bghazzal

19 hours ago, OneYellowTang said:

@Davide DB

Well said, however there is a bit of revisionist history in the argument you make.

Apple was not the first company to create a smart phone, and actually there were Android devices availabe on the market (made by Danger) before the first iPhone was released. I understand the argument you are making, but both Japan and Korea had internet enabled "smart" phones (with app stores widely available) well before the iPhone. Several of the manufacturers still exist today (although most now standardize on Android).

Apple did well to consolidate the market, however only a small bit of this was due to technology, the rest was through coerce the "app ecosystem" to within a walled garden (the app store).

Hmm, are you talking about imode enabled phones for Japan?
These certainly predated the iphone and smartphones by a few years, but also didn't really compare to smartphones and apps from what I remember...
It was basic email + browsing (and a manga / book reading app) and not much else. No real app store (or apps...) to download.
Which was certainly ahead of its time (a bit like the French Minitel network vs. home internet, ever heard of it?), but very limited and quite a different environment.
imode was also introduced in France just a couple of years before the smartphone explosion, by Bouygues Telecom if I remember correctly. It was slooooooow, but sometimes you could check email and (sometimes) load a webpage...

I remember when I started going to Japan, Japanese phones were more advanced, with colour cameras, then video when we had the first still still cameras... Very cool.
 

And then... smartphones happened in Europe.
And all of a sudden my cheap smartphone became and object of interest in Japan, 2009 maybe, I don't really remember - as the imode operating clamshell phones and carrier protectionism meant smartphones were introduced later, much later in Japan....
People were asking to see my phone, and really impressed as these kind of phones were not available on the Japanese market.
Not sold, but also not useable on Japanese carrier networks - SIM cards, for instance, are a recent introduction in Japan (which was a deliberate move to secure the domestic market)

It was a little bit sad, to see Japan lagging behind so much after being such a symbol of advanced technology... Really felt like the end of an era...

Another thing I remember is that in the early days, after Android / Apple smartphones were finally introduced, it that Japanese users had to pay to dowload/use even basic apps.

I would show all these apps to my sister-in-law before realising that the Android "playstore" or whatever what they were accessing through their carrier was called required payment to download, and for most apps (including youtube, gmail...) a monthly payment IIRC...
This lasted a bit before it was normalised like elsewhere.

People were shocked we didn't have to pay to download apps and or to use them for the most part, just data quotas.... 😅

Another fun fact about Japan is that carriers actually rebranded Korean (Samsung) phones for the Japanese market at first - so Samsung Galaxy phones were rebranded as "Docomo phones", with no Samsung brand or model name, and sold directly by carriers on the domestic market - so as not to underline how behind Japan now was... This was a little weird as well...

Bu things have changed - my current Japanese smartphone is a Chinese Oppo, which I got free bundled with a Docomo-linked subsidiary carrier subscription (OCN) - however, as i just found out, the Oppo models sold in Japan are not sold in SE Asia, so my efforts to change get the battery changed (which is very easy to do in Kuala Lumpur) all failed...
So there's still a bit of protectionism there I guess.

And nowadays, other than home-based monthly internet subscriptions, internet access is still ridiculously expensive in Japan compared to Europe or S.E. Asia, and with low data quotas...

Just to give an example, my Japanese phone has one of the cheapest plans, which is 500 Mb of data per month, for around 8 euros per month...

3 hours ago, sinetwo said:

What would people recommend as a gilet, vest or hoodie? I really dislike the fisherman look, and my Ayegear hoodie sags so much when I put in anything with weight in it that it's a complete dead giveaway 😂 

We got some nice light multipocket vests at a store selling outdoor working clothes in Japan (workman), and usually wear those under a standard hoodie and/or rainjacket depending on how strong the airconditioning is in the airport.

Otherwise look into military-ish "tactical" gear (after all, body-carrying gear to survive a carry-on luggage check is a tactic...)
I you're worried about looks, what works fine as well isjust transfer everything back to the roller after check-in (if you're not expecting a weigh-in at the gate or elsewhere, that is).

The main control point is usually the check-in (though airports like KLIA2 will has an set filtering gate after checking with staff and scales, which you have to go through to access immigration and security), and some low-cost carriers (Jetstar for instance) can do visual based weight checks at the gate.

cheers

17 hours ago, sinetwo said:

Interestingly I was just looking at this. 

 

I'm probably getting the AOI wide lens, as it'll help me do close focus wide angle style shots. 

 

However, the only macro specific lens I could find was the Macromate +15? The corners (which are HUGE!) look really bad in all the footage I've seen. 

 

Is there an option here to film in 5.3K, use the macromate +15, and then crop to 4K to enable more center sharpness? 

 

I'd love to hear about, or ideally see, gopro macro capabilities. I'm off to Tulamben soon and I'm thinking of entering the video part of the competition for the first time ☺ 

 I recently sold my Macromate+15 - the original idea was for it to be used in narrow mode - then as GoPros were updated, you were supposed to zoom in, which caused problems as the zoom was touch-screen controlled and would reset.

That said, you can use it in linear and get ok results. It's just very fiddly, because it's difficult to nail the correct focusing distance.

The Inon accessory focus brackets seen here would certainly help:

as would the new focus peaking functions which have been introduced.

I didn't get conclusive results when I played around with cropping in, but there was no 5.3K at the time.

The newer AOI / Inon lenses are probably easier to use than the Macromate, with less corner distortion.

For Tulamben, you'll have a lot of nudis which are both a little boring on film but also not super difficult to shoot - a tripod would be preferable. More mobile subjects like ghostpipe fish or active frogfish might be a little trickier in terms of focus, but with peaking, who knows.
Just look into it and play around with focusing before the shoot - you'll find tons of still pictures of Tulamben subjects here, for video there a few of mine here , but these are on a compact (I mostly dive in Amed now, as it's more flexible for me).
I actually sold my MacroMate to Fresh Fins diving in Amed, and the owner is mostly shooting on a a GoPro with the Macromate in Amed and Tulamben, so take a look at his footage here: https://www.instagram.com/freshfinsdiving/

Let us know how it goes, macro on the GoPro has always been tricky, but the newly introduced focus peaking function might be what we were waiting for...

cheers

ben

6 hours ago, Davide DB said:

Very serious!

You are condemned to Dante's circle of videographers!

😱

"I see... Canon colours..."

9 hours ago, Luko said:

 

May be I'm wrong but since the first Leica came out with the 35mm format (that was exactly 100 years ago btw) there was no other significant and successful miniaturization in the history of pro/prosumer photography (except for spy cameras if that counts as professional usage...almost forgot the lame analog APS-C try that started pushing Kodak towards the edge of the cliff.).

A sort of analog optics glass ceiling, pardon the pun?  I dunno... but it seems the history of optics was always in the direction of "the bigger the better".

 

On the other hand integrated computational functionalities will need a wider screen (that is to say if you want to control them, otherwise all the craft is in the machine & back to square one : smaller but powerful Smartphones win, why bother.) that's how SmartPhone sizes are getting bigger btw, so I guess any development in that direction would fall into a size tradeoff or a change of paradigm rather than a pure evolution.   

 

Yes - but we’re also considering  computational functionalities replacing traditionnal optics, right? In the same way that a smartphone’s tiny lens always you to do away with glass and get good results.

Same goes for lighting, as strobes / lights will no longer be necessary thanks to computing power. So future dedicated devices (cameras) will no doubt be greatly miniaturised as well, which has great implications for underwater imaging.
If we take it even further, screens will probably be replaced by lens integration, like the budding vision-pro technology.
But this far ahead, we might not even be talking about devices per se - like cameras, smartphones will also be long gone 😄

ah the joys of anticipation...

 

9 hours ago, Luko said:

 

How I see it, there might be a much smaller niche than currently. If you roughly try segmenting the market :

- UWP consumer/beginner : I only have very little doubts on the fact the smartphone will overtake the digital photo market within the next 5 years.

- UWP prosumers  including most of ourselves on this board. Probably a matter of 10 years, there is currently an ongoing switch from dSLR to the still new MIL cameras that will curb the adoption cycle for the next 5 years or so, what will be the next replacement in 10 years? Just time for the UW accessories to develop.

- UWP professionals/film makers : that niche I was talking about, 8.000$ worth per optic, RED cameras etc. Not for me, not for you, 10% on this board maybe? Probably the last virus infested niche. Brands will paraphrase "Professionals, how many divisions have they got?".

 

A point where I don't fully agree is the concept of generalist/non dedicated tools differenciation in the vast history of tech evolution. I'm afraid it's only a semantic criteria to differenciate "us" from "them" at certain periods of the evolution (ie the "Who knows" from the "who doesn't").

To me it's more how it is used than what it was made for, ie. what was the computer made for before digital photography : generalist or dedicated use? Sometimes the tech can drive the usage.   

 

Timeline noted, and time will tell - I believe dedicated cameras that are not smartphones will survice in some form or another, and that we might actually be reaching peak smartphone multifunctionality.

Saying this I'm aware that the odds look very small, but I've said it and look forward to being proved wrong if I have enough time to see it through.

As stated, I’m really discussing here is current smartphone use, which, to simplify, is using a non-dedicated (= not designed from the ground up for imaging purposes) generalist (=which does many other things other than imaging) device with a great photo functionalities, but also one not specifically designed for the purpose.

However, if I'm not mistaken, using a non-dedicated device for imaging is also a first (ie cameras, no matter how portable or throw-away they might have been, were cameras only).

The sheer practicality if it has swept compact cameras away, we definitely agree - and it's only logical, after all carrying cameras in bags or pockets was always a nuisance for people who didn't really make a hobby out of it, so replacing them with a device  people will carry with them all day long was a no-brainer.

Yet again, that said I do have doubts that his trend will mean hobbyist photographer’s primary tool will be non-dedicated generalist (ie- that does everything and more) Swiss-army knife smartphones - and even more so for underwater imaging... But who knows, maybe the future is formless.

But at the moment, despite the odds, I still believe that dedicated imaging tool (let's just call them "cameras" if this is clearer) will prevail.
In a different form, yes, integrating technology which was designed to overcome smartphone photography limitations, yes.

