eocean-eu

Depending on what your are filming, you may consider - if that's possible for ypu - putting the housing on a tripod and step away by a few meters once you have framed your shot and started recording.

I don't have experience with housing mounting hydrophone but some with hydrophone hanging in the water. I am using an Aquarian hydrophone. I suspect you can get easily interfering noises just by rubbing the housing, by the autofocus if it's in auto, even fan if your housing or camera has some. If the hydrophone is directional and let's say mounted forward; it could be better. When hanging the hydrophone in the water, I get noises of me rubbing the cable up to 1-2m from the hydrophone.

Yes (I am doing this kind of calculation quite often for my job :) ) but I tend to think some values are a bit optmistic for watertight by design monitors as there is not a lot of free volume inside so I am a bit surprised as far as 2/3 of the land weight vanishes thanks to Archimedes thrust for those units. It's also worth noting the weight of the attachment system might be substantial (another clamp + pair of ball ends or swivel system)

I am surprised on how various brands can get land weight at around 1.5-2kg for only 300g underwater. Those numbers may be acceptable for solution with housing for monitor like the Seafrogs unit where you get lots of volume inside but I doubt this applies for monitors watertight by design since they are super compact with little volume for air inside.

Along the exotic brands of housing for exotic land monitors, I've found Seafrogs actually makes an aluminum housing for the Shimbol M5 (you can find it on Amazon). The cable looks nice and it requires an M24 port on the camera housing. There is no indication of size and weight (aside from the land monitor unit) https://www.seafrogs.com/products_details/1293270225312227328.html

Thanks Edy for your detailed answer. Yes it's definitely a Nikon thing. I don't have any problem with my trusty GH5s which works just perfectly whatever monitor I hooked on it (underwater or on land). Those blackout/rescaling is something worth considering for someone who may want to buy a monitor. It's worth also noting some camera only turn on HDMI on in playback mode. It's never happening in the high-end range of products but I remember a friend buying an used SmallHD monitor and housing only to find out it was not working underwater. Long story short: read the camera manual before spending thousands of euros/dollars on a U/W monitor.

Thanks for the detailed review. Regarding the comments on Nikon (which is an echo of my complaints with the Z8), As the problem is not happening in photo mode, by curiosity, would you mind trying to see if the monitor has a long blackout in vdeo mode when stopping video recording or going from live view into menus ? Thanks !

To be honest, since HDMI underwater cables have a long history of being fragile whatever brand you use, the sideway exiting cable is probably providing less strain to the cable than the up/down usual location of connectors (the other alternative is monitor with back straight output). I see that as an improvement in terms of durability but on the other hand, yes it eats side space which might interfere with arm location/handle.

Only with the 5" . The 7" has a small blackout (1sec maybe) but I do not consider this lag to be a problem. And again, the issue is only for video shooters, not photographers.

I've tried all the resolution and there is something odd in the Z8 HDMI behaviour as it seems to switch back HDMI resolution whenever you stop recording or go into a menu in video mode... while being super consistent in photo mode. Whenever resolution change, a new EDID handshake is done between camera and monitor. If the monitor is slow to do the handshake or has limited choice of resolutions, you'll get temporary or permanent blackout. The most common resolution that will work for any camera is indeed 1080p60 but even that seems to be a slow boat for the combo Weefine 5 and the Z8. I've also tried with an HDMI EDID dongle to see if I could force the handshake process with no luck. On the other hand, as you did with your A1, I've never had any single issue with my GH5 on 1080p60. It's a pity because the Weefine 5 is a nice little unit to travel with in comparison to the bulky 7inch TV set :D . The Nauticam one won't be better for sure on that point.

Aside from being made by Nauticam, there is IMHO nothing really exciting so far about this monitor. Nauticam has not even bothered including batteries in this setup and cables. Both will increase the price sharply. The monitor so far has nothing that makes it a game changer, no internal recording and we do not know yet the supported resolution. I am using 5 and 7inches Weefine monitors on the GH5 and Z8 and while they works flawlessly on the GH5, the Z8 has long blackout with the 5inches in video mode (lenghty EDID handshake apparently) tberefore I wouldn't buy anything before having a good idea of the supported HDMI resolutions in the manual. At the end of the day, you get more features with a Ninja with its dedicated Nauticam housing for a substantially lower price.

