Luko

I already experienced a Red/Blue flashing vacuum light during a dive. Started to ascend, the light went back to green, hence continued my dive betting on that it was just a system malfunction (I'm a player), the system alternated red/blue and green during the whole dive. Once up, I checked on land what was going on inside the housing, apparently nothing wet. Closed and vacuumed the housing until green. Continued for the 2nd dive, Same pattern : green then Red/Blue sometimes back to green. Back to the hotel room I changed for a new battery and everything went back to normal the day after.

That's a good question for macro where sharpness is critical. A long while ago when I was using some of the initial Canon IS lenses with land camera (such as 24-105L IS), the IS was quite effective for handheld/slower shutter in situations like available light street portraits, however I would still feel the old IS "buzzing" into the lens. On a fast shutter speed it was no benefit and to an extent, some photographers would say it could be a nuisance to the sharpness as the optic groups would slightly move. I could also experience that on some of the still images I was shooting at that time : sharpness but not ultra sharpness as expected when the IS was on. IS has certainly progressed since, I have now a RF100 IS that I use for most of my UW macro shots but I must admit I never wondered about switching the IS off. TBH with the hindsight, ie. using a fast shutter like 1/200s with the strobelight freezing the subject for some ms., add on top that the density of water environment don't allow fast shake movement, I don't see what would be the benefit of the IS in these conditions. On the contrary I can only guess the inconvenience of using more battery life and maybe some residual slight internal "shaking" (certainly at a lesser level than 20 years ago). Hence probably something to think about when not using continuous lighting and slower shutter.

Well you probaby forgot the past years before : many people living in the Phils will tell you that in the recent years, typhoons have frequently been hitting the Phils in the last quarter of the year, and most this violently. This is the link to the data of the main typhoons hitting the Phils since 2018: https://www.worlddata.info/asia/philippines/typhoons.php You'll notice that within the past years 2024 (to be complete : 6 rainstorms or typhoons hit the Phils in October november 2024), 2022, 2021 and 2020 have all had typhoons from end of october to late december . You probably have heard about Rai aka. Odette ,the most devastating typhoon that hit the central Visayas mid december 2021, which wiped out many of the shallow coral gardens in all parts of the Visayas. FWIW the last trip I planned end of the year in the Phils was for Xmas 2014, we had to cut our stay on Panglao short because of a typhoon coming in. Marine coast guards had locked all boats at deck and prohibited trips from/to Cebu. We eventually had to charter a bangka in Cabilao to cross the channel to Argao in 2m waves and heavy rain falls hours before the Typhoon landed. For the record, a year before in 2013 the deadliest typhoon recorded in the Phils known as Yolanda had hit Bohol mid november, I thought that was happening once in a while... huh... from now on I only travel the Phils from Feb to May. So from the theoritical POV November might not be the heart of the typhoon season, real figures have shown, filipinos will also tell you that since the last 10 years, november-december are more frequently hit by rainstorms and typhoons. Since this is quite impredictable, you may go and find decent weather in November, however you should know that there is a risk you may want to play with or not.

A lot of the indonesian archipelago is diveable early november, actually October to mid november is probably the best season for diving some parts of Indonesia. Nusa Tenggara islands of Komodo and Alor should be great at this time of year (that's even the blue whale season for Alor). Bali for flat seas and North Sulawesi should also good until mid november before the turn of the season I know that seen from far away Komodo seems like the big bad currents spot. After 5 trips to Komodo either resort or liveaboard diving I can testify there are lot of kind of people diving Komodo, some of them very inexperimented, Komodo is not currents everywhere, many divers get certified there : I've been on a liveboard where some of the divers where just out of their OW certification. So if you mention that you don't want currents, the guides will make sure not to bring you on currenty spots. Funnily enough, you seem attracted to Raja Ampat whereas I find that are more tricky currents in Raja Ampat than in Komodo. IMO the most spectacular sample you could get of diving SEA In 14 to 18 days, would be to spend a week to 10 days in Bali for diving and sightseeing plus a another week either staying in Alor or a short liveaboard in Komodo. With the combination of Both Bali (Tulamben) and Komodo or Alor you'd get some of the best reef and muck dives in Indonesia. North sulawesi is alos an option however and even though I find Sahaung on Bangka one of the most beautiful coral spots, don't expect to find corals/fish schools/big fish like you would have in Komodo, Alor or even Bali. As for the Visayas and generally the Phils, august to november is not the best season to travel since you would have chances to hit a typhoon or rainstorms which are not uncommon at that time of the year. (I even bumped into a typhoon alert until late december, that is why I tend to favor Feb to May for diving the Phils).

