Everything posted by Adventurer
-
Help with Retra Burst Shooting
10fps are done at easy with Marelux strobes at full power in their ultra-fast MTL mode. But you have to use them in MTL and with fibre optic cable (not Lumilink) to squeeze out the maximum repetitive performance. They are currently leading the fast recycle time without blackout frame technology in underwater strobes. Here on the forum is a pretty dismal measurement of mx strobe strength by dreifish though - something I could not agree to when comparing it 1to1 to my Backscatter HF-1. I can only assume the Apollo tested by Dreifish must have been a monday model or malfunctioning pre-production unit. On any AA eneloop powered strobe you will struggle to get fast recycle times near 8 - 12fps. You need a strobe which utilizes 18650 or 21700 high current discharge cells. Otherwise the capacitors cannot fill back up at the speed you desire.
-
New Seacam water contact optic
Not an Ivanoff Optic but a Rebikoff Underwater correction port will also create a somewhat „virtual image“ similar to a dome. Contrary to dome port the corrective effect can already be seen in air, but the image is not improved in air.
-
New Seacam water contact optic
Chris we have to stay sorted here, so everybody is on the same page and not mixing things up. There is no such thing as a sole Ivanoff optic working standalone and making your underwater image better. There is just Rebikoff-Ivanoff Optics, where the Ivanoff Element does Step two of the optical correction. Contrary to sole Ivanoff Optics, the Rebikoff corrector port can have a positive effect with increased IQ when used alone, simila but still different to a dome port. The Rebikoff corrector port will look very similar to a flat port when viewed from the outside, mounted on a housing. So for everybody going first time into this, there is: Flat Ports Domeports Rebikoff uw correction Ports Rebikoff-Ivanoff uw correction Ports
-
Ivanoff Style underwater corrector port on a Canon Marelux MX-R6II
I would like to give everybody an update about my time and shooting experience with the above optic. Overall resumé : I am in deep love! The setup I am shooting with the Canon RF24-105 STM is a dream combination, filling the flexibility gap between my 8-15 Fisheye and the 100mm macro lens. Beeing able to shoot substantially wide dent Sharp reef scenes and fish portraits on a single dive with a full frame mirrorless system is amazing. However I would like to put some terms straight that may have been coined wrongly by the Keyword „Ivanoff Optik“ inspired by our dear Dr. Alex Mustard and who got me started researching and exploring this road. Alex was in fact shooting a Ivanoff-Rebikoff optic with 20mm fixed focal lengths, which is internet keyword wise sometimes just referred to as Ivanoff-corrector Port oder Ivanoff-Optic, leaving out the credits for Mr. Dimitri Rebikoff. During diving deeper into the topic, I found that I am actually shooting a Rebikoff optic, which goes without the correcting inner collection lens presented in their later introduