All Activity

Very well said

You need to delay the price increase until the 1st of October! My copper mine shares haven't reached the top yet.

Quick heads-up for anyone who has been on the fence about the new Retra Maxi strobes: Launch pricing for both versions (with and without the video light) ends on September 1st. After that, prices will increase, so this is the last chance to order at the current launch price: https://www.retra-uwt.com/products/retra-maxi

Guys, I am jumping into this discussion about Full Frame for the last time just to share a very personal thought, without any intention of convincing anyone. As we always say, we agree to disagree: the great thing is that everyone is completely free to choose and use the system they feel best with in the water. There is no absolute truth to impose. I find the video posted by @Christian K very insightful. @Alex_Mustard and @MatthewSullivan review what they consider to be the most iconic underwater photos, taken from the book celebrating 60 years of the Wildlife Photographer of the Year. What makes you think is that many of those photos, which we still consider absolute masterpieces today, were taken several years ago. In the video you can see shots like Doug Perrine shark in the sardine run or Brian Skerry incredible encounter with the right whale. The cameras used for those shots were prehistoric compared to today. They had a fraction of the megapixels and a dynamic range that would make people laugh today. Yet, do we really think that any random photographer today, just because they bought the latest top model with 15 stops of DR, is able to take better photos than the ones David Doubilet took fifteen years ago? Following this logic, photos in the future will always be better than those from the past. Yet the history of photography teaches us the opposite. Often on forums we focus so much on the specs, and I completely understand that having the top technology is appealing. But I believe that in practical use, the technical differences between the various formats affect the final result only in a very small way. The reality is that our limits as photographers almost always arrive way before the limits of the gear. Very few people can really push the capabilities of the camera in their hands to the extreme. Underwater, physics and water skills rule. You can have the most advanced sensor on the market, but if you do not know how to approach the subject properly, the water column will eat up your colors and contrast. If you do not know how to position your strobes correctly, you will get a flat image or a wall of backscatter, regardless of the size of the sensor. Modern technology is fantastic because it makes our lives easier, drastically increases the success rate of our shots, and forgives mistakes that previously ruined a photo. But aesthetics, composition, and light management are not included in the price of the sensor. Because of this, I believe that arguing over sensor format is a bit pointless. Let us enjoy the gear we chose, whatever it is, and let us focus on getting our housings wet.

Interesting lens, but the shade hood can't be removed. Is that going to be a problem in a housing? ANd what about using it on an aps-c camera? ANy disadvatages. FOV will be smaller.

In the review you state that the Retra MAxi's don't feel large under water. What about travelling with them? They are rather big and each of them weigh over 1 kg adding a lot of weight to the luggage. I'm doubting about a new strobe since one of mey YS-D2J's have died. Thanks,

Cheers! Will be interesting to see how I go! Hopefully I don't get too many garbage in...

Ah OK. My memory might be too fuzzy to remember... I'll blame all of those all-nighters on Tuesday nights at Cha Cha's nightclub in Hurghada back in the late 80's / early 90's😀

I could be mis-remembering, but I seem to remember them being involved at a manta ray cleaning station.

It's not so much the software, it's physics. By the time the part that is further away comes into focus, the closer part is badly out of focus and partly obstructing being able to see the further part. They provide two main stack methods (3 in total) One is better at avoiding the blurs of foreground objects the other better at avoiding haloes around the perimeter of the object. You can use one method to re-touch the stack made by the other method. But it has limitations and if subject parts are too far apart (in distance to the camera) it eventually becomes too hard to re-touch. Then there's the garbage in garbage out problem, setting up the stack can be challenging and it's easy to mistake which object you want to place in focus for the starting point of the stack. and it can be hard to detect if you captured everything in fine focus just looking at the small screen, particularly if your vision in not 20/20.

Hello everyone, I see what i think is the extended back-end, original Nikonos 15mm repair manual above. Does anyone happen to have the later N version of the lens repair manual they could share here or privately? TIA!

