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I mostly use the cooler bags to transport my camera to and from dive boats to pad and protect.

For my upcoming Cozumel trip, I’m planning to use the AO cooler as both a tote and a rinse tank, instead of bringing a separate mesh bag. For the flights, I’ll fold it in half, vacuum pack it, and tuck it into the front pocket of my suitcase, though I could also use it as a carry-on or to line another bag. For diving, I’ll place a 10L nylon dry sack inside and use it to transport my gear to and from the boat. Once on the boat, the dry sack comes out and the cooler gets filled with fresh water as a rinse tank, as suggested by the dive shop. After the dive, I’ll dump the water, pack my wet wetsuit and other gear inside along with the dry sack, and take it back to the hotel, while leaving my BCD, reg, and fins on the boat.

Hello! I'm new to the forums and a diver and underwater photographer, and I've been building a desktop app called Pelagic, basically a dive logbook and photo organiser rolled into one, with a few bells and whistles attached. The idea came from being frustrated with having dive logs in one place, photos in another, and species IDs scattered across notes etc. So in theory it connects to 60+ dive computers (Shearwater, Suunto, Garmin, Scubapro, Mares, etc.) using the open source libdivecomputer library although I've only managed to test my Suunto eon core and garmin files so far. Once you've imported your dives and added them to a trip, you can add your photos and as long as your dive computer time/date and your camera's are somewhat synced up it will automatically sort your photos into the imported dives. Once imported to your photo library you can tag species with common and scientific names, add a google gemini API key for AI ID, and writes all the metadata back to your images as XMP so it survives into Lightroom or whatever your editing workflow is, speaking of which you can launch your preferred editor directly from the app. Once edited Pelagic will track the edited file and import it back into the app enabling you to side by side compare the raw and edited versions. There's also a built-in community map, a global database of dive sites contributed by Pelagic users. All data is anonymous so no usernames or personal info are attached to submissions. You can browse dive sites, see what species have been spotted there, and check depth ranges where sightings occurred. It's the kind of thing that's genuinely useful for trip planning or if you're heading to a new area you can pull up nearby sites and see recent observations. It works the other way too, after your dives, your species tags feed back into the database so the next person planning a trip benefits from your data. The whole thing runs on the idea that shared, anonymous sighting data makes everyone's diving better. There's also an equipment tracking system, you can catalog all your dive and camera gear with brand, model, serial numbers, and purchase dates. You can group items into equipment sets (like your cold water kit vs. tropical setup, or your macro rig vs. wide angle), so you've got a quick record of what you took on each trip and it all stays in the log history. Handy for insurance purposes, keeping track of service intervals. Still actively developing it and there's a ton more features I haven't covered here. Always looking for feedback from other UW shooters on what would actually be useful and what you find easy/hard, intuitive/unintuitive etc. It's completely open source and free, the code is here https://github.com/wyvernp/pelagic and can be downloaded from https://github.com/wyvernp/pelagic/releases. Anyway, looking hearing any feedback and being part of the community. Cheers!

Thank you for the warm welcome and for looking into the location issue!

Hi Wyvern, Welcome aboard! We look forward to knowing about your software. Just post about it. Regarding the location issue we will investigate ASAP. Ciao

Awesome! Landbased or liveaboard?

I was thinking the 1.4 would be good for Norway for orcas. The wacp-1 requires a 28mm so won't work. It seems like a nice lens but just to new. Was hoping one of you were excited about it too grab it and test 😂

Hey everyone! Just signed up, been lurking for a bit and figured it was time to say hello properly. From a diving perspective, I mostly enjoy muck and have recently upgraded to an A7r v after an unfortunate flood last year. Here to learn, and hopefully contribute. I have been developing a dive logging/photo managment desktop app, which I'll make a separate post about, would love to get some feedback on it. Quick heads up to the mods: the site seems to have grabbed my location as Sweden rather than the UK, so if you could update that for me I'd appreciate it! Wyvern

The AOI trigger (at least the Olympus one) is IR based, not much brightness to see. I have had NO issues with the AOI and the MF1 Bill the ==

I received the AO cooler today. It is quite large. I don't think I'll take it to Roatan, but I do think it will be nice for local CA diving.

