Looking for high res underwater photos

[cerich]

31 minutes ago, bvbellomo said:

To start, I disagree.  I think anyone can appreciate the technical abilities of a camera by looking at other people's photos, even if they themselves don't have much technical expertise.

 

I am trying to be nice, I am not convinced from your photos that you are either a great a photographer or all that knowledgeable.  Regardless, the equipment you are using means you can't provide anything on this thread in the direction I wanted it to go.  You are saying I don't know what I don't know, but you are the one trying to pass yourself off as an expert, not me.  I haven't claimed any ability or expertise.

I called myself decent, never said I was great even admitted I didn't take it seriously enough  to try and be great, but I do have enough experience and  knowledge to spot you are missing some important concepts that are foundational to even being "not horrible" let along decent from a technical perspective, ignoring all the "artsy" stuff like composition and vision.

You really can't tell the technical ability of a camera just by looking at folks pictures with said camera outside a controlled lab type test, you can't. Even superb photographers may identify some limitations of the tool they are using (camera) but will also never fully hit limitations of gear in other aspects. Lot's of that depends on what type of photography they do. Birder's tend to find more, for reasons. Underwater, some do a decent job doing tests as best they can, but rarely indeed do they approach truly controlled like in a lab..because water.

Underwater, water is a massive part of the optics solution/part of what a sensor is gonna to see, resolve, as is what lens, port,  or wet lens , much more than most will believe. That all said, you aren't limited by gear, you just aren't. Not even close

[TimG]

Guys, we are starting to approach the amber line in terms of the tone of recent posts. Let’s not get too personal please. 

[bvanant]

I think that one approach (I tell this to beginners underwater) is to take your camera to a nice location on land and shoot with the lenses you want to use underwater. Pretend to be Ansel Adams and go shoot some nice wide angle photos. Shoot them at a variety of shutter speeds/ f stops/iso settings (all to get the same exposure more or less).  Then take them home and look at full resoultion snippets to see if in fact your camera/lens can generate shots you like. It could be that your particular camera/lens for example has some back focus issues and nothing is sharp. That is an easy fix, but maybe not cheap i.e., a new lens. No underwater photo will ever be as crisp/sharp/nice as one on land (maybe the Nasa tank) so that is a good starting point.  I shoot flowers and birds on land with a 20MP OM-1 and routinely print A2 (almost, I print 16 x 20 inches, 400x500 mm) with good results. 

Once you are sure that the system can make photos that meet your desires then move to UW but with care. Shooting WA with rectilinear lenses can lead to mushy corners but if the center is mushy something is wrong.  Mismatched lens/dome can also be an issue.

 

I print the photos for both LAUPS and Orange County UPS for the Long Beach scuba show. I have printed a bunch of A6300 photos of things like whales and sea lions, all of them seem to me at least perfectly acceptable.

 

Bill

[Chris Ross]

6 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

 

The logical place to start is by looking at what other people are getting out of their gear.  I wasn't asking for a critique of an old image of mine, especially the post-processing and I don't care about colors.  I want to know whether other people are getting better detail, in a technical sense, from APS-C cameras.  And I want to know how much more detail they are getting with higher end gear.  If no one else is getting any more detail, then it is a lost cause for me to try.  Of course, there are other aspects I can improve, including color, composition and post processing, but there are other threads on that.

 

Underwater, a reefscape with that Ziess requires F8 to have enough depth of field in focus.  Then I need around 1/100th to keep moving fish from blurring.  Without strobes, the lack of light pushes my ISO high.  With strobes, I can hit 1/160th and don't have limited light, but still have the limit of F8, so I can lower my ISO at the expense of darkening the background and limiting how far I can see.  Above water, this lens takes much better pictures as I have more light and usually shoot F4.  If I stop down to F8, throw on the housing and use my strobes in the dark, I am going to get similar picture quality above water as below.  I am not sure what the point of trying this lens on the A7RV would be, as an APS-C lens on a full frame camera is going to give a weird FOV with the corners missing and the a6300 is more than enough to resolve the image detail I get from the lens with underwater shooting conditions.