Everybody is likely to pay more wherever you are because for any international business, this becomes a "challenging economic environment" when you might lose a big portion of customers in a region while not getting more in others. It's clear that to maintain benefits you'll certainly have to increase prices at least a little everywhere or to find other ways to reduce costs of manufacturing. In Europe, Brexit has been for me a good example of a lose/lose situation. I used to order for my job parts from big companies in the UK because they were made there. After the Brexit, it was a hassle and costly because of customs to get those. Some manufacturers among others opened some warehouse in mainland Europe. Others just didn't have the resource for and I now rarely order from them. Now the prices for those parts for those companies that have now offices in both side of the Channel are about 200% what they used to be before Brexit was effective. Aside from the rising costs since Covid and Ukraine, those companies had to buy/rent warehouse, deal themselves with customs or make assembly lines in Europe. It costs money in all cases and it has to be absorbed by the customers at the end of the line.

It makes sense to keep the lens cover when you are in the water and wait for a crewman on the boat to give you or get your camera on board. At that moment, it can be easy to damage the glass or port. A neoprene cover like for other nauticam port could be a less bulky solution.

U/W Competition is actually a word that describes different things. Your image can be judged at: - dive shows - online scuba contest - online U/W image competition - film/photo festivals - actual underwater competition/championship where you dive and then immediately submit your work. All of them are vastly different and the criteria to win are different. And since there are no real standard rules for a given category, it also adds some variability in the outcome. I've been modestly doing UW films and a few of them have won in the 4 first categories. I was also part of a national team some years ago at a CMAS underwater championship. I have mixed feelings about all this competition things but yet enjoy doing them. Here is a summary of my thoughts on this: ** The neutral ** - Don't do this for money and don't expect visibility there might boost a career or fame. It might have happened in the past but since bringing U/W is super easy nowadays, standing out of the crowd is getting harder and harder. Most contests and especially festivals do not provide any cash reward. You sometimes get goodies, occasionally a partially paid trip, some free dive somewhere but that's all. - If you want to have pictures properly evaluated, don't submit them to contests part of dive shows or any online contest where voting is public because it's like when people post badly framed pictures on FB and their friends tell them those pictures are amazing. Some people will ask their friend to vote for them. It makes sense to them to get a prize but it's not a good indicator of the quality of their work nor the work of other contestants. - The most serious UW championships tend to me to be more like ice skating competitions where your pictures are expected to match arranged criteria to make points with an imposed theme, imposed dive schedule and post-processing. Pictures are excellent technically speaking but often tend to be creatively dull because of all these constraints. It's perfectly normal but this is something that can be hard to fully grasp. Other championship are more relaxed on rules and are more focused on divers having a good time. ** The ugly ** - Sometimes contestants can go too far as they manipulate the scene or animal to get the perfect picture. This is not limited to diving but wildlife pictures in general. There is a problem when subject taken is unlikely to have the common behavior or to be at its usual location. They are many pictures online of "free falling open-water octopus" (aside the blackwater ones which are normal) or swimming animal that usually rests on the bottom. It's always frustrating to see those kinds of pictures winning where one would expect the competitor to be disqualified. - People can go as far as cheating in any thinkable ways at any form of contests. That's why sometimes raw pictures are asked by the judges. That's why cards are cleared, WIFI disabled, time stamped differently at actual U/W championships. Yet, some people try to submit pictures that not belongs to them or upload stuff before the dives... and they often get caught. - Sometimes some judges are just clueless and completely miss the first point or they are just part of the dive industry with little experience on judging pictures and sometimes there are not even divers and are judging UW picture... Comparing different photos/videos with sometimes different topics between competitors is tough job so you would expect to get some professional U/W image makers in the panel with some knowledge on biology. Those guys exist and some competition are judged by those guys but it's unfortunately far from universal. ** The good ** I kept the good for the end because it's probably the most important and what makes me still want to "play" at competitons: - it's nice to compare your work with what other do and any award is somehow some signs you're making good quality images. On the long run, it's a good record of your progress and each award raises your own bar to another level. - Actual UW competition are nice to meet other folks who shares the same enthousiam for image making. It's an occasion to share and learn and develop friendships. - Festival (especially nature ones) are great to show people the beauty of the ocean and to pass some take-home messages about threat and conservation required to our playground.

I don't own the 60mm but I've just received the Laowa 58mm in Z-mount format. For the 58mm, I don't see any major issue for underwater use for the few tests I've made in regards to distance. Focus for the 2:1 magnification is very close to my port (N120 macro port 6 + 50mm extension) at 2-3 cm / around 1 inch in air. As you mentioned, it's a fully manual lens that I will use with peaking activated. I've made a 3D printed focus ring for it for my Nauticam housing. I don't know which port you use on your Sony but one way to get aperture control would be to use a port extension with knob and design a ring for the aperture and one for the focus. That is my current plan (the 50mm extension can be fitted with a knob).