Blackwater Photo Shooting Techniques?

[Davide DB]

I see that there is a fair amount of interest in blackwater diving and thought it would be appropriate to open a thread dedicated exclusively to this specialty from a photographic point of view.

 

• What are the best lenses according to the size of the subjects?
• How best to use strobes?
• Besides strobes, what are the best support lights to help focus the camera and look for subjects wandering in the black water?
• Advice on logistics and the best locations/periods for this type of diving (this is a common topic with video makers).

 

Some time ago our member @Giancarlo M. posted a nice article on using the Nauticam EMWL lens (the desire of many) in this particular context. I repost it here for reference.

 

 

 

[Giancarlo M.]

Ever since I discovered blackwater diving, I have fallen madly in love with it.
As with underwater photography, you have to be a very good diver first, and perhaps this rule is much more important for blackwater.
Diving in the dark, off the coast and in very deep water can be a bit stressful if you don't have a good experience of diving in various contexts.
For those who have never tried it, I can tell you that your first blackwater dive will remind you a lot of driving your car at night during a blizzard. At least that was my first dive.
Blackwater is mainly macro photography, larger subjects are much rarer to find.
The lens par excellence is a 60 mm macro lens with a 1:1 ratio or similar or equivalent.
Why this kind of lens? Mainly for the angle of view and the minimum focusing distance
As I wrote in the article, unfortunately Sony and Canon owners are at a disadvantage because they do not have similar lenses, and the few that do exist have very slow AF. 
Although, in May on my last trip, I met an underwater photographer who was using on a Sony A7R3 the Nikon 60 micro lens with the Monster adaptor, updated with the latest firmware. He was enthusiastic about it and did not experience any problems.

 

How best to use strobes? This is a more complex question than it sounds, as it is very personal.
I think that the position depends a lot on the lens being used, changing the MFD and consequently the position of the flashes and the subject being photographed, bigger, more distant, smaller, closer, translucent or reflective, are all factors that impose a change in the position of one's strobes.
The power should tend to be low, in order to favour a faster strobe recharge time.

 

It is certainly a must to have a focus light mounted on top of the housing, it does not have to be powerful, but it must have a good aperture angle, so as to illuminate even a little far from the dome of your camera.
A focus light that is too powerful could be very annoying to the subject you are photographing and will try to move away from you very quickly, making it more difficult for you to shoot. Another negative fact is that you might attract a lot of microplankton which again would make the shot complex.
The search torch, on the other hand, must have a very narrow beam (6°-10°) and good power(> 1500 lumen), this will help you locate subjects as they swim through the water column.

Blackwater certainly is becoming very popular, and more and more operators are offering this kind of diving. 
Always rely on dive centers that have good experience, have a good line with powerful flashlights and good guides. Going in the wild will only bring you great frustrations.
Ask for information from those who have had experience so that they can direct you to the best dive centers.
Certainly there are better times, where you can have a better chance of sightings, but there is no certain rule, the sea is complex and with climate change certainties are jumping.
Again always ask those who dive locally, they will be able to give you more accurate information, due to their experience. However prepare to hear all the opposite of everything, there are those who prefer to dive with the waxing moon and those with the waning moon, those who believe that one time of year we are better than another...
Perhaps that is also the beauty of it, to have little certainty and to be enchanted by what you will find, for me that is the most beautiful part.

 

[Davide DB]

Thank you Giancarlo, very informative.

[Barmaglot]

5 hours ago, Giancarlo M. said:

The search torch, on the other hand, must have a very narrow beam (6°-10°) and good power(> 1500 lumen), this will help you locate subjects as they swim through the water column.

Inon LF800-N and its successor, LF650h-N are uniquely good at this

 

http://www.inon.jp/products/le_light/lf650h-n.html

 

Despite the low rated power, the fresnel lens in front of the LED concentrates the beam into a very narrow and sharply defined column with hardly any falloff - it looks like a lightsaber underwater - which allows it to penetrate surprisingly far.

[Giancarlo M.]

3 hours ago, Barmaglot said:

Inon LF800-N and its successor, LF650h-N are uniquely good at this

 

http://www.inon.jp/products/le_light/lf650h-n.html

 

Despite the low rated power, the fresnel lens in front of the LED concentrates the beam into a very narrow and sharply defined column with hardly any falloff - it looks like a lightsaber underwater - which allows it to penetrate surprisingly far.

