Is anybody housing land strobes these days?

[Barmaglot]

Earlier today I remembered Ultramax strobes that were a reasonably popular budget option some years ago, and wondered what had happened to that product line, as I haven't seen any mention of it in a while. Opened up Google and ended up surprised seeing this: https://www.ultramaxdive.com/products/underwater-strobe-housing-for-godox-ad200-pro-pocket-flash

 

I know that housing some Canon/Nikon strobes used to be a reasonably popular option back in the day (before my time), but this is the first time I see a modern offering of this type. Are there any advantages to it over a dedicated underwater unit? At 200WS it seems to be quite powerful, and the total cost is fairly reasonable, but it's bigger than the old YS-250Pro and much heavier to boot. When it comes to travel weight, I think you could pack a land flash or two, a pair of underwater strobes, and still come out ahead... am I missing anything?

[Chris Ross]

5 hours ago, Barmaglot said:

Earlier today I remembered Ultramax strobes that were a reasonably popular budget option some years ago, and wondered what had happened to that product line, as I haven't seen any mention of it in a while. Opened up Google and ended up surprised seeing this: https://www.ultramaxdive.com/products/underwater-strobe-housing-for-godox-ad200-pro-pocket-flash

 

I know that housing some Canon/Nikon strobes used to be a reasonably popular option back in the day (before my time), but this is the first time I see a modern offering of this type. Are there any advantages to it over a dedicated underwater unit? At 200WS it seems to be quite powerful, and the total cost is fairly reasonable, but it's bigger than the old YS-250Pro and much heavier to boot. When it comes to travel weight, I think you could pack a land flash or two, a pair of underwater strobes, and still come out ahead... am I missing anything?

Subal make flash housings for Nikon and Canon.  http://www.subal.com/c5c17/Light_Flash/Flash_Housings.aspx

 

I think one of the issues with land flashes is that while they come labelled with impressive guide numbers like 58 or 60 this is fully zoomed in.  My Canon 580EXII has a headline guide number of 58 but at 14mm lens coverage the guide number if 15.  Zooming into 24mm coverage it is 24 GN which is about the guide number of a Z-240 but with less angular coverage (84° vs 100° without diffuser for INON Z-240).  Of course all of this assumes supplied GN are somewhat accurate.

[Barmaglot]

To be fair, those Canon and Nikon strobes that Subal is housing are in the 60-80WS power range, which is substantially less than the 200WS that Godox quotes for the AD200. While no single number tells the whole story, I think WS is a better proxy for a strobe's overall power than GN, as it is subject to fewer variables. In fact the specs on Godox website are impressively detailed; I wish underwater strobe manufacturers were as open with theirs - I don't recall, for example, any of them publishing t.1 or t.5 numbers for their units.

[Chris Ross]

I found this link for the Godox you mention, seems like the coverage is not great:

 

https://strobist.blogspot.com/2019/04/godox-ad200-amazing-flash-if-you-tweak.html

 

Fixed using the bare bulb reflector system, but housing that would end up being a huge lump.  It's been discussed on WP about dome covers probably not actually improving lighting cover.  You want to see what sort of coverage it produced in testing.  Getting a 100 deg beam would a reasonable target.  Possibly it won't be Retra in its light quality??

[Barmaglot]

Yeah, that fresnel head output does not look good. Godox sells a separate round flash head (H200R), which is not mentioned in the review that you linked, but it probably won't fit the housing.

[FrancoisC]

A friend of mine is using a Nikon D7200 with Nikon SB800 strobes in homemade housings.

 

Some infos here (this is in french, but there are some pictures 🙂 )

https://www.forum-photosub.fr/forum/viewtopic.php?p=224459

[TimG]

Subal still make housings for some Canon and Nikon flashguns.

 

http://subal.com/c5c17/Light_Flash/Flash_Housings.aspx

[Phil Rudin]

All in for the strobe and housing is around $1000.00US and the sad news is that it fires fiber optically but only in manual mode and while I can see a number of controls on the rear of the housing the info page does not indicate if you can take advantage of any of the top side features like HSS, variable color temperature, wireless trigger and more. 

 

The Subal housings offer a five pin Nikon's type cord that at least allows TTL. 

 

 

[Pavel Kolpakov]

Land strobes underwater were an acceptable solution in the past. I used Nikon and Canon strobes in Subal housings. But it was many years ago. That era is long gone.

I support the previous answers about some disadvantages of land strobes underwater nowadays. Usually the list is following:

- The 2 land strobes in a pair (paralleled on a HotShoe interface) cannot communicate with a camera for TTL / HSS and other functionality, intellectual protocol totally doesn't work. Only manual flash is available by the central contact grounding. As for me, this is a main problem. Of course, some solutions are exist for this, but not simple.

- Using a land strobe, an electric sync cord is necessary for communication with the camera. Electric cords underwater are not reliable enough, often get damages, leakages etc. We prefer to use mainly fiber optics nowadays.

- Some more difficult to change batteries in the land strobe installed inside the housing, comparing to underwater strobe.

- Land strobe functionality is some restricted because of the few buttons on the strobe housing.

- Many underwater strobes are more powerful, than land strobes. This is typical.

- The size and weight of the land strobe+housing usually are bigger than underwater strobe of the same power. This is important for traveling.

- The complete set of land strobe+housing has the similar price or more expensive, than underwater strobe.

 

Nowadays, i would use a land strobe in underwater housing just for interest, but only 1 strobe (not a pair). I love to use retro equipment sometimes, it reminds me about the past.