Great video!

Probably no real advantage unless you really need the speed, but shooting wide open even in a 230mm dome is going to produce pretty horrible corners. Then there's the question about whether it plays well behind a dome and also if it will work behind a WACP-2, probably more likely to work on this optic than the WACP-1, the large front element can be the issue for these optics. The WACP-2 might be a chance as it works with the Sony 14mm f1.8.

Aloha, My name is Terry and I am an underwater photographer based in Hawaii. I am interested in the Canonn RF 14 1.4 for shooting sharks, people, whales, and orcas. The lowlight capes would be good for Norway for orcas I would assume. I am not sure what extension would be needed for a 230mm dome or a wacp-2 but if anyone has tested it or any insight I'm open to hear. I have one available near me so just debating if it's gonna be better then my 14-35 f4 or my 15-35 2.8.

Wow just wonderful! As much as I enjoyed your u/w shots I also really liked the drone and topside shots. Nice work!

I think for something this old that you probably need to print gears. You say zoom can sometimes can be adjusted, does that mean you have a zoom gear and it is slipping sometimes? You might be able to pack it out or otherwise adjust it so that it doesn't slip - how to do this would vary with the design of the zoom gear. If you need a zoom gear made you could try messaging on of our members @gudge as he prints zoom gears. It seems that the N90 doesn't allow for viewfinder diopter adjustment, seems to me that is the most important thing to get sorted before attacking anything else. It uses screw in diopetr adjustment eyepieces, so you would need to source one of the correct strength, or something like this might work? https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005007792504364.html Though if it is too thick it might not work. Is the viewfinder in focus outside of the housing? it is unclear from the attached document how the viewfinder is meant to work, does yours have an external eyepice On the aperture ring - not sure how this is setup in the housing - when you say it can't be adjusted - is there no control for it? Are you lacking a gear? what is on the inside of the aperture control knob? is it a gear or a wheel? If you can't solve the viewfinder it might simpler to look around for a different film camera model housing preferably one that takes "G" lenses where the aperture is adjusted electronically. Maybe an F100 or F80 ?

I agree working on the narration and music volumes will improve your video. Interesting to watch and as always, it's sad to witness the decline of our marine environment.

INON strobes have very sensitive fibre optic receivers, so triggering them tends to be very easy. to test you could try placing the fibre optic port directly over the trigger port on the housing. Also check the housing port by looking into it and triggering to see if seems bright or not, you could perhaps compare brightness to the TRT trigger. You say that it used to work with the TRT trigger, does it still work with that trigger? It's possible for example the LEDs are not well aligned on the housing ports.

Hello everyone, A colleague of mine is having problems with her Backscatter Mini Flash-1 and her new AOI housing for the Sony A7CII. I know that the MF-1 can be quite finicky when it comes to fiber optics, and problems are often related to the cable. I experienced this myself with my MF-1 and the manual Nauticam Sony trigger. However, I eventually found two cables with which the MF-1 almost always worked. My colleague is now having nothing but trouble with her new AOI housing for the Sony A7CII and the trigger. She has tried countless different fiber optic cables. Sometimes the MF-1 seems to work, and other times it doesn't. The INON flashes she still has work without any problems with all cables. The trigger is always in manual mode (WL ON). Could it be that the older MF-1 flashes are causing even more problems with the newer triggers? It worked perfectly with a TRT trigger I had previously used in a different enclosure. Or does anyone else have any ideas? I'm meeting with her again tomorrow and will take another look. And I think it would be best if she also asked Backscatter directly. But collective wisdom is usually even more helpful! Thanks in advance for any feedback, Tino

