Nemrod

I guess the lack of a modeling light limits snoot use for the S220? It certainly has the bayonet to accept accessories. The Atom flash is probably where I am headed and just have to live with Manual only with all three of my cameras.

Just opinions. The TG is a most unimpressive thing. I would not purchase an expensive camera and put it in a cheap plastic housing (Sea Frogs). I doubt anyone but pros really needs a FF camera. But we want what we want and can figure out a way to justify it. I also doubt you will see much difference in images with a MFT vs a APS-C. Either of which are huge sensors compared to a TG. Your image softness with the TG could be the result of many factors including the inability to control shutter speeds. By the time a housing is outfitted with a wet lens, a dome port or macro port, dual strobes and supporting arms, tray, focus light and floats then the size difference between MFT/APS-C/FF begins to disappear. Yes, FF is definitely bigger and heavier and more $. But there are some fairly small FF cameras out there. Here is my tiny little Canon S90 in the equally minuscule FIX housing with twin strobes and floats and a tray.

Cut the ends off both cables to get clean, fresh ends using, as stated, a sharp single edge razor blade or box cutter blade. I have, in a pinch, been able to cut the cables with my very sharp Swiss Army Knife. Lay the cable on a smooth, hard surface and press the blade through the cable at 90 degrees. The blade needs to pass through the cable with one slice, do not saw at the cables. There is not a Z330 position on your older board. For TTL you would choose the position that is for an Inon strobe (Z240/D2000 etc). Or set for hardwired manual. Since (you say) more light is emitted by the LEDs at position 0, which is hard wired manual, I would run the trigger board there. And set the strobes to manual and configure the Inon "Advanced Cancel Circuit Switch" for no preflash. And thus shoot in full manual, camera and strobes. The Z330 strobes do not have HSS, you cannot use an HSS trigger position or any shutter speed above your camera native maximum sync speed. You might check that the cables are fully inserted in their end caps. If one cable is not repairable you can use the one good cable to a strobe and then run the other strobe as slave from it by just having an open sensor port. of course, the flash will fire on other person's strobes if it sees them. Always carry spare 613 cables: DiverVision Underwater Photo EquipmentHowshot Fiber Optic XL Cable 613L for INON Strobe (4 types)Howshot Multi-Core optic fiber cable 613L for INON's strobe. The best quality Fiber Optic XL Cable 613L is composed of 613 fibers (cores). Even when the cable is bent, attenuation of light is minimal.

Finger nail? I can turn my UWT switch with a finger nail, a Swiss Army knife, a plastic spoon, a dinner knife, toothpick. If the trigger LEDs are confirmed to be firing and the strobes are not firing then the issue is either the optical cables or the strobes. Or they are not aligned with the optical windows. If the LEDs are not firing then try new batteries and if that does not work you may be --------. If the LEDs are firing and the strobes are firing but not syncing then please set the TTL switch to 0 and set your strobes to manual and configure them for no preflash (Hardwired Manual Mode). In the future I find it useful to always set my gear up at home on the kitchen table even to the dismay and consternation of my wife person and make sure everything is working. I also usually do a pool dive to confirm integrity and operation. And I do these things in plenty of time to work out bugs, order whatever might be broken and get some help. And I carry spares, spare cables, batteries, tools etc. like a screw driver or my Swiss Army to turn that TTL trigger switch. This could be an expensive learning opportunity. Off subject, triggers and all of that complexity are cool and offer many advantages but there is also much to be said for rigs that can trigger from a built in camera strobe. Simplicity, always works, bad cables will usually still trigger because the camera flash is so much brighter than an LED, no batteries to go dead, no contacts to corrode, no electrical cables to break, fray or disconnect. It just works, plain and simple.

I have never entered an UW photo contest and the last contest of any sort that I entered was black and white film contest of street and people shots. I entered what I shot and developed in the darkroom because that is all there was. I think there should be two tiers of entries, manipulated/processed using the various software and AI and then the other being the jpeg straight from the camera with no editing or cropping allowed and verified against the RAW. Edit to add, I never said nor inferred one superior to the other, only that there should be a level playing field with known rules, one could be the wild, wild west, anything goes, the other nothing allowed.

I have several regular buddies who have not figured out how to shield their strobes 😵‍💫. Sometimes I can use them to good effect for additional lighting as here. But most of the time it is just annoying and lights up all the junk in the water 😀! Gotta love my buds because they put up with me!