But as I was writing above, I don't think hobbyists (not just prosumers, just people with an interest in taking pictures and video) will be shooting on smartphones in the future. Again, time will tell, and I'm curious.
And underwater after all, Angrybirds isgreat for long deco stops, so why not stream movies, read the news or chat with friends? Don't get me started on dive live streaming 😄

This is what I meant by dedicated vs. generalist tool - a tool built for imaging purposes.
It’s not really us and them, it’s more along the lines of do you want your frying pan to be your health monitor? Is it practical or does it also get in the way?
Do you need, or want the million non-imaging related functionalities in your primary underwater camera?
It might be a generational thing as well (read: old-fartism), but a lot of people around me are downsizing their multimedia multifunctional tool base, going back to more monofunctional relationships to objects, for a variety of reasons.
But again, this is probably generational, and a backlash to perceived current noise/signal ratios.

Back to smartphones instead of cameras, I totally see the appeal for impromptu shoots holiday snaps and all the rest, but would a hobbyist, with a passion for taking pictures or video underwater really want to bring their bank account, phone contacts, play Angrybirds, email with them to shoot underwater - even if it's perfectly safe to do so?

All the wonderful stuff that a phone does is also largely unnecessary for imaging purposes, and in a way limits the development of the tool (ergonomics for instance).

This is partly why I stubbornly believe non-generalist, dedicated imaging tools ("cameras" ) will survive the smartphone revolution in some form or another.

The computer is a good example of a generalist tool, which evolved out of dedicated calculation devices filling basements to using this calculation / processing power to run a variety different programs, thus allowing it to do different things.

The "office suit" was born (cue in memories of my the first Apple 2 in my dad's office...).

Does that mean you want the Adobe CS sofware suit in an airplane cockpit? not really.

However, and this is where it gets even more exciting, computer-based functionalities have then been integrated into dedicated tools - and this is pretty much how we arrived at digital photography cameras.

Similarly, I’m convinced functionalities designed to overcome limitations of camera phones will be integrated into future dedicated imaging tools (cameras), but that the smartphone won't kill dedicated imaging tools (cameras).


***

Regarding art, I'm probably not the right person to discuss this with 😅

My broad view on the subject is that Art with a capital A is a concept which evolved in a specific cultural and philosophical context, based on what were practical, functional practices, then “elevated” to a theoretically superior, transcendental plane.
But in many ways it is also a matter of perspective.

For music, as a social-anthropologist and ethnomusicologist, I also still see music as primarily functional activity (music in culture, music as culture).
Instruments, music production (and consumption) have all evolved radically in the past 50 years, since music production is now basically software/computer/sample based since the digital revolution changed everything.

However, some forms have undergone a deep freeze, thwarting their evolution, as they became set classical forms, instrumentation. They still evolve of course, but at a much slower pace.

Western classical music, for instance, also evolved out of functional practices (ceremonial, religious, entertainment…), which gradually settled in form and function.
Classical western music instruments as well, evolving into the form we know until the late 19th early 20th century.
And while it can certainly be appreciated as a pure Art form, it is nonetheless still deeply linked to social functions and practices (very interesting to work on the ethnography of the classical music concert or of the opera, for instance...)
Jazz is another example of a living cultural practice (again, deeply functional to begin with) settling into a classical form taught in conservatories.
And nowadays, same goes for electronic music for instance, etc...

My point here is not so much to correlate gear and artistry - I think you can do Art with a smartphone, DSLR camera, paintbrush or a pair of tweezers - and that the medium - any medium - will fall on a spectrum as to its relationship to the ideals of pure Artistic creation...
When it comes to underwater imaging, I'm actually more interested in naturalist documentation (with a bit of aesthetics sprinkled on to top for good measure of course), than in the artistic rendering of reality by a photographer's eye. Which is why, as much as I love an impactful picture, I still miss motion and favour moving pictures as my partial re-rendering of reality.
But that's another story 😅

 

Yes i hear all this, and agree it's definitely the trend, and I think everyone pretty much agrees with that.
Industry leaders, media, and pretty much everyone in the room here 😄

And the weight argument is certainly a good one - but this doesn't mean that cameras, miniaturisation, computational functions etc will not bring UW kits back to smaller, more manageable proportions.
 

What I do have my doubts about and am discussing here, is the replacement and eradication of dedicated imaging equipment by generalist, non-dedicated tools, especially of the smartphone-type.

But let's see - the technology is out there, and phone cameras are getting better by the month (week?), housings are available and pressure resistant phones are maybe already tested and out (if there's really a market for it, that is)

Which means that the smartphone underwater explosion should happen in the next, what, 3/4 years most? Maybe less?

It's fun to imagine the revolution for underwater imagery.
The younger generation will shoot on smartphones because this is what they know, what they do and also like (it's in their DNA, to use a tired corpo-trope, which stands for Digital NAtive, right?).
Tired veterans will make the switch, more or less reluctantly, because big rigs are cumbersome and heavy, airline luggage policies too restrictive, and anyway if they can do the same or better with their phones, so why even bother?
Software will make up for all those heavy, unnecessary, physical elements (such as optics and lights) anyway.

