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Hi All, A quick post about an adaptation of the retra snoot I've implemented to improve functionality. Instead of using the slide masks, I've created a 3d printed iris that allows the snoot beam to adjusted on the fly from ~24mm down to about ~3mm. At 24mm, the iris is circular. At 3mm the iris is hex-oid. My snoot is set up for a sea and sea ys-d3, but i presume it would bolt between any standard retra snoot columnator and strobe mount. This may not be for everyone as you may want perfect circles, may want the full diameter beam, or you may want other shapes. But for me it seemed to work well. The iris unit is 3d printed in ASA. I did break the handle off on one dive and there is still room for design improvement, which im working through. I've only just returned from a trip and I'm yet to review my snooted photos, so will share these once I've made room and had a chance to review. Wanted to gauge whether this is something that retra snoot users are interested in.

The 6000 lumen video light is specced to be 110 deg wide, compared to the strobe coverage 160 deg with wide angle diffuser , the coverage without diffuser is not stated, I would guess it's maybe 130 deg based on my strobe?? The pilot light beam is narrower and I think designed for the snoot aiming. The short version is that if you are setup with standard strobe positions to minimise backscatter the pilot lights won't be pointinng at your subject. My approach to a focus light and assuming mostly strobe illumination is a torch with a 60 deg beam and about 400-700 lumens in the cold shoe of the housing. It's relatively dim so less likely to cause the fish to leave but easily enough for AF to grab focus within 1m or so from and also being so dim it doesn't show up in the images.

Yes, you can certainly be a gear head and it's fun to toss around various options and you can be just as much a gear head with m43 as FF. Interestingly all the moderator crew now shoot or have bought into m43 with 3 x OM-1s and a GH5 in use. Having said all that Davide's post to me is a reminder not to succumb to paralysis through analysis and have constant FOMO about not getting the very latest and greatest. The sensors these days are so good there really is no bad choice and it comes down to other things like lenses that are available, battery life, native sync speed etc, things you can tick off, rather than subjectively staring at test images and noise plots and confusing your self. Make a decision and starting using your new tools!

Yes, I totally agree. In this light, it's interesting to revisit the discussion in this September 2024 thread as well: https://waterpixels.net/forums/topic/1704-number-of-camera-sold-worldwide/ Let's see how how the prediction holds up in two years 👁️‍🗨️ Who knows, maybe by then we'll all have smart dive masks giving us augmented-reality dives in real time 😁 In the meantime, hold on to your hoverboards...

TimG I agree . I love the images I made with a Nikon D200 and D300. It is all about some skill and experience with your tool after all. I was wondering what you thought of the D800 ? Was it a camera you fell in love with at the time?

I missed that, was listening to the review with half my brain.

Definitely a “code brown” moment at first, but a very cool encounter. I’m amazed that the shark was so chill with you swimming alongside with lights. Thanks for sharing!

Did you get the DR21 studio version for ipad or computer ?

It has an A setting on the aperture ring allowing it to be controlled from the camera.

Looks like the aperture will require a gear of some sort

Yes we can..... From my point of view pictures and photos are work of art, not a technical discipline. Br Markus

Rembrandt and his underwater painting technique - should he have used 20MP brushes?

That is just it, you cannot have your cake and eat it too. Didn't that get somebodies head removed or was that "let them eat cake" or something! Anyways, to have a monitor or 45 degree VF and a dome, it is what it is. By going to the larger Maxi strobes which are neutral I was able to remove the outer float arms and just have bare skeleton arms outboard. View finder/monitor, no. Run and gun or jump and go, all of that stuff added negates the premise. In some future where I am exceedingly wealthy I will hire a porter to haul all my equipment about and when we see something photo worthy they will hand me my camera and assist. And serve as a model and set up off camera lighting. And if an OWT shows up hungry sacrifice themselves for benefit of my escape!

Partially plastic, not that there is anything wrong with that! The front end is aluminum and acts as a heat sink. The rest of the body is very tough plastic that does not scratch and dent like aluminum body strobes do.

Basically no. The video light is on a programable switch position that is via the Retra app specified to be TTL cancel or the video light. Either but not both. And the programmable mode (U) position is on the mode dial and power is set on the strobe power dial. The focus light is available in all modes via a push of the center button a two power levels. And, yes, it does shut off when the strobe is triggered. I find both focus lights to be adequate for lighting my way through swim throughs or a night dive. I do not think the HF1 can do that either but I admit to not being particularly smitten with it once I found out it had no support for Canon/Nikon and Sony only via yet another $ trigger and no universal TTL. And it is plastic, yuk.