There are many lovely women and handsome men (of which I am not) but frankly I do not find the human form underwater especially compelling. Here and there, yes, but mostly, I do not want divers in my pictures. Yes, divers can add a human interest element. I am mostly not interested in other humans, I seen them before, mostly too much ;). I know I said same ocean buddy but I DO take into account my buddies skills as to exactly how far I will let them away from me and I do keep and eye on their location. Fortunately I am not a macro guy. I feel for the macro folks who need to take some time on a small critter. All my buddies 🤗 :

My wife no longer dives. If I trusted the DM/Guide I would buddy her to them. And just keep an eye on her. Only if I trusted them. Now, I tell anybody who buddies with me up front that I am into photos and am a same ocean buddy. If the group zooms along I stop wherever I want and find my way along on my own. Be it a drift or an out and back I usually wind up back with the group for pickup. Especially on a drift however, if they zoom off, I just shoot my own DSMB. One of my dive friends is often the group leader and he is always asking me why am I way out there, or way back there, or way up there. My answer is to get away from all of y'all so I can have a photo with no fins sticking in. He does not like it for me to wander away and I do not care. Pretty self sufficient.

I like my Sony A-6400 in Nauticam. I use either the WWL plus a Sigma 19 or the kit lens behind the WWL. I also use the Sony 16mm pancake by itself, with the wide angle or the fisheye adapters inside the 4.33 dome. The WWL easily produces better image quality than the 16mm pancake but at the expense of only a 130 degrees FOV. The problem for me with the A-6XXX series of cameras is the 1/160 sync speed and the preflash that cannot be cancelled for manual only. Using the UWT trigger I can trick the camera into 1/200 sync speed and it works fine. It also has the booster battery or I can run onboard charging thus making it possible to shoot several days without opening the housing if need be.

Ebay and Amazon are full of inexpensive float arms. Most of them work quite well. Couple of things, unlike some float arms from the camera housing companies they have no internal connection between the end caps. They often leak, usually if they are going to it will be on the first few dives. When you begin to ascend, the arm becomes pressurized and blows the end cap off. Yes, this has happened, to me. I dumped the water out and glued it back together with epoxy adhesive and it is still in use. I have a couple of sets of inexpensive float arms I have used on many dives over several years. One of my dive buddies had the same sort of arms and one of his flooded also but ti did not pop apart, just had water sloshing around inside and loss of some buoyancy. So, I guess it can be hit or miss. For absolute reliability, aside from Nauticam or equal floats, the Stix floats on ULCS arms is possibly the best way to go.

I have used a Sharpie pen, a fresh one, to just cover the writing. When the day comes that you want it gone, just use isopropyl on a cotton swab and keep gently dabbing and rubbing until the ink is removed. One lens that I have is UW dedicated. I carefully masked off everything except the beauty ring with all the nomenclature. I shot it lightly with Krylon Ultra-Flat paint, a couple of light coats.

I did not clean, lube or pull the O-ring off on this particular occasion as I describe how I normally would have. What I think happened is that the FIX S90 housing is a clam shell type. When I opened the housing the door with O-ring rubbed across the room table I was working from. The room cleaning lady did have curly black hair (like a perm) so I think it likely hers from cleaning the room and wiping the table down as part of her duties. I am not blaming her, I was the one who deviated from my normal routine and did not inspect the O-ring for FOD. FOD can come from all sorts of places. I think that is how the hair got on the O-ring. Many times I have found sand and debris on the door O-rings and down in the groove after a dive and upon opening the housing. The OP asked what other people do. I explained my routine. "So, it got me to wondering what other folks do:" I did not say it was necessary or required. I remove, clean and lube with each opening and I answered the original question.

I remove the Nauticam door O-ring (both housings are clamshell type) with each opening. I clean the groove, look for debris, sand, hairs, Q-tip fuzz etc. Same with my strobes, I remove the Inon strobe O-rings with each opening, clean and lube. The only flood I have had was a FIX housing for my S90. I changed the battery in a rush, went diving, flooded. Afterwards I found a tiny, black hair on the O-ring wrapped around it. Neither me nor my wife have black hair.

In the more than two decades I have owned a set of Inon D2000 strobes I have never cleaned them, flooded them or seen any sort of corrosion on them. My new S220 strobes are clean as can be, maybe in another twenty years I will give them a good cleaning. If I am still around to do so.

Maybe some day in a distant and alternative universe, OM Systems will get their head out of their wazoo and give us a TG Pro. Full manual controls, actual f stops, pancake 24-75 with macro zoom lens, 1.0+ inches sensor. Video capable for those who do such, not me, and then we will have a replacement at long last for the legendary Nikonos III. I will buy three and a nauticam housing to put it in. In yet another alternative world, Nauticam et al could take the guts out of a Canon R50 or similar and install it in a housing as an integrated, updatable platform, work with Canon, Nikon, whoever to provide the electronics. We are stuck since the passing of the Nikonos in this buy a box and then buy a camera and then stick the camera in the box thinking. What we need is an actual underwater camera, not a box with a land camera inside. And it does not need to be FF.