Davide DB

Wow that is a dive! Regarding the video itself, I am not the best person to give an opinion since I practically only dive in the Med and have little experience diving abroad. Add that the Med is a pond compared to the ocean, and I don't even want to start recounting all the incidents that have happened to me in 34 years of diving as divers like to do over dinner or over a couple of 🍺 I can only give you the impression I got as a “foreigner.” The owner and everyone seems to put on airs. Maybe the translation is not the best and I don't understand the linguistic nuances. But I also understand that taking clients offshore in those conditions is not easy. I do not get if he wants to discourage inexperienced people from going there or create “hipe” for foreign divers. Here in Italy, diving has always been DIY as they call it. At most they give you a guide if you ask for one but otherwise, you have to be autonomous. It seems like the norm to me. maybe Italy and Japan are exceptions but I think it's different only in resorts and liveaboard. It also frankly bothers me that someone touches my equipment and on Red Sea cruises I had to get used to it. The video clearly seems to me to be a promotional video for foreign countries. Frankly, I don't know how well they hit the target. Only at the 'last minute,' the owner makes a last minute effort in saying that they are happy to welcome new people and that they are trying to improve their standards to have a wider audience. But after 30 minutes spent explaining how dangerous diving there is, that if you can't fin, you'd better stay home, and that if you don't follow the rules you'll be permanently banned.... to me it's like to close the stable door after the horse has bolted. 😄 Still, I would love to do three or four dives there. I wonder if I can 😉

Yes, I understand but frankly, starting from scrattch, for an action camera I wouldn't be wasting a lot of time with DIY solutions and I would go straight to ready-made solutions like these that are cheap and also handy: https://www.flex-arm.com/en/tripods-and-monopods/underwater-camera-tripod Or the ones on Aliexpress. or, last but not the least, since you already have the bracket, perhaps the solution proposed by @bghazzal is the quickest.

I've just seen this little guy popping out from some FB posts...

Fro your question basically just browse and read previous messages on this thread. Everything is described in great detail already...

TV and film have always demanded products with characters and stories with certain characteristics. While this used to apply only to fiction, it now (unfortunately) also applies to documentary. This has led to bringing to the screen an increasingly overt dramatization of nature and its characters, breaking in part the contract between representation and audience typical of documentary. The use of famous people as hosts in nature documentaries is the latest in this escalation. Will Smith, Obama or characters like Steve Backshall completely turn the perspective upside down, becoming themselves the focus around which everything happens. Nature becomes the stage for their egos. Conversely, David Attemborough, with his British understatement, although he was always the main host in all his documentaries, was never cumbersome with his presence. Rather, he was always a kind gentleman who would almost take you by the hand on journeys into the natural world. The intention behind these editorial choices is clear and perhaps even not bad in itself: to attract a wider audience to a genre considered (wrongly) niche. I, personally, do not like it but everyone has his own taste. I find that in this way the public is treated as a mass of fools incapable of getting excited about natural events. And maybe there is a kernel of truth to it: in an age when we are constantly exposed to thousands of contents, everything falls flat and it's a shouting match. Or maybe I'm just too pessimistic.

Thanks, we have a lot of question on that action camera 🙂

Hi Wags, Welcome aboard! I'm sure you will find here a lot of familiar names. Ciaooo

This always applies 🤣

Of course, such filming is done only with a rebreather. What struck me about the footage in the documentary is also yours is the amount of fish and their confidence with people. Here in Italy we have destroyed everything. I also found some kind of 360-degree BTS video from Serge Dumont.

With an optional CMC-x flip holder...