 

**edited to fractions of a second instead of fps, but I am sure people reading knew what I meant.

I believe people are answering your questions on the premise you want better quality prints, they are raising issues other than just resolution because they believe for want of a better expression you are barking up the wrong tree.   This forum is free to join and works because people are prepared to share their experience to help fellow photographers out.  If they share something outside what you ask there is generally a reason for that.  BTW I was suggesting comparing land photos with your A7RV and whatever lens you use with it to images from the a6300 and the zeiss, you mentioned in your reply that the a6300 land images are a lot better than UW - so there is Room for improvement UW!

 

You ask about better detail.  I critiqued your old image which you posted as an example as I believe you are not getting the anywhere near the full potential of the camera.  I don't shoot Sony, but it seems to me you should be able to get a lot more out of that camera.  Like it or not proper post processing, settings and workflow is a part of getting the best out of your images.  It seems sensible to me to explore getting the most out of what you have now and spend $zero doing so before exploring spending a lot of money to take a different camera UW.  You could upgrade to the A7RV and still be disappointed if you don't change what you are doing with the images.

 

Regarding the image you posted there are significant issues with it, mostly around the colour noise I mentioned, in the 100% crop I posted the BG fish are very poorly defined, but with the noise it's hard to tell if it's the noise or maybe falling out of depth of field that is the issue.  The downloaded image was 8874 x 6033 so it's been up sized.  You mention f8 - I would think many people shoot at f11 on wide angle with APS-C.  If you want to take this further I would suggest you provide an unprocessed image preferably the Raw file with EXIF intact to review.  Also what equipment was used - you said it was the Zeiss lens, what dome are you using?  did you use strobes?  Until you solve the issues here I think you'll continue to be disappointed.

 

By way of comparison here is one of my images taken with the EM-1 MkII - a 20MP micro43 camera using an 8mm fisheye lens at f8 (this a 180° diagonal fisheye)  It is uncropped.  1/100 @ f8 ISO200. 

 

Sea fans at mermaid reef

[bvbellomo]

1 hour ago, bvanant said:

I think that one approach (I tell this to beginners underwater) is to take your camera to a nice location on land and shoot with the lenses you want to use underwater. Pretend to be Ansel Adams and go shoot some nice wide angle photos. Shoot them at a variety of shutter speeds/ f stops/iso settings (all to get the same exposure more or less).  Then take them home and look at full resoultion snippets to see if in fact your camera/lens can generate shots you like. It could be that your particular camera/lens for example has some back focus issues and nothing is sharp. That is an easy fix, but maybe not cheap i.e., a new lens. No underwater photo will ever be as crisp/sharp/nice as one on land (maybe the Nasa tank) so that is a good starting point.  I shoot flowers and birds on land with a 20MP OM-1 and routinely print A2 (almost, I print 16 x 20 inches, 400x500 mm) with good results. 

Once you are sure that the system can make photos that meet your desires then move to UW but with care. Shooting WA with rectilinear lenses can lead to mushy corners but if the center is mushy something is wrong.  Mismatched lens/dome can also be an issue.

 

I print the photos for both LAUPS and Orange County UPS for the Long Beach scuba show. I have printed a bunch of A6300 photos of things like whales and sea lions, all of them seem to me at least perfectly acceptable.

 

Bill

I've done a lot of above water with both cameras.  If I pixel peep, the A7RV + 14mm GM is considerably sharper than the a6300 + Zeiss, which is really impressive as it has almost 3 times as many pixels.  The dramatic difference is why I've thought about taking the A7RV underwater.

 

I am not convinced that depth of field at F8 (or any other stop) underwater in a dome is the same as F8 out of water.  This is probably easy enough to measure in a pool and I should do that.  It still isn't a great comparison if  I am using strobes, I can walk around in twilight with my underwater strobes on my camera, but any pictures taken that way are going to look strange.  Underwater is really a whole different world as far as photography.

 

The a6300 prints above water are good, but noticeably less sharp than the A7RV prints.  I think if I have perfect settings and don't crop my underwater a6300 prints can come close to my above water a6300 prints, but there is much less room for error.  Full reefscape photos without cropping are a big challenge (besides getting the composition, no friends, bubbles, fins, etc can be in frame, camera has to be perfectly level).

 

What size are the prints you do?