I have never seen it in operation, so I trust your experience.
But you would have to compare it, in water, with a more powerful torch to be able to make a proper comparison.
I am using a torch that I bought in January, adjustable from 3 to 18°, which also does not have a great power output, but it does its job well and has a very clean beam, but comparing it with other torches, the more powerful ones have greater penetration in the water over long distances.

[Barmaglot]

On blackwater dives with a dozen divers in the water, using a variety of torches, the LF800s clearly stand out.Here's one in a pool at night:

 

 

[Giancarlo M.]

On 7/15/2024 at 3:49 PM, Davide DB said:

what's the best Canon lens for AF in this kind of dives?

 

Seeing the Aquatilis project her in the Med, most of the critters are huge. Something I would shot with the 12-35mm (24-70 FF).

I use the EF-S 35 macro, but it is APS-C lens.
If you use an APS-C camera it is perfect, the only disadvantage is that you have to get very close to the subject, but MFD is only 13 cm.

You can use the same lens on the new mirrorless R-series, but the camera will recognise that it is an APS-C lens and you will have a cropped file. On the R5 you will have a file of about 20mb.
On Canon DSLRs, with APS-C it will work perfectly, on FF DSLRs you can use it in combination with a Kenko 1.4x multiplier, I tried it on my friend's camera and it is absolutely perfect, like having a 60mm.

Another lens you can use is the Canon 100 macro on FF, although it has a small angle of view, it becomes more complex to shoot, but it's not impossible.

 

Sigma 50 and 70 macro for Canon, they are nice lenses, as I wrote in the previous post, but their AF is extremely slow in addition to being stretch lenses, this complicates adapting the port

[Davide DB]

44 minutes ago, Giancarlo M. said:

I use the EF-S 35 macro, but it is APS-C lens.
If you use an APS-C camera it is perfect, the only disadvantage is that you have to get very close to the subject, but MFD is only 13 cm.

You can use the same lens on the new mirrorless R-series, but the camera will recognise that it is an APS-C lens and you will have a cropped file. On the R5 you will have a file of about 20mb.
On Canon DSLRs, with APS-C it will work perfectly, on FF DSLRs you can use it in combination with a Kenko 1.4x multiplier, I tried it on my friend's camera and it is absolutely perfect, like having a 60mm.

Another lens you can use is the Canon 100 macro on FF, although it has a small angle of view, it becomes more complex to shoot, but it's not impossible.

 

Sigma 50 and 70 macro for Canon, they are nice lenses, as I wrote in the previous post, but their AF is extremely slow in addition to being stretch lenses, this complicates adapting the port

 

Do you have an example of bw critters and size you got with these lens?

 

Thank you in advance

[Giancarlo M.]

1 hour ago, Davide DB said:

Do you have an example of bw critters and size you got with these lens?

 

Thank you in advance

 

[Phil Rudin]

I see many BW shooters using 60mm macro lenses on DSLR, APS-C cameras which is about equal to the Sony 90mm macro I use on Sony full frame. Lots of full frame shooters are also using 100/105 lenses with success. 

[harry]

I found this article on blackwater photography very helpful. It's well written and got a lot of useful information (including settings) in it, and also some great photos too!

 

 

https://www.divephotoguide.com/underwater-photography-special-features/article/blackwater-photography-anilao-philippines-sony-alpha-1-a1/ 

 

 

[Davide DB]

1 hour ago, harry said:

I found this article on blackwater photography very helpful. It's well written and got a lot of useful information (including settings) in it, and also some great photos too!

 

 

https://www.divephotoguide.com/underwater-photography-special-features/article/blackwater-photography-anilao-philippines-sony-alpha-1-a1/ 

 

 

 

Terrific article indeed. Pietro Formis is a WPX member.

I wish there was a similar article for blackwater video too.

[jlaity]

I’ve always shot black water with 5D4 and 100mm macro (EF 100mm non-L). Tougher to find the subject but a better shot when I do, I think. Saving to upgrade to R5 and the new RF 100mm, mostly for better AF on black water dives. We just finished a Komodo trip and I did 9 or 10 black water dives.