Remaining camera makers, holding on to their brand-names, will be trying to sell add-ons for phones or already filing for bankruptcy - housing manufacturers will only sell phone housings and lights (while this is still needed, since low-light functions will soon be fully handled by software making Stanley Kubrick's "Barry Lyndon" indoor shots look amateurish...).

Underwater imaging equipment will be reduced to a few online outlets, selling whatever specialised pieces of equipment are still (barely) needed and underwater drones for people who can't be bothered getting wet.
Professional applications will be upheld by action cam makers, non-banned equivalents of DJI, but even in this field it will all be almost all software (and light-field cameras 😁😁😁)

Sharing, social media (an old world word, since all media is now fundamentally social) will be showcasing a mixed bag of reality based content, and reality-derived content of all shapes and sizes, some with interactive functions enabled, others not.
BBC Blue Planet 10 will allow you be at the center of a baitball or see it through the eyes of a predator (but also offering a "visual only" version for artistic respectability, and pleasing the old farts still watching rather than interacting with the content)

And who knows, we might even be spending time in a metaverse that finally looks better than the one of Godzilla-attacked-Wendy's fame, and drone-based cars will be flying, at last. 😅


I'm well aware that since the iPhone was launched in 2007 and we got pictures of all the material products it could and has replaced -  this has become the doxa, the accepted obvious direction, a crossroad that only blinded fools like that photographer arguing that slides would never be replaced by digital pixels could misread.

the future is now

And we already have further ventures into generalistic, broad-sweeping interfaces aiming to further integrate what phones currently do into "augmented reality" (here's another word that smells fishily obsolete already...), think google glass or apple vision pro, but on steroids, where you can "do everything", including typing out your Minority Report, just by looking and pointing into thin air (life).

And implants, or less icky devices offering similar integration capacities, are probably not that far around the corner either, for always more integration, immersion, less is more.

So why would anyone want to hold an imaging-dedicated object like a camera in their hands? Who would bother, and why?

Underwater, won't the logical trend be to integrate cameras into dive masks and live-stream your dives?
It's not like camera integration hasn't been tried already, from go-pro mounts to integrated mask cams, to video "flashlights" like the Paralenz...
Less to carry, less to do, less to worry about = more pure, unadulterated fun, right?
less to do, more to live (© patent pending)
And I'm sure members of your daughter's generation cohort, her friends or maybe her kids, will use such devices at least a couple of times (if they can still fly somewhere on holidays, that is...).

Yet my point in all this is that I'm not totally convinced that all of this stampede-forward will rid us of dedicated physical imaging devices (ie "cameras") altogether.

Especially for hobbyists ("photographers") and professionals.
Something about form and function, practicality, a little on the same lines as to how Kodak mini-instamatics or Polaroids didn't kill the camera market, as some people thought they would at the time. They served a slightly different purpose.
I see smartphones (and their all-purpose, further integrated offsprings) and cameras (dedicated imaging devices) going along the same way - crossovers for sure, but not necessarily mutually exclusive. Maybe.

Same line of thinking goes for musical instruments perhaps? Were synthesizers, midi-instrument, ProTools and (argh) DJs, and even digital audio in general (from recording to Napsterized digital output) were revolutionary, but somehow also not the first nails in the coffin?

ProTools, recording studio killer

The Cartier-Bresson example is also an interesting one in that painting is a more physical activity than photography, a return to form but also to a more hands-on visual creation medium than clicking a shutter and developing prints will ever be (a beautiful irony is that photography was once anticipated to kill-off painting completely as a medium...)

And beyond the physical object, in a world soon completley saturated both by quality point-and-shoot an partially to fully computer-generated content, will there not be some sort of longing for a return of the physical, if not in the medium itself, at least in the tools used?

With iphones and other smartphones capable of taking award-winning pictures and shooting professional video, with action cams killing it  like never before -  why are interchangeable lens camera sales going up in Japan in 2023?
Is it just a glitch in the Matrix, a last dying hiccup of aging photographic-Mohicans before the curtain falls for good? Or is there something else going on there?

Also, for some odd-reason, I'm not sure sharing images on "social media", Instagram or other is actually the endgame for imaging. It certainly seems this way now, (after all, what else is there, print?) but I think there are also hints that things might evolve a little differently in the future.
 

I would just say: don't underestimate the backlash to the major, mainstream trends we see now. 
Especially when it comes to hobbies, personal time and more professional application.
But this is most likely the Butlerian-jihadist luddite in me speaking, of course 😄

"Nikonos-users of the world, unite!"


So I've done it - it's 2024 and I'm putting these crackpot ideas out there for you folks - or whoever might be accessing archives by then - to laugh at in 10 or 20 years, laughing at how wrong I was in doubting the smartphone and its multifunction integrated offsprings as the ultimate camera killer, in what will likely be a time where people will just be creating imaging content without actual subjects being shot, since they will just be choosing and working from captures from their 360° archived life-feed  (and making smashing composites on their first try, no doubt 😅)
A world where dedicated cameras/imaging device are no longer made or sold, and Cartier-Bresson would likely shun painting for prompt-based generative-art...


crappy open-source AI generated image of a boy with a smartphone.

Definitely for computational photography, but I don't think it will kill the dedicated-camera market.

