Nikonos, but the other 10 rolls came out well enough to leave me pleased with my first effort. Of course, I had plenty that were so-so and none of them are going to turn up in dive magazines, but very few of them were really bad. For the most part I found that focus and exposure weren't a problem. Composition is about the same as on land, though I think it's a lot easier to find a dark, cluttered background UW. I attribute the success of my first efforts to the thousands of frames I've shot out of the water, which I think gave me a pretty solid foundation in the basic skills, which largely translate to UW. On our last trip, one of my companions was using a brand new Olympus C-4040. It's a decent camera, but he wasn't used to it and pretty much stuck to full auto point and shoot. He had only a couple of dozen dives when the trip started and no previous UW photo experience, but he got a few very good shots and plenty that are decent enough. Especially for his experience level, I don't think he found it so hard that he didn't get some very satisfactory results. Since the OP says she's a good photographer out of the water I'd expect that she should have gotten enough decent shots that she wouldn't sound so completely dissatisfied, but until we hear more we don't know what her criteria are and why the lousy pictures were lousy. If they all sucked for the same one or two reasons, maybe there's a relatively easy solution. If there's a single problem that's common tor most of the bad shots, maybe she does have a camera that really sucks. OTOH, maybe she's not nearly as good as she thinks, and the UW shots just show that to excellent advantage. Until we get more info all of our advice is going to be somewhat generalized. SignatureSteve The above can be construed as personal opinion in the absence of a reasonable belief that it was intended as a statement of fact. If you want a reply to reach me, remove the SPAMTRAP from the address. >> Or maybe we can simply assume it was the same problem the rest of us >> had when we started u/w photography. It's hard. [quoted text clipped - 4 lines] >so-so and none of them are going to turn up in dive magazines, but very few of them >were really bad. For the most part I found that focus and exposure weren't a problem. I had more or less the same results. Once I figured out how to actually use the camera (the first roll had some shots of the hatch from inside the boat), I could get the composition OK. A few parallax problems but nothing major. I did have additional trouble at night because I really could not see where I was aiming very well. What I had to be more aware of was that distance shots didn't work well -- even if *I* could see, the camera couldn't, and the color washed out. I got the camera immediately after I did my certification. I could only do full auto point and shoot, with basically the cheapest camera I could buy. My major problem was that the flash on the front of the camera caused some scatter reflection if the water wasn't completely clear. This part I felt WAS due to the camera. Otherwise I was THRILLED with the photos I got. I had been doing photography out of the water since about 1948 (I was 10 and had a Brownie camera which is the ultimate point and shoot), and I actually got a camera which fitted into a Plexiglas housing and did a couple of uw shots in 1968 when I did my first dives (after which I didn't dive again until 1997 at which time I went through an actual certification process). I didn't get a digital camera until 2000 though, so all of my uw photos have been film. >Composition is about the same as on land, though I think it's a lot easier to find a >dark, cluttered background UW. I attribute the success of my first efforts to the [quoted text clipped - 15 lines] >she's not nearly as good as she thinks, and the UW shots just show that to excellent >advantage. Until we get more info all of our advice is going to be somewhat generalized. grandma Rosalie Steve <SPAMTRAPglawackus@hvc.rr.com> pounded away at his keyboard resulting in: : For the most part I found that focus and exposure weren't a problem. I found focus to be a huge problem when I started. Combination of the 25% closer thing and a narrow depth of field. Dan Bracuk Is it my imagination, or do Buffalo Wings taste like chicken? The Best of rec.scuba http://www.pathcom.com/~bracuk/RecScuba/ > >>Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on > >>cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a > >>disposable, but perhaps just as bad). I shot 11 rolls of film and was > >>lucky to get 3 decent photos. I really want a good underwater camera > >>and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is > >>recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. Years ago, there was only film, and all of that was slides, not prints. Today, you can get a digital camera with a housing and digital's faster feedback loop will help get you up the learning curve faster. You can then switch back to film :-) > >I personally like my Sea&Sea MX-10. I've got all the lenses, etc. > >It's been a great camera for the last 12 years. > > > >We just bought a housing for my wife's Sony. We'll see how that works > >works in about three weeks. Good luck with it Dillon. > I don't disagree with either of you. I told my husband that perhaps I > had just had trouble estimating the distance needed to really get > decent photos. You're on the right track: proper range estimation is very important for UW photography, and it doesn't help that we perceive everything as magnified by 25%. Most beginners either shoot way too close or way too far away (beyond strobe range) in addition to not being particularly aware of composition and backgrounds. > His attitude was if that many photos came out