Interesting! Have you found any software that is better than Helicon?

Yes, Helicon, it does a good job but has its limitations. First it's only as good as the frames you feed, second you need to work out how to re-touch , any crossing parts of the subjects at different distances will generate haloes, sometimes fixable in Helicon, sometimes requires cloning in photoshop.

Very nice!! We get a very similar species down here in winter and they make spectacular subjects!

Many many thanks for running all of those tests! That gives me an absolute ton of useful information to work with. It is obviously going to take some work to get things up to around 8 frames per second. I guess besides increasing the ISO or lowering strobe power to get the frame rate I need, the other answer would be to add more strobes😀 Or for really still invertebrate subjects use longer exposure times and video lights.

Not my footage so please don't critique, but really interesting - I have never seen or heard of Emperor Angelfish acting as cleaner fish! https://www.facebook.com/reel/1457512566216158

A lot of great information in this thread. I would only suggest that between the A7cII and the A7r, the extra mpix will be very welcome for the task you propose and the a7r will be less limiting. It has been mentioned numerous times that TTL is important, but I would point out that the most expensive part of this is the TTL adapter that will work with whatever strobe you want. The simplicity of just having the correct exposure across those different fish is pretty key. And having bought a non-TTL and then a TTL... I went the most expensive route possible. With a strobe, you light it up for such a short period of time it freezes the action even if there is movement. Not so with a video light so that also means greater success with a strobe compared to a video light if the fish decide to move at all. My other thought, is a 180 dome floating around while you are trying to catch fish is a great way to get it beat up quick and a PITA. A flat port will be less likely to get scratched and that maybe of importance when deciding on your rig.

According to the Nauticam portcharts, the Sony 28-60mm behind Nauticam N100 45 flat port gives up to 0,9x magnification and working distances between 55-80mm with CMC-1, while CMC-2 gives up to 0,7x and distances of 83-135mm (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1caMOa2cyCxucdcAiI8q9UsUu1YEg9ImC/view) In addition, 28mm is probably the widest what one would want behind a flat port. (I use Sony 28-60mm behind WACP-C, but never used it behind a flat port and/or with diopters, so what I say is theoretical)...

Meet the upcoming QRS-02-MB7, designed for the GoPro Mission 1 and Mission 1 Pro Protective Housings. The hugely popular QRS-02 quick-release mount, will soon be available for GoPro Mission users. Compatible AOI lenses: UWL-03 | UWL-03 MKii | UCL-03

Something might be coming

As UW photographers, we shoot a whole system. And we shoot in water. Singeling out one part like the sensor, a lens, the camera model, port/dome, etc will not always be productive. I think this episode of the UWP show gives some perspective and food for thought. Many images shot with equipment way inferior to what we have today. My fav of the lot is shot on a 12 mp aps-c sensor, noisy as hell. It’s fun to measurbate, but it won’t produce anything. YMMV.

I would not recommend the Sony 20-70mm behind a flat port because other choices are so much better. I have tested the Sony FE 28-60 with the flat port using CMC-1 and two CMC-1's stacked. Remember the 28-60 only focuses to 30cm with 1:6.25 magnification so the added closeup lenses only get you to about 1:2.5. If you are looking for more magnification than the 20-70 or Sigma 20-200mm give you the macro range of lenses are a better choice with the Sony FE 100mm F/2.8 being the best followed by the Tamron 90 and Sony 90mm's. Regarding the Sony FE 50mm macro now well over a decade old my recommendation would be the Marelux MV-60 or if you want everything Nauticam the MFO-3 on a flip adapter for both super macro and wider on the same dive. The MFO-3 works from 0-150cm while the MV-60 works from 0-infinity, the reason Tom Kline got his for the added distance.

This lens is now available in the online store for $449.00USD. Christopher Frost has posted a Youtube review and states the corners are better from around F/2.8 to F/11 than the manual FF version he tested. No way to mount filters but overall not bad for the price.