Really interesting times - looking at the Nikkei graph posted in the other thread, illustrating the "penetration rate" of digital camera in Japanese households in 2023 makes it look like armaggedon for digital cameras.
But then the article I posted above also shows that the same 2023 was the also the first time in 13 years that the Japanese digital camera market experienced positive growth, with a 7% sales increase compared to the previous year, and this growth concerned interchangeable lens cameras (9% growth) and lenses of all things...

Statistics are very useful, but have to be approached with caution, and given context, meaning.

While camera functions on phones are great, let's not forget the primary function of smartphones is not photography, but clearly online media access and communication. This is what people use them the most for on a daily basis.

I'm confident cameras will become more phone-like in their features (computational features, automation, media sharing etc,), I doubt that phones will fully replace dedicated physical cameras for photographers.
Something about the dedicated physical object, form, lenses...

Sometimes I wonder if we're not already at peak smartphone, a form of saturation of the non-dedicated device that can do everything but also relies on limiting physical interfaces and ergonomics.
Beyond memory snaps and other social, interractive content, will imaging users, especially hoobyists, want more touch-screen / vocal commands, or return to the comfort of physical ergonomcs, handles triggers, balance.
Will users want even more automation, even less to do to capture images, or will this kill some of the interest? Phone touchscreens will soon be obsolete as an interface, thing headset mounted integration etc - but will this really "kill the camera" or will the dedicated camera just become (in a way like it already is), something else, another tool, with sligthly different purposes and persepectives?


Probably both will evolve in parallel, with smartphones filling, like they already do, the role of a compact, always available, memory snapping (and sharing) device - the new instamatic / polaroid - and likely biting into the action-cam market as well.
While dedicated photography / imaging equipement will continue to appeal to hobbyists and professionals.
This could be even more marked for specialist applications like underwater imaging.

ben

Blowing against the wind, and maybe totally mistaken, but do have my doubts as to whereas phones will really leave their mark on the underwater photography/video world.
 

Sure, smartphones killed compact cameras (which are also making a comeback of sorts at the moment, but this could just another retro-trend) yet there's a major difference, in that people usually have their phones with them during everyday life activities.

For diving, yes, people will bring their phones on a boat, but it's quite a step-up to build an UW imaging kit around a smartphone intended as your primary imaging device.

Yes, I know it works fine, and that people are doing it, that it would save having an extra device etc... I've seen recent phone housings even with filter attachements (Divevolk and others), and even if you counter this with an amazing dive video filmed on an iphone,I do have serious doubts as to whether this will really catch on.

At the moment there still is something of novelty to it, and it seems we're in a phase were gadgety products are one the rise in the underwater imaging world - so given phone sales, it seems natural that phone housings seem like the next big thing, and that phones (and AI capactities!) will sweep the UW imaging world like a tidal wave.

But again, something feels off, and it the anticipated explosion of demand doesn't really seem to be happening either...
So let's see in a few years, if we can  point the finger at my lack of foresight in this domain or not.

Why? Well I see the form factor as a drawback, also the fact that phones are not dedicated devices, plus maybe psychological reluctance to bring a phone underwater for diving, and having to deal with a proper housing etc...

There's also the fact that action cams exists and are easier to use in such a context, and also that people looking for more complex products / applications will probably be willing to invest time and momey in building a practical UW kit around a more specialist product than a phone, regardless of the phone's technical bells and whistles.

Same goes for underwater tablets and UW wireless data transmission... beyond professional applications, retailers and technology geeks, will people really bother?
 

At the moment it reminds me more of those soft "surf" vinyl housing intented for using DSLRS at the beach.
Works, some people bought them, but didn't really catch on for a number of reasons...

So I'll bookmark this and see if I was totally off-mark, and housing manufacturers will mostly be seeling phone (or whatever Swiss-army knife devices phones have evolved into) in a few years

cheers

As an unexpected follow-up to this adventure, the SUPE MS-10 replacement received above is now unuseable...

I would advise potential SUPE customers to be very careful, as there is clearly something wrong with at least some of the products in their range...

So here's the deal:

As explained above, the replacement SUPE MS-10 light arrived after 5 months, on January 5th.

During the 5 months interval (!) waiting for its replacement I had bought a Backscatter MW4300 Macro-wide video light to fill the void, and it became my primary light (no problems with it, so I am not cursed 😝)
 

Meaning that the SUPE MS-10 went into storage, after checking that it worked on land.

However, I have recently been doing bonfire-style night dives, which gave the SUPE MS-10 a new purpose as a narrow pointer, especially since I was using the MW4300 as a lure light.

So the brand-new replacement SUPE MS-10 went diving with me, 4 times. Yes, that's 4 dives at around 10 meters...
No flooding no nothing but...

Long story short the electronics are giving-in, and the SUPE MS-10 light turns on when it wants to...

On land you can unscrew the battery compartement and try again. Underwater this is not an option of course.

So I contacted SUPE again, explaining the situation, with pictures and a video of the problem.


I got a (swift) reply from SUPE, asking for a video - I had already sent one, but sent it again, along with other test videos.

I was then told to try to wipe the contact area with alcohol.

Fair enough - the red circles were added by SUPE on my footage to highlight which areas to clean.