[bvbellomo]

I asked for examples of other people’s work with higher resolution cameras.  I only provided my own images as examples of what I want people to upload.  I am not opposed to starting a different thread to discuss post processing raw files, but there are a lot of similar threads already.  There are no threads with high resolution images.

 

If I ever take another picture underwater, outside of a test environment like a swimming pool, it will cost me a lot of money.  Scuba diving is expensive even without photography.

 

I am using a Nauticam N120 180mm Optical-glass wide-angle dome port.  I have 2 Inon 330 strobes.  I may use 1, 2 or no strobes.

 

If it is possible with to get a lot more out of a 6300, I was hoping someone who did it would post an image.

1 hour ago, Chris Ross said:

I believe people are answering your questions on the premise you want better quality prints, they are raising issues other than just resolution because they believe for want of a better expression you are barking up the wrong tree.   This forum is free to join and works because people are prepared to share their experience to help fellow photographers out.  If they share something outside what you ask there is generally a reason for that.  BTW I was suggesting comparing land photos with your A7RV and whatever lens you use with it to images from the a6300 and the zeiss, you mentioned in your reply that the a6300 land images are a lot better than UW - so there is Room for improvement UW!

 

You ask about better detail.  I critiqued your old image which you posted as an example as I believe you are not getting the anywhere near the full potential of the camera.  I don't shoot Sony, but it seems to me you should be able to get a lot more out of that camera.  Like it or not proper post processing, settings and workflow is a part of getting the best out of your images.  It seems sensible to me to explore getting the most out of what you have now and spend $zero doing so before exploring spending a lot of money to take a different camera UW.  You could upgrade to the A7RV and still be disappointed if you don't change what you are doing with the images.

 

Regarding the image you posted there are significant issues with it, mostly around the colour noise I mentioned, in the 100% crop I posted the BG fish are very poorly defined, but with the noise it's hard to tell if it's the noise or maybe falling out of depth of field that is the issue.  The downloaded image was 8874 x 6033 so it's been up sized.  You mention f8 - I would think many people shoot at f11 on wide angle with APS-C.  If you want to take this further I would suggest you provide an unprocessed image preferably the Raw file with EXIF intact to review.  Also what equipment was used - you said it was the Zeiss lens, what dome are you using?  did you use strobes?  Until you solve the issues here I think you'll continue to be disappointed.

 

By way of comparison here is one of my images taken with the EM-1 MkII - a 20MP micro43 camera using an 8mm fisheye lens at f8 (this a 180° diagonal fisheye)  It is uncropped.  1/100 @ f8 ISO200. 

 

Sea fans at mermaid reef

I asked for examples of other people’s work with higher resolution cameras.  I only provided my own images as examples of what I want people to upload.  I am not opposed to starting a different thread to discuss post processing raw files, but there are a lot of similar threads already.  There are no threads with high resolution images.

 

If I ever take another picture underwater, outside of a test environment like a swimming pool, it will cost me a lot of money.  Scuba diving is expensive even without photography.

 

I am using a Nauticam N120 180mm Optical-glass wide-angle dome port.  I have 2 Inon 330 strobes.  I may use 1, 2 or no strobes.

 

If it is possible with to get a lot more out of a 6300, I was hoping someone who did it would post an image.

 

I appreciate you posting a link to the image, but I don't have permission.  I did request it.

[bvbellomo]

Apparently this forum won't let me edit, so I apologize for double-posting my reply both above and below the post I replied to.

[cerich]

5 minutes ago, bvbellomo said:

I asked for examples of other people’s work with higher resolution cameras. 

Thread title "Looking for high res underwater photos"

 

In first post in thread by you- "This got me thinking and looking at other people's images.  Most people are posting 1920x1080 or smaller, even people with $10k setups.  That is great for Instagram or showing a friend your dive trip, but I like having large prints.  I really want to compare what I have to what good photographers are taking.

 

Can anyone post or link any high res underwater photos, preferably with the camera, lens and housing models?"

I believe people did what you asked for.

Be well

null

 

[bvbellomo]

I thought it was clear from the context of my post, but I was looking for images larger than 6000x4000. 

[shokwaav]

RX100V (so a 1 inch sensor), Inon wide angle wet lens, Inon strobes

100% center crop to assess the sharpness.