More than just sea. I know someone will appreciate 😉 Yesterday I happened to come across a beautiful documentary about the largest freshwater reservoir in Europe, in the Upper Rhine River Valley. Simply stunning and another shot scored by a French documentary filmmaker 😉 The Invisible River - Under Water between the Black Forest and the Vosges (2019) Director: Serge Dumont Writers: Serge Dumont, Frank Nischk Narrator: Paul Bendelow Genre: Documentary Language: English Synopsis: Between the Black Forest and the Vosges it’s not only the Rhine that flows slowly northwards but also another waterway, hidden from view. The largest groundwater reservoir in Europe forms an underground river in the Upper Rhine Valley, which gives rise to wetlands of unique beauty – home to rare animals and plants. Underwater cameraman Serge Dumont, whose work has won numerous awards, has captured this unknown world in breathtaking sequences. He gets closer to the inhabitants of this biotope than any other documentary maker before him. Pike and great crested grebe pursue their prey right in front of his lens. This wildlife filmmaker, who is a professor of biology at Strasbourg University, has managed to record behaviour patterns of fish and birds never seen before. The film also reveals the fascinating world of insects, amphibians and microorganisms in these biotopes. For the first time, Serge Dumont was able to film dragonflies laying their eggs in plant stems up to two metres below the surface of the water. It’s their way of ensuring that the eggs don’t dry out when the water level drops. The film transports us into an alien world filled with bizarre creatures we would never suspect lived right on our doorstep. The wetlands in the Upper Rhine Valley owe their existence to the constant flow of clean, unpolluted groundwater. This is increasingly affected, though, by the excessive use of fertilisers and pesticides in agriculture, which poses a real threat to the small paradise habitats. “The Invisible River” shows uniquely the great biodiversity dependent on pure groundwater – and just how important it is to protect it.

Good News. I'll look forward to see some simple clips

Yes of course you can. I've been using this combo for 5 years without any problems. But since I was coming from another 5 years of the classic dome solution, I had noticed that the stability of my shooting had deteriorated. My friends used to tease me that I was getting old and my hand was shaking. Then I had the counter proof by reusing the 12-35mm and the dome. It depends on the focal length used. The defect is much less noticeable at maximum wide but zooming in is more pronounced. With the 12-35mm I can be stable at 35mm (70 equiv.) In free water. With the 14-42mm zoomed to maximum behind WWL absolutely not. So it also depends on what kind of shooting you do. For narration you use narrower focal lengths usually. I'm splitting hairs of course 😉

This was the thread I opened while ago. It's strange I was the only one to notice it but we are few guys to shoot video with wet lens.

While the used market is full of camera bodies, housings are like unicorns 🦄

How does it work tracking AF for video on your A6400? Did you make any test on moving UW critters?

Well let's say vertical video is only good for social networks, for reels or stories or shorts. If you decide this in advance then you have to pay special attention to framing with the final crop in mind. The full 8:7 sensor format of the latest Gopro generations helps a lot in this but I think the AOI lens vignettes in this mode. Maybe even if it vignettes you have more room to reframe the image. I don't know, I've never played with it. Again, I don't know if you have, starting at 5.3K you have the option to reframe the shot slightly. the clown fish are too high. You should remove some of the stones. You can also help by slightly enlarging the image. Resolve works wonders.

It is a pity that marelux does not have a housing for Panasonic GH6/7. it happens once in blue moon that two models have the same bodies. I see that they supposedly have a housing for OM1 but it looks like just a rendering and there is no port chart for M43 either. As I have already written in another thread, the GH7 does not seem to follow the glory of the GH5 despite being impressive in the video features it has. On the other hand, Nauticam's policy of pricing the housing like that of a flagship FF does not help, and the GH6 housing while being absolutely out of the market for its price, does not even have a joystick like Nauticam's flagship housings. What a shame.

15cm Nauticam HDMI cables are outrageously priced

Out of curiosity, What's wrong of this native lens? No stabilization, huge MFD? https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1277527-REG/sony_sel50m28_fe_50mm_f_2_8_macro.html

Yes Surrender, you're surrounded!!!

Yes the typical footage is like the last clip. 3/4 from behind. I usually lose my patience right away. This one was particularly quiet. It happens once in a blue moon.

Wow, tough decision!