To be frank, I couldn't see any oxidation on this light which had been only 4 times in the water, but hey, I had some IPA / Isopropanol, so wiped everything and hoped for the best.

Alas, the problem remains - as suspected, it is most likely due to the light's electronics / control circuit.

I told SUPE, and sent further test videos showing the light turning on and working and, in other cases, not turning on or working (with the same batteries...)

I then got this reply:

To which I answered that a light which sometimes turns on and sometimes doesn't cannot be used for diving.
I'm am not taking a light on night dives that might or might not work (I generally avoid this with any piece of equipment if I can....)

Having waited 5+ months for a replacement last time, I also explained that I did not feel like losing more time with this and especially not with their suppliers in Indonesia.

I don't know if this applies to all SUPE products, this specific MS-10 model or if I've just been very unlucky, but the light I have is unuseable and will now end up in the garbage.

I hope this misadventure will help other people make more informed decisions when considering buying products from this manufacturer, SUPE, also known as Scubalamp / SUPE / Fotocore and maybe others names.

So big caveat emptor, unfortunately - I for one will stay away from this brand (which should maybe spend more time on product design and quality-testing than on social-media promotion...), once is bad luck, twice might be a coincidence, but I'm not in a hurry to confirm any patterns the third time...

cheers

ben

4 hours ago, atus said:

Yes, they do, but with a very small boat, so only about 8 people allowed.

Wow  - good to know thanks -  how far out is the boat ride in the strait?
The Lombok Strait major Indonesian throughflow so I've always wondered what the current must be like there. Must be quite a drift!
I've only been out on junkungs, about a mile or so out to the FADS / rumpon. At the moment I'm doing bonfire dives in the shallows, but deep backwater would be interesting.
cheers
 

Interesting - Paralenz's depth sensor was used to adjust auto-WB based on pressure / depth for instance.

It does look good - not mind blowing revolutionary-good to the point that I would feel the need to buy it, but certainly a worthy, solid contender.
Wonder what the UW footage would look like with a filter and manual white-balance in post, as always...
 

Out of the 3 main acion cam brands, I'm partial to DJI.
I've been thinking about switching to their action cams in the future since the Action3, seems a little less gadgety - for lack of a better word - and maybe a little better thought-out than GoPro and the Insta360 (but of course their is some serious confirmation bias at play here 😉), and in softer price range than GoPros.

But as shocking a denial of the GAS syndrome as it may sound, I haven't felt a radical urge to upgrade my GoPro 7 blacks yet (although the swelling batteries are really starting to drive me nuts...).

Last action cam purchase was my already obsolete AOI wide lens a few months back. When the GP7 are finally put to rest (and they are getting there after years of use), big chance I will become a DJI user

Davide was working on a shallow cold-water (river) project with a digipower case giving 3 hours or so of filming

IIRC the waterproof battery pack is this one here, digipower refuel

https://digipower.com/collections/re-fuel/products/9hr-actionpack-extended-battery-module-for-hero9-ip68-waterproof-dust-proof-all-weather

it was used with new wide lenses, see here:

https://waterpixels.net/forums/topic/616-inon-and-aoi-wide-angle-wet-lenses-for-gopros/page/2/#comment-3616

13 hours ago, atus said:

I would like to add in Tulamben, Bali. Matahari resort, good accomodation, the dive center is 10 meters away from the restaurant and swimming pool. Amazing dive spot just infront of the resort, black water, the best creature spotter guide I have ever seen... Fantastic place for macro shooting. I have been twice and I will probably return.

As a side question, does Matahari organize boat-based black-water over deep water in the strait or shallow, bonfire-type dives?
cheers!

Wetpixel seems to be back up now.... 🧟‍♂️

 

Looking forward to some lake action then! 😄

If we take a look into other filters in the Lee range and compare curves, the LEE 008 Dark Salmon actually comes out as really close to the UR-PRO Cyan (if the spectrum reconstruction is correct, which it seems to be empirical tests).
Both filter material's colour is also nearly identical





To address the exposure issue, here is the Dark Salmon and a few other (lighter) potential contenders, superimposed on the UR-Pro spectrum/transmission reconstruction data posted a few posts above:

Main transmission differences are highlighted in red:
 

Assuming the UR-Pro filter reconstruction data  is correct, to summarise:

• UR-Pro lets more violet/deep blue than the Lee Dark Salmon, 27% vs 17% at 410nm - the UR-Pro curve goes up at this point a sort camel hump in violet/deep blues.

• UR-Pro lets more green through, 50% vs LDS 36% at 570nm, and also more yellow 60% vs LDS 48% at 580nm and orange 87% vs LDS 75% at 600nm, so a steeper steeper curve from green to orange.

These transmission differences likely explain exposure differences between the UR-Pro and LDS, especially the 570nm to 600nm points.

The rest of the two filters' transmission is actually almost identical, only a few % difference, which is rather impressive and explains why the results are so similar....

This is going to be hard to beat I think...