Serendipity. Nothing is better. Amazing footage and great patience letting her relax and the encounter happen. And your breathing rate stayed steady.... makes everyone smile who is lucky enough to see this. Thank you.

The Maxi video light mode is exclusive of the Flash. Pretty sure the HF-1 is the same.

Thank you @Nando Diver Now I've DR21 studio version. I bought DCTL by xtremestuff too, as you suggested. Do you use GP-TUNE+ Transform? I suppose + has more controls not very effective in my case. Last but not least, a LUT is also provided together the DCTL: I suppose LUT is not necessary using DCTL as first node. Bye Giacomo

I couldn't agree more. Often technological replacement is confused with the extinction of an entire sector. The idea that smartphones would completely wipe out cameras was based on the assumption that taking a picture is just recording pixels. Following this linear reasoning, if the phone takes good photos for 99 percent of daily situations, the dedicated camera no longer has a reason to exist. Instead, something very similar to what happened in the music market with vinyl is happening. The more mobile photography becomes automated, compressed, and dominated by aggressive computational algorithms, the more people rediscover the value of the physical object, manual control, and an image with a natural optical rendering. "organic" 😁 Just look at kodak and film stocks. it was declared dead but now a lot of movie are shot again on film stock. The phenomenon of the Fujifilm X100 series and Ricoh GR is explained precisely like this: Fuji has intercepted a huge audience that wants the "organic" shooting experience and ready-to-use color rendering, without necessarily having to spend the evening developing RAW files on a monitor. The overtake of Nikon in terms of volumes tells exactly this change of priority in the consumer market. I guess that most of the X100 and GR customers comes form smartphones and not from hard core photography. The roles have simply sorted themselves out in the end. The smartphone acts as an omnipresent visual notepad and finances technological research on sensors, the dedicated camera remains the tool of those who look for deliberate action and control of parameters, and action cams and products like the Osmo Pocket have taken the place of old camcorders for mobile video. Smartphones may cannibalize large numbers, but they will hardly erase dedicated tools as long as the latter continue to offer a user experience that a flat touch glass can never replicate.

While it's tiny, it's a prime lens so you will not get the flexibility of a fisheye zoom and TC

Yes certainly but ours is a niche need. In normal photography today HDR is used. But surely underwater photography will benefit from it too. We need to keep an eye on the reviews of the new high end Chinese phones coming at the end of the year that will use Sony and Omnivision sensors.

This, and other native Sony FE (zoom) fisheye lenses, look great, since they are smaller compared to the adapted Canon 8-15mm. The question to me is, however, whether they accept TCs and if yes, whether they provide acceptable IQ...

You say that this technology changes little for photography, but would it not be a hughe benefit against the blown out sunballs in WA photos?

I have never owned a MFO-1, but I am/was using adapted Canon 100mm IS macro/Sony 90mm macro/Sony 100mm macro on the Sony A7RV. Even with the adapted Canon 100mm macro AF was o.k, but a liga below the native lenses. AF is great both with Sony 90mm and Sony 100mm on this camera body, but there were several complaints that AF is slow/pumping on Sony A7RIV and downwards. AF may be even better with A7RVI and it should be on par with A7RV on the A7RC, but I did not use this camera ever... In the MFO-1 portchard (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YcKS767I57nPedgq5vG3WVlElsp3XVLF/view) the Sony 28-60mm is not listed as compatible/tested, probably not useful for this lens (AF from the model A7RV upwards is very capable without any special diopters, however) I started by using the back LCD on my first UW camera, an Olympus EM5II (and previously the Panasonic TZ5 and Olympus EPL-7 from my wife). Upon upgrading to EM1II, I got a 45° viewfinder together with the second hand Nauticam housing. Since then I greatly enjoy using it (also now with Sony A7RV). It helps a lot in getting a slightly upwards from the bottom perspective without bending body and neck too much... I would not switch back to a plastic housing these days (e.g. like the initial Panasonic and Olympus housings of my wife, that I could use occasionally). My first alu housing (EM5II) was Nauticam (at this time very good quality (what is still the case) at a low price (unfortunately not valid any more)). Since then I use Nauticam. I presumably will not switch to Isotta or Marelux upon updating to a newer camera model, since (i) I know Nauticam as reliable and very ergonomic (I cannot say about the other brands, I never used one) and (ii) when switching to another brand I would have to deal with adapters for my other gear, i.e. (dome)ports, extensions, wetlenses, that is more expensive than just a bare housing ...

Interesting. By chance have you tested 28-60+MFO-1, mostly to see if the wet lens improves auto-focus ?