The resolution is 3648x5472.

Edited Monday at 12:19 AM by shokwaav

[OneYellowTang]

@shokwaav

Completely unrelated to the topic, but that's a hell of an image.I've seen similar in Cocos (but darker water) and in the Solomons (but not with the shaped "funnel" - where was this taken?

 

[TimG]

7 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

Apparently this forum won't let me edit, so I apologize for double-posting my reply both above and below the post I replied to.

 

Not a problem. No worries.

[Chris Ross]

7 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

I asked for examples of other people’s work with higher resolution cameras.  I only provided my own images as examples of what I want people to upload.  I am not opposed to starting a different thread to discuss post processing raw files, but there are a lot of similar threads already.  There are no threads with high resolution images.

 

If I ever take another picture underwater, outside of a test environment like a swimming pool, it will cost me a lot of money.  Scuba diving is expensive even without photography.

 

I am using a Nauticam N120 180mm Optical-glass wide-angle dome port.  I have 2 Inon 330 strobes.  I may use 1, 2 or no strobes.

 

If it is possible with to get a lot more out of a 6300, I was hoping someone who did it would post an image.

I asked for examples of other people’s work with higher resolution cameras.  I only provided my own images as examples of what I want people to upload.  I am not opposed to starting a different thread to discuss post processing raw files, but there are a lot of similar threads already.  There are no threads with high resolution images.

 

If I ever take another picture underwater, outside of a test environment like a swimming pool, it will cost me a lot of money.  Scuba diving is expensive even without photography.

 

I am using a Nauticam N120 180mm Optical-glass wide-angle dome port.  I have 2 Inon 330 strobes.  I may use 1, 2 or no strobes.

 

If it is possible with to get a lot more out of a 6300, I was hoping someone who did it would post an image.

 

I appreciate you posting a link to the image, but I don't have permission.  I did request it.

I really think you are missing the point of what people are trying to say to you.  They have provided you with examples taken with lower MP cameras that look a lot crisper than your sample shot that is plagued by colour noise.  The point they are making is they can produce an arguably crisper shot than your example using a lower MP camera, even the 1"sensor from 20MP RX-100 looks sharper and crisper throughout the frame.  Therefore there is room for improvement in what you are doing with your current equipment.  Higher MP cameras are not a magic solution to producing a crisper image.  Like it of not proper exposure and processing of your UW images is needed to convey an impression of sharpness and crispness. 

 

The point of stopping down behind a dome is not to get more depth of field it is to compensate for the dome optics.  Your image edges will improve with stopping down some more.  With full frame you need to stop down even more if you are using a rectilinear lens.  Fisheye lenses are more forgiving, they are popular UW for a good reason.  They are less sensitive to being used in a dome generally have much better corners and are sharper than a rectilinear in a dome. They allow you to get much closer to the subject with less water between you and your subject.

 

You are wondering about depth of field behind a dome - it is significantly greater than what you get on land due to the compression of the virtual image to between 1 and 3 dome radii from the dome. 

 

Strobes UW are used for a reason also, to bring in colour and to fill in shadows created by overhead lighting from the surface.  Unless you are in very clear tropical water and quite shallow, water when exposed as metered will often look muddy and often quite greenish - quite un-attractive IMO.  To deal with this white balance is set for the subject with strobe light which pushes the water bluer and the shutter speed is increased to darken it.  You can fine tune this to taste if you don't want very dark water. 

 

All of these items need to come together to make an image that is sharp and also pleasing to the eye.  With the colour noise in your image you can't add much sharpening as it will sharpen that noise and quickly make the image look garish.    I'll say it again it is not just the MP of the image!

[Architeuthis]

15 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

Here is another example.  This is not really a reefscape, and I took it at F20/ISO200 despite not needing the depth of field and it is slightly overexposed.  It would be better if I used ISO100 and even better if I lowered the power of my strobes and opened up to F16 or F11 or F8.  It is still one of my sharper images. Had I used optimal settings, I'd be equally limited by my sensor and my lens.  I am reasonably happy with this level of sharpness, but the A7RV would be in another league.

 

I've attached it cropped to 1200x900 instead of doing any resizing.  This is a good example of what I was hoping someone would post.