****

For lighter alternatives, quick and dirty colour/exposure test on land (placing gels on the gopro lens, sorry for the fingertips 😅) gives the following results:

It seems "107 light rose" is the most solid contender for a similar but lighter filter, though I'm a little concerned that the curve from green to orange is much flatter in this case...

cheers

As yet another follow-up to this fascinating quest for the filter-grail, I tested the Lee 008 Dark Salmon filter in water (depths ranging from 8 to 20m on a tropical morning, slightly overcast day in east Bali) and the results are in...
 

As anticipated (drum roll?), the filter works really well, with a very similar profile to the UR-Pro Cyan (or Cyan SW?), however with one major caveat:

it is stronger / darker (and a bit warmer) than the UR-Pro - meaning a little more loss of light / ev, and also a slightly deeper tint in the reds - this is visible when looking at the camera's ISO sensor data, with a higher ISO on the LDS.
Yet what this also means is that, as expected, the Lee gel actually works better than the UR-Pro when going deeper, but this is a give and take, as it means a greater loss of light - could be fine in the tropics, less so elsewhere.
So, the quest is not completely over just yet.

However we can add with confidence that the Lee 008 Dark Salmon is a truly worthy replacement for the UR-Pro cyan, and readily available for very cheap in gel rolls... 😄

But a tad stronger, then...

***

Since the proof usually is in the pudding, here is some test footage, shot on two GoPro7 Black held side by side (no tray, this is quick and dirty handheld, one GP in each hand...), identical settings (flat profile ie. WB native, GoPro colours, ev -0.5, ISO max 1600, 4K 60fps).
If you're fast enough as a click-slinger, you can actually watch both clips at the same time 😉

UR-PRO CYAN FILTER VS. LEE DARK SALMON GEL FILTER, AS SHOT (not white-balanced in post, ungraded)

UR-PRO CYAN FILTER VS. LEE DARK SALMON GEL FILTER, WHITE-BALANCED IN POST + QUICKLY GRADED

not bad for a commercially available gel, eh?...
(please not that grading adjustments are flexible and subjective choices - there is plenty of room for modifications on both cams - this was just a quick and dirty grade, aiming to bring the cams' footage to similar results)

cheers!

ben

14 hours ago, Davide DB said:

Number of cameras sold worldwide in 2023:

 

1. Canon … 3.34 million units (46.5%)
2. Sony … 2 million units (27.9%)
3. Nikon … 810,000 units (11.3%)
4. Fujifilm … 430,000 units (6.0%)
5. Panasonic … 260,000 units (3.6%)
6. OM Digital … 180,000 units (2.5%)
7. Ricoh Imaging … 60,000 units (0.8%)

 

Source

 

R&D costs are scary and the number of units sold is the only way to deal with them and maintain revenue margins.

 

I for one was shocked to read the numbers. Nikon sold 800k cameras worldwide so the figure should be divided among all models. I don't understand Japanese so I don't know what range of cameras the statistic includes.

It just says "digital cameras / video cameras" in the article. The main snippet here:

The rate of decline in the global digital camera market share has slowed compared to before, and demand for high-performance mirrorless cameras is increasing, with our magazine describing it as “high-performance mirrorless cameras are strong and the market is recovering.” The ranking of sales volume share remains the same as in 2022 , with Canon in first place, and if you add Sony’s share in second place, the two companies will exceed 70% of the sales volume share. Canon and Sony still seem to be overwhelmingly strong. I would like to see the share based on value as well.

is accurately translated.

Not going to buy it, but I'll take a look at the Nikkei report when I'm in Japan, see if they give any more details on actual camera ranges per maker.

I found another related April 2024 article here, giving a lot of details for the Japanese digital camera market (based on a survey of roughly 10,000 outlets throughout Japan)

https://www.gfk.com/ja/insights/mi20240418
 

The article highlights that 2023 was the is the first time in 13 years that the digital camera market experienced positive growth, with a 7% sales increase compared to the previous year.

Importantly, interchangeable lens sales experienced a 4% growth compared to 2023, whereas interchangeable lens cameras 9%

- Here is a graphic of camera sales in Japan per camera type and per year.

From left to right:
 

- digital cameras as a whole (blue)

- compact cameras (green)

- interchangeable lens cameras (yellow)

- interchangeable lens (red)

And this graphic here shows user preferences influencing Japanese camera purchases, from October 2022 to January 2023 and October 2023 (light blue) to January 2024 (dark blue)

Top to bottom:

- autofocus speed

- maker / brand

- pixel count

- autofocus accuracy

- camera size / weight

- autofocus range and number of focus areas

- in-camera stabilization
- continuous shooting speed
- available lens range
- eye-tracking AF


cheers
 

ben

I tried the small light to spot last time - I had the SUPE MS-10 snoot video light centrally mounted, and used the Bacscatter MW4300 as a lure.
But the beam of the MS-10 turned out to be too thin for these purposes.

After 20/30 minutes waiting for the swarm to develop around the lure only to have it reform on the lights, I gave up and mounted the 4000 lumen lure centrally on the kit instead, which is nice.
Macro mode beam is narrow enough, but not too narrow to be unuseable, and also it seems to help with the focusing / lighting from what I could see.

As for using the two lights on low, this was indeed the plan - I thought I would have them on low all the time - but based on what I could try in situation, what worked best to avoid backscatter (or rather critter saturation, as they're actually alive) was actually having the lights at 6000 lumen and using the side of the light cone instead of have them more central which illuminates a too large zone.




