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Chopstick and sandpaper. Wrap a bit of fine grit sandpaper on the fat end of a wooden chopstick and secure it with a rubber band. Lightly sand the contacts at the bottom of the battery compartment. Maybe spray on some contact cleaner or isopropyl alcohol. Clean it up with a fine microfiber glasses cleaning cloth on a chopstick with more alcohol. Do the same on the cap contacts AND the battery contacts themselves. Dissimilar metal oxidation is the root of many non-flood electric problems. I see it in all of my strobes and lights over time. Copper on the device and aluminum on the battery in most of them. This is why lots of electronics products use gold platted contacts. I wish i could pay an extra fee to gold plate all of my strobe products! It probably only costs pennies to do this in bulk.

I have that problem with the Retra LSD 😉

We recommend the Wide angle diffusers for the Maxi, primarily because the Maxi has cooler light output by default and those diffusers help warm it up. Quality of light is coverage, color temperature and distribution.

I am just wondering how you managed to clean the contacts of your HF-1s after the flooding... The reason I am asking is that I recently had a problem with both of my HF-1s that are now almost 2 years old: I did not flood the battery compartments, nor did I drop droplets of (salt)water on the contacts. Both flashes stopped working during my last trip to Tansania in November 25. After sending photos of the contacts to Backscatter it was decided that the problem is some kind of "stain" on the contacts, arising from corrosion. The (very kind) service department of Backscatter said that this "corrosion" can built up just from humidity or other kind of moisture, no flooding or water droplets required... The flashes are now at Backscatter for repair (the contacts will become exchanged), but I am afraid that this phenomenon will come again. I am not aware what I did wrong. I tread the HF-1s the same way as I was treating five S&S YS-D2 and four Z330 before and these strobes never made any problems with their contacts. => It would be great to know an efficient procedure for contact cleaning that I could do also during a diving holiday abroad (last one was not so revealing when making photos with the single remaining MF-2 (o.k., I could practice a lot of macro snooting, to say something positive on that issue)...🙄). Thank you, Wolfgang

Hi Luwellyn, Welcome aboard!

Hi. On a previous forum there was a guy that said he did modification to his canon 350D ikelite housing to fit a 400D. Does anyone perhaps have photos available or know where i can go and look?

Hola Maria, me alegro de que te guten. Thank's for comment ;-)

What is, exactly, meant with "quality of light"? More even light distribution across the entire area with the Pro Max? Warmer color temperature with the Pro Max (Can you say with wich diffusers the warm temperature of the Pro Max can be produced (or the temperature of HF-1s with the 4500K diffusers)? Thanks, Wolfgang

Soooo cute, brilliantly done. Thanks for sharing :) - sure made me chuckle today!

Thanks Bill - I have more time than money but unfortunately I'm also quite clumsy when it comes to this kind of stuff, so might need to reconsider. It sounds like a disaster in the making. AOI hasn't got back to me about conditions since my last email. cheers

Amazing Edit!

Hello everyone, Here’s a short clip I shot recently on Okinawa Main Island, a cute little jawfish hard at work on his burrow (🎧 sound on please 👷) Shot on the good ol'Panasonic LX10 compact in 4K 30 fps (with some upgraded 1080p 60 fps footage used for slow motion during the rock-spitting sequences) Lighting was two Kraken Hydra 8000-lumen lights and one Backscatter MW4300, as well as a remotely mounted Kraken Hydra 1500. I used a Nauticam CMC-1 for most shots (so yes, I was very close), and an AOI / Fantasea UCL-05 +6 on others. Cheers, and keep on diggin’ Ben

Thank you Phil, very informative as usual!

And when you are back, they say: Is that a MFO-3 in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me?

I have been following the progress of the maxis and the recent updates have been very timely for me. I recently became interested in trying some video and have been trying to figure out the best way to deal with the lighting requirements. I have looked at a number of products and the maxis look interesting. However, I will not be purchasing these at least until a USA retailer can supply them. On my last Retra purchase, DHL charged me duty and miscellaneous fees that was 17% of the price of the strobes, even though underwater strobes should be exempt from duty under U.S. laws, or at most subject to a minor duty of about 5%, if mis-characterized under the tariff schedule. Assuming DHL did that again, that would be a $425 additional charge on the Maxi, making it the same price or less to buy locally. When this happened previously, and I tried to discuss it with DHL, they simply told me to pay up within something like 48 hours or they would ship the strobes back to Retra. More recently, I ordered a product from a reputable store in the Netherlands. It was shipped via DHL and simply disappeared in transit and DHL was useless as they have no real USA customer service program. Seller suffered the loss. So, I avoid DHL whenever possible and especially on a $2500 purchase. Okay, well, rant over and I don't blame Retra for any of the DHL issues and I like their products. So, I am anxiously awaiting more testing and product availability in the USA for possible future purchase. I guess the real question is if I were to take the Maxi strobes/lights on a trip, would I miss the the Pro Max and if so how much? I bet Retra could make a killer of a small, bright video/focus light....

I snapped up a second one a few months ago myself! I use one for my 140mm dome with 8-15mm and the other on a 60+20 macro port. I didn't want to have to move the 20mm extension back and forth.

Yup, exactly why I am looking for a used one! It's crazy the pricing.

Have you seen what Nauticam is charging for these nowadays? ☹️

Stopping down that far would be a real non-starter with how little light I have available. I wonder if the Weefine version has the same issues. I assume the MFO-3 works fairly well wide open.

Howdy all, I am looking for a Nauticam N120 extension 20 for sale. If you've gotten one please drop me a line! Thanks! Scott

The port charts list the two 30mm macros and the 12-50 so it seems it would work with the 45mm. I'd estimate the field would be be a bit wider than the 12-50 - about 24mm FF equivalent in terms of horizontal field. The MWL seems like a great idea but never really took off and there is probably a reason for that. For one thing it is said it needs to stop down to f16 to be at its best which is well into diffraction softness with m43. It seems not too dis-similar to my situation in Sydney, I mostly dive Macro and regularly see things that would benefit from the MFO3, but possibly might see a big subject - a grey nurse shark shows up occasionally as do other things like wobbegongs, large rays etc. I still dive with the macro setup and now the MFO3 as it covers 95% of what I shoot very well. There is FOMO of course but I'd rather have a system that does well on the most common subjects. I'll occasionally dive with something wider at this site.

Yeah, I've had that problem with the shorts, too 😁.

No I don't have a tether, just need to pay attention when mounting the lens. It's worked OK so far. I used cargo shorts in lembeh, but reverted to a dock on the float arm diving in Sydney. The weight of the lens causes the shorts to fall down over time when walking any distance - not an issue when you are just falling off a boat but a real problem shore diving.

@Maria Munn those are great images. Which strobes from Inon did you use?