 

 

 

 

I suppose the problem in this photo may be slightly out of focus. Also diffraction at f/20 will contribute to softness...

 

When your photo is not sharp with 24 Mpixel, it will not become sharper with 60 Mpixel. Switching to A7R5 will not better these images...

 

Wolfgang

[TimG]

Chris is spot on.

 

Shooting in water adds all sorts of complications which impact on the overall impression created. Whilst non (?few) of us want to create the image in post-production, it does have a critical element especially, I'd argue, in wide-angle shots where increases in things like Clarity, Dehaze and Vibrance can have a huge impact on the crispness, punch and wow-factor. MP is not the issue.

 

As I wrote earlier, for many years I used a 24MP D300 and sold A3 printed images that were really sharp and could, I'm sure, have gone to A2. You need a good RAW file for sure but also good post-processing.

 

As Chris suggests, and you may already be doing, shoot RAW, make adjustments to create the style of image you like, re-size to whatever you need for output - then take a look at the critical sharpness issues.

 

[shokwaav]

6 hours ago, OneYellowTang said:

@shokwaav

Completely unrelated to the topic, but that's a hell of an image.I've seen similar in Cocos (but darker water) and in the Solomons (but not with the shaped "funnel" - where was this taken?

 

Thanks, this was taken at Aguni Island, Okinawa.

[bvbellomo]

4 hours ago, Architeuthis said:

 

 

I suppose the problem in this photo may be slightly out of focus. Also diffraction at f/20 will contribute to softness...

 

When your photo is not sharp with 24 Mpixel, it will not become sharper with 60 Mpixel. Switching to A7R5 will not better these images...

 

Wolfgang

 

This Zeiss on the A7RV would not be sharper than using it on the a6300.  The limit is the lens, not the sensor.  That isn't relevant to any decision to upgrade, as I would be using a different lens, such as the 14mm GM, on the A7RV. 

 

I planned to test the 14mm GM on the a6300 in a pool.  I'd be at 21mm equivalent, which is narrower than I want for a full reef shot.  It is minimal gain to reach the limit of the sensor.  If I need money for a port extension or similar from Nauticam, it is an expensive upgrade.

 

At f/20, I am probably seeing diffraction, but the image is probably not out of focus as I have a larger depth of field.  The reason I posted it is I feel this is the limit of the system at F/20 if you ignore the blown out highlights.  I planned to post a similar image at F8 for comparison, which is a little sharper, or other apertures.  With the direction this thread went, I don't see the point.

[shokwaav]

7 minutes ago, bvbellomo said:

This Zeiss on the A7RV would not be sharper than using it on the a6300.  The limit is the lens, not the sensor. 

 

 

On 3/22/2025 at 7:21 PM, bvbellomo said:

I am increasingly disappointed with my camera (a6300) as it is only 24MP and even then, does not give a sharp image.

 

Don't these two sentences contradict each other then? I think everyone in the comments are replying to your initial assumption that your photos are not sharp because of the sensor, which I think my example can help disprove.

 

I agree that it may be a combination of your lens and dome combination, although just looking at the Nauticam port chart, it already is the "ideal" solution. Of course, there may be sharper options out there for wide angle, but unfortunately, I'm not too familiar with the APS-C options out there, so others may be more helpful.

[shokwaav]

Just a quick google search:

 

https://www.backscatter.com/reviews/post/Sony-a6500-Camera-Underwater-Test-and-Review

 

They suggest the Tokina 10-17mm with an adapter.

[shokwaav]

A7C2 (33 megapixels, 7008 x 4672), 28-60mm, WWL-1B, no strobes

1/160s, f/9, ISO 500

100% crop below. It probably is sharper than the RX100, but we're dealing with a bigger sensor, much more expensive wet lens.

[bvbellomo]

1 hour ago, shokwaav said:

Don't these two sentences contradict each other then? I think everyone in the comments are replying to your initial assumption that your photos are not sharp because of the sensor, which I think my example can help disprove.

 

I agree that it may be a combination of your lens and dome combination, although just looking at the Nauticam port chart, it already is the "ideal" solution. Of course, there may be sharper options out there for wide angle, but unfortunately, I'm not too familiar with the APS-C options out there, so others may be more helpful.