So I moved from the lightbox to a more open config, but this also requires more power to work.

Maybe this need more testing - if I remember the previous posts, some people (Nanette?) got nice results with 3000 lumen lights, but I assume this was in a true blackwater setup with a ton of lure lights...

After giving up on the single lure light, I tried just using the MW4300's beam to spot/attract critters, but the problem remained, everytime I had something and turned on the two lights, a swarm formed around them, drowning out the suject I was trying to isolate..


 

One question that really intrigues me, in current circumstances, is the relationship between the constant light output of video lights used for filming and video lights as lures.
 

For photography it seems pretty straightforward: a narrow beam focus light to spot, staying around the lures, and milliseconds of strobe lighting to shoot the critters.

But for video, shooting means turning on the constant output video lights...

Question is, in blackwater/bonfire type setups, how does this work when working with lure lights ? Won't the camera video lights become lure themselves?
Is the secret to always have more power on the lure lights than on the videast's rig?

This interrogation is directly linked to my current situation, where I'm in a very interesting place to try things of the bonfire kind, great opportunity to work on things, but I'm also alone in the endeavour, with no access to a set of lure lights.

I'm basically trying to shoot some of the larval planktonic critters which show up on night dives, to work on things, and there are plenty of subjects arounds (most common at the moment are larval mantis shrimps for instance, present even on a bad day).

So I tried using one of my 3 lights as a lure, but it's only 4000 lumen - so when I turn on the other two, the swarm of planktonic critters instantly reforms around my camera's lights, and it's very difficult to isolate subjects as it's heptic with life coming in super close.

Really not sure how to approach this and make it work. It's been easier to shoot planktonic critters in blue water during the day,because the sunlight means I don't have to deal with attraction to the lights...
I just shoot them as I would to create black-background shots, which works fine (especially now that I have a set of 2x 8000lm lights) but daytime plankton is much less consistent.

I've asked around and no one has powerful lights unfortunately (too many photographers 😁), so not sure what I could do.
It feels a little sad to give up on the idea, but maybe local waters are just too rich to roam in the water column at night....
i guess I could use one of the 8000lm lights as a lure (leaving me with one 8000lm and one 4000lm, but wondering if this would make that much of a difference since the rig's lights would still overpower the lure...

any thoughts?

cheers

ben
 

12 hours ago, hedonist222 said:

Who's Aijex ? 😀

The one and only Ajiex Dharma 😎

https://www.marelux.co/pages/ajiex-dharma
https://www.instagram.com/ajiexdharma/

I found this definition:

Blackwater Diving vs Bonfire Diving

So as not to confuse the terms and to establish a clear difference, there is “Blackwater diving” and “Bonfire diving”.

Blackwater diving is done in the open ocean; it is NOT an ordinary night dive with a subject photographed in the dark. Blackwater diving is done where there is no bottom, over very deep water, using a downline and lights to attract larval and pelagic subjects.

Bonfire diving is done over a shallow area by using torches planted in the sand or hanging them in the water (or both) facing deeper water. During a Bonfire dive, one can expect to see subjects that are still larval but closer to the settling stages of their lifecycle. Bonfire style dives are also a great way to learn the dive skills, hunting skills and photo skills needed for blackwater diving but without the stress. 

Both styles of diving are equally important to gain a better understanding of the marine world. Both will expose divers to a variety of jellyfish, salp, comb jellies, pterapods. shrimps, octopus, squids, the list is endless…

Source: https://www.uwphotographyguide.com/art-of-blackwater-photography
 

1 hour ago, Elvandar said:

 

I did not see the price for the new model, but I see a PRO in the name, usually it means a bump in the price, waiting for news

 

oh yes definitely  - I drooled over the AOI Pro closeup diopters, especially their +18.5 and +23.5, which are really nice, but had to gave up because of the price tag, and still holding on to my non-pro AOI UCL-09 (catchy name) +12.5, which is now discontinued...

17 hours ago, Elvandar said:

The AOI Housing is 1500$, I don't think is comparable for having the feature in camera, and not considerable a workaround.

I wholeheartedly agree - but practically, using focus peaking for macro on a screen as small as the gopro's might be an issue underwater, don't you think?

I say this because my LX10 compact has a bigger screen and I use an RGB screen magnifier along with my +3 underwater readers to make up for the lack of external screen options when shooting macro with focus peaking, and that's already something... 😁

But maybe I'm just old and need new eyes, and the tiny dots of colour will be enough of an indication to judge if one if actually in focus. Better than nothing for sure!

9 hours ago, Davide DB said:

 

It's important to stay focused and not get distracted for a second 🙂

 

Wow - already better late than never I guess!

Action cams have really taken programmed obsolescence to another level.
 

10 hours ago, canislupus said:

Damm, I just bought a regular UWL-03 and didn’t tried on the water yet. 😅

Same same - just tried it once for tests - had I known, I would have held back as I plan to use it in the shallows in a few months...

Ah well, I'll have to make do with my AOI lens which can scratch easily and reflects in the shallows or shooting into the sun  then... 😅