Ha... been there done that. (with Fotocore GTX strobes similar to Supe D-Pro). Problem is NOT the 613 vs. single optic cable. Fotocore/Scubalamp strobes are quite picky with connectors : you need to have the "appropriate" connector with your fiber optic cable because S&S connectors can be quite loose in the flash socket, hence it needs a thicker than usual connector. I tried with legit Nauticam and S&S cables and couldn't fire the strobes. Also make sure you don't have a double fiber connector, it won't work either. I recommend using the AOI/Weefine connectors thicker like these : https://uw-foto.ch/en/2858/weefine-optical-fiber-cable-long-seaandsea-seaandsea

Yes but not exactly. They indeed have the same body structure and similar performance although the Fotocore GTX adds 2 stroboscope modes with either 3 or 6 flashes in one long frame. I owned 2 of these and sold them back : after one trip my opinion was they were good and powerful for wide angle although not versatile enough for shooting macro, heavy as well. For travel comfort reasons, I wanted to use the sames strobes for both macro and WA. Now I'm back with Retra/superchargers and the carry on load of AA batteries... we can't always get what we want.

I will speak for Tawali/Milne bay. I was there in march a few years ago, I was lucky the rain had stopped at my time of arrival a week before the previous tourists had to walk 2km through some hilly jungle to get to the embarkation pier to Tawali because the roads were completely flooded, fortunately no rain the week after. Expect 30-31C water temperature, 3mil wetsuit is more than enough. I thought it would be a mainly muck place but in fact it's a mix of muck on Lawadi (Lots of Cyerce nudis!) and pristine coral reef. You will often return to Lawadi but the other muck dive sites like Samarai pier are much further away and need to get on a short liveaboard, I don't think Tawali resort will take you there unless the Spirit of New Guinea liveaboard is included for a few nights in your package. Ask for Albert for your macro guide he's as good finding critters as many Indonesian guides in Lembeh or Tulamben. Deacon's reef is just next door to Lawadi, it becomes instantly your favorite divesite, pure wide angle : great corals and a fantastic spot covered with tree foliage in the shallows, so you can do shots with vibrant coral colors and sunbeams coming from the surface. Lacey rhinopias (Rhinopias aphanes) can also be seen on Deacon reef. Other sites are mostly coral walls and wide angle : Coral garden and Barracuda reef near to Tawali are also wortwhile,, hammerheads have been reported on barracuda reef however dont count too much on them. The outer reefs that takes a daytrip like Tania's reef are spectacular so much teeeming with reef life, that said I've been wondering if they would be better captured on video than still image (mostly zillions of reef fish but not much bigger fish). Hence during my stay I would state it was about a third macro-2 thirds wide angle. Port Moresby :I recommand staying at Airways Hotel, decent restaurant with excellent australian Wagyu meat priced reasonably compared to the prices we have in Europe. If you have time after your dive trips, you can ask hiring a driver and go around Mo'sby, nothing much to see except for parliament haus which is a real architectural curiosity. What to buy/gifts? You'll find better priced woodcarvings than what they try to sell you at the resorts in a japanese held small shop inside the Gateway hotel, near to Airways. (If you find Nozaki a japanese lady instructor who was working for Lissenung and Tawali, I don't know where she's now, she will give you updates). If you know girls you like to please, I suggest you ask your driver in Port Moresby to take you to the bilum market. Ladies sell the traditional colorful woven bags called "bilum". I bought 5 or 6 and gave them to my female colleagues. I was the king back at work.

1- yes, I would say every othertime I flew to/from Sorong or Makassar with LionAir. It was either canceled or rescheduled. 2- try to get a TransNusa flight if you can, which is more reliable and cheaper for the SOQ-MDC segment. On top of their SOQ-CGK, Garuda has also opened this year a SOQ DPS flight, not everyday though. Problem will be to get a refund from LionAir, it takes many phone calls (you'd want to kill their web bot) 3- as a rule of thumb I always try to get a day early in/out of Sorong and I spend the night at SwissBelotel.

Many thanks! I can vouch for @CaolIla as a buyer similarly. 🙂

I was at Paris show, no specific Inon booth. Although Takuya Torii was on a local distributor booth. Apparently he told everyone Inon had this new strobe prototype out but couldn't show it... from what I understand his bag had been... lost at Tokyo airport. 😄 (fortunately located in Amsterdam/Schiphol but could not do it for Paris show) https://www.instagram.com/p/DEwHSPhIvZR/

Yep. Adobe announced 3 weeks ago a monthly price increase in Europe starting from jan15th up to 18€ per month for the LR+PS bundle (meaning a 50% increase!). That said the yearly price will remain around 144€.

Nice report from a friend. That is if you can read french (I know many of our italian neighbors can) https://www.forum-photosub.fr/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17907

I tried the trial version this morning. Very easy to download and use immediately after. Of course I wanted to trick it on a photo mixing diver bubbles in the distance with some actual backscatter. It eliminated the backscatter without touching to the bubbles : much better than a hand made selection. VERY Impressive.

If by any chance you are not adverse to reading french (you may use Google transaltion as well) this is a Cabo Verde landside and diving report that was written very recently on the Forum Photosub (somehow a french sisterforum to Waterpixels, you'll be welcome to join too btw). https://www.forum-photosub.fr/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=20414

Not for the Visayas though where visibility depends mainly on the sea conditions/weather since it's shallower and sandier bottoms than Anilao/PG. March can be a hit or miss espcially for Panglao/Bohol, in all my stays in the Visayas I had much better conditions and viz late April/May.