bad, the > camera sucked. I had a camera like that once, then I discovered that it was a manual and I had not been setting any of the dials :-). There's a huge difference between 'sucky' equipment and 'sucky' photo skills, and UW photography is a pretty drastic increase in its demands on the skills of the photographer, especially if you've never clawed your way up the learning curves on proper focus, exposure, composition, lighting, etc, etc, etc. The best way to get a bunch of really bad UW photos is to be a "point-n-shoot" land photographer and assume that the equipment will compensate for your lack of skills. True, the UW world is a heck of a lot better than where it was even but 5 years ago, but its still not slam-dunk easy as land photography, from whence there's decades of refinement on automatic focus systems, exposure setting, etc, etc. > I've been shooting film more than half my life and > have won some photo contests, so I do know what I'm doing. > Just not underwater, yet. You already then know the basics. Here's how they apply UW: 1. Focus. You need to sort out and memorize (know it cold) just where your system's going to be in focus and what its sweet spots are. For many UW systems, this will be around the 3ft range (shorter with wider lenses). 2. Exposure. Understand and be able to work out how to get a balanced exposure between existing ambient lighting and your strobe fill, and recognizing that anything beyond roughly 5-6ft is going to be "blue" no matter how powerful of a strobe you have. As a rule of thumb, assume that your strobe's UW Guide Number is going to be roughly 1/4th your regular (land) Guide Number. BTW, if you're relying on the camera to set exposure, the classic "18% Grey" exposure assumption problems do tend to crop up more frequently underwater, particularly since the setting often has less contrast, so you'll have to make it a point to learn exposures so as to check the auto-system, or better yet, turn off the automation and do this manually. 3. Composition. The most common errors here are shooting tails of the fish and not looking past your subject at what the background is going to be: the rule of thumb is "Shoot Up!" so as to use the water as a clean, non-distracting background, because if you shoot down, the background becomes the chaotically cluttered bottom. > I was thinking of getting the strobe and the macro > attachment for the camera for this trip. Maybe that will help. A strobe is pragmatically a must-have because you're scuba diving, not snorkeling. Its also often worth considering Macro because some people find it an easier lens to get good yield from quickly, as you can sidestep your Exposure challenges simply by putting the system on TTL/Autoexosure, and filling the frame with your subject. -hh kaasman <idont@think.so> pounded away at his keyboard resulting in: :I don't disagree with either of you. I told my husband that perhaps I :had just had trouble estimating the distance needed to really get [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] :underwater, yet. I was thinking of getting the strobe and the macro :attachment for the camera for this trip. Maybe that will help. It won't. At least not until hubby recognizes the real problem. Dan Bracuk Is it my imagination, or do Buffalo Wings taste like chicken? The Best of rec.scuba http://www.pathcom.com/~bracuk/RecScuba/ Digital! You'll get more good shots quicker than any other way. You can review the shot immediately, correct and re-shoot underwater. SignatureRoss www.myoldtools.com > Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on > cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a > disposable, but perhaps just as bad). I shot 11 rolls of film and was > lucky to get 3 decent photos. I really want a good underwater camera > and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is > recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. What he said :-) Go digital. Instant feedback. Less hassle easier learning curve. IF you have the time and money conventional film - when exposed properly AND in focus :-p is probably better, But digital will get you to magazine quality IMHO. Some example on my site. HTH Tim www.DivingTheBlue.com www.FilteredLight.com > Digital! You'll get more good shots quicker than any other way. You can > review the shot immediately, correct and re-shoot underwater. [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] >> and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is >> recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. "My Old Tools" <ross@myoldtools.com> pounded away at his keyboard resulting in: :Digital! You'll get more good shots quicker than any other way. You can :review the shot immediately, correct and re-shoot underwater. Digital is better than film, but, for the rest of this post, wellllllllllllllllllllll, perhaps possible but not likely. Dan Bracuk Is it my imagination, or do Buffalo Wings taste like chicken? The Best of rec.scuba http://www.pathcom.com/~bracuk/RecScuba/ I noticed that there is an underwater photo discussion group at Yahoo where you will have loads of underwater photographers. You might try getting some advice there. The group is called UWPHOTO Good luck Clint Free Spirit Gallery http://www.FreeSpiritGallery.ca Exquisite Inuit Eskimo & Native Art > Are there any underwater photographers out there? I need some help on > cameras. Last year for Fiji I bought a cheap underwater camera (not a > disposable, but perhaps just as bad). I shot 11 rolls of film and was > lucky to get 3 decent photos. I really want a good underwater camera > and am willing to invest a decent sum to get there: what is > recommended? I'll consider print or digital. thanks. |
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