I have both the Cinebags grouper and the AO cooler. I like them both but for different reasons. The AO cooler is much thicker and provides superior padding when traveling around with my rig in the cooler. It also is much taller so you can get a housing with a monitor on the top to just tuck in. My zipper is still alive after a couple years. It does not travel super flat so harder to get to wherever one is going diving. However, when closed up with the flaps down it is a nice padding setup! The Cinebags - (now Kraken... somepoint would like to know how that happened)- is great for strobe + mirrorless housing and arms but no monitor. Plus it fits nicely in a XL Duffel bag (in particular a North Face one w/o wheels) so I use it as a packing divider for all of my camera stuff when flying/traveling to the dive site. It provides nice extra protection for float arms...all that kinda stuff for baggage handlers. When I get to my destination it then becomes my camera moving device on and around the boat but I am always right at the size limit for it with 180mm dome and a couple strobes. I don't do enough live aboard diving to have an opinion on using either as a rinse tank. I have definitely used both as rinse tanks on the dock at the end of a day of boat or shore diving to make sure they get a good wrinse.

I shoot the A1 with a 90mm and am very happy with it. I use it bare, with the SMC and EMWL without too many issues. Even with nudibranchs I always use continuous AF, we're always moving slightly, and enough to move you off critical focus at such close distances. For me, the key is learning which AF mode to use. For macro I use one of the spot modes and move the AF area as necessary for framing, if I'm shooting moving fish with the 90 I'll switch to a zone / tracking mode Once you get the right setting I'm pretty sure you'll find the hinting drops dramatically Mike

Hi The Subal system doesn’t use diopters to adjust the viewfinder optics. You need to adjust the diopter that’s on the camera and then just for the housing into the camera. There are no diopter adjustments on Subal viewfinder. And yes, you need a zoom ring to change a zoom setting. Autofocus changes the focussing do you don’t need a ring for that. For the zoom ring check out Subal.com. There are number of folks on this forum who print their own zoom rings using 3D printing. If you have the right camera in the right housing the main controls should line up perfectly. If they don’t it could be that the camera isn’t aligned quite right on the sledge. Occasionally you might get slight misalignments on a control or two which might require minor adjustments on a control rod. But such adjustments are, by my experience, not common on Subal housings. It’d be a bit like adjusting a Rolls Royce 😝 Another possibility is that you need to remove the rubber eyepiece on the camera before closing the housing and/or remove and kind of screen protector. Hope these help!

Me too!

Hey everyone, I've recently purchased an old Subal N99 housing for my Nikon F90x. The housing appears to be in fantastic condition, but when I secure the camera on the baseplate, and shut the housing, there are a few issues: Through the housing viewfinder, the camera viewfinder appears sufficiently out of focus as to make any attempts at photography impossible. My housing is not the deluxe edition, and therefore I do not have the option of adjusting the dioptre of the viewfinder. My suspicion is that I need some form of dioptre adjustment eyepiece for the camera itself, as the following image from the product brochure (https://www.marinfoto.no/subal/pdf/en99.pdf) shows some sort of larger eyepiece. The aperture ring cannot be adjusted within the housing (and the zoom can only sometimes be adjusted it seems). I expect I need to source/3D print some gears to solve these issues, but just want to make sure I'm on the right track here. I assume a zoom/focus gear sized for the aperture ring should do the trick there too? If anyone has any further information on sizing (Nikon 24-120mm 3.5-5.6 D) and/or can provide some good options on where to source these gears from, that would be great. Controls such as the on and off switch and mode wheel seem to be slightly out of reach of their respective levers/buttons - as thee only work sometimes (on/off switch will turn off reliably but not on) Hopefully this is enough information, but happy to provide more as needed. Cheers!

Welcome. When I first saw your username, I thought that someone had hacked me, lol.

🤣 you might be a better underwater image maker than me! It's been 10 years since I've took any serious camera underwater and from what I recall, very little of my on-land knowledge gets transferred underwater! In fact, I'm having to watch videos now of experts sharing tips :P