There is no contradiction.  Let's put some fictional numbers on things.  Let's assign the Zeiss lens a sharpness of 3, the a6300 sensor a sharpness of 4, the 14mm GM a sharpness of 7 and the a7RV sensor a sharpness of 10.  Right now, I am using the Zeiss on the a6300, so I am at 3 since I am limited by the lens and can't take full advantage of the sensor.  If I upgrade lenses, either using the 14mm GM or buying something new, it can only get me to a 4 because I will hit the limit of my sensor.  If I upgrade housings, it takes me to a 7.

 

I've gone through the math.  For many lenses, the lens is physically too far forward, which can be solved by adding an extension.  In this case, the lens is actually too far back.  If there is a way to move the dome closer to the camera body, it is going to be very expensive.  I can calculate the exact mathematical ideal for the where the dome should be, but I cannot calculate how much of an improvement there will be in the image.  Based on what I know about the lens above water, I don't think I'd see a huge improvement if I could fix this.

[bvbellomo]

6 hours ago, shokwaav said:

A7C2 (33 megapixels, 7008 x 4672), 28-60mm, WWL-1B, no strobes

1/160s, f/9, ISO 500

100% crop below. It probably is sharper than the RX100, but we're dealing with a bigger sensor, much more expensive wet lens.

 

 

Thank you for posting this.  This is what I was looking for. 

 

This is much better depth-of-field than I expected at F9 on full frame.  Can you post a crop of the left hand side, and further up, so I can see it better?  Do you have more images like this?

 

Edited Monday at 07:54 PM by bvbellomo

[cerich]

1 hour ago, bvbellomo said:

 

 

This is much better FOV than I expected at F9 on full frame. 

 

aperture has nothing to do with FOV

[Chris Ross]

6 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

Thank you for posting this.  This is what I was looking for. 

 

This is much better depth-of-field than I expected at F9 on full frame.  Can you post a crop of the left hand side, and further up, so I can see it better?  Do you have more images like this?

 

You are not depth of field limited with dome optics when shooting at f8 plus.  Look up dome port optics, you will see that the lens is recording a virtual image that curves around the dome, infinity is located about 3 dome radii out and with a fisheye lens it can be right on the dome at minimum focus distance.   Because the virtual image is compressed like this the depth of field covers the full range for most shots, the only exception being close focus wide angle where the subject is almost touching the dome.  You can actually use a calculator to work out the position of the virtual image compared to the actual object being photographed then plug these into a depth of field calculator to show this.    The zone of sharpest focus is parallel to the sensor plane.

 

Lenses are stopped right down behind domes to deal with the virtual image.  Rectilinear lenses are designed to image a straight line and render it straight in the image.  The edges of the virtual image are much closer than the centre, it's partly a depth of field thing but mostly dealing with abberations that requires you to stop down so much to get good corners when shooting underwater with a dome.

 

Wet lenses like the WWL are designed to deal with this phenomenon they produce barrel distortion in the process and their zone of sharp focus is curved the same as a fisheye lens and matches the shape of the virtual image more closely.

[shokwaav]

9 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

There is no contradiction.  Let's put some fictional numbers on things.  Let's assign the Zeiss lens a sharpness of 3, the a6300 sensor a sharpness of 4, the 14mm GM a sharpness of 7 and the a7RV sensor a sharpness of 10.  Right now, I am using the Zeiss on the a6300, so I am at 3 since I am limited by the lens and can't take full advantage of the sensor.  If I upgrade lenses, either using the 14mm GM or buying something new, it can only get me to a 4 because I will hit the limit of my sensor.  If I upgrade housings, it takes me to a 7.

 

Practically in your situation, if you're not interested in full frame housings, is to get a better lens/port combo. Even upgrading to the A7RV sensor, not many lens/port combos can resolve to the complete 61MP, especially at the corners.

 

9 hours ago, bvbellomo said:

This is much better depth-of-field than I expected at F9 on full frame.  Can you post a crop of the left hand side, and further up, so I can see it better?  Do you have more images like this?

A7C2, 28-60mm w/ WWL-1B, 1/80s, f/8, ISO 100, no strobes, centre crop, corner drop and side crop

Edited yesterday at 01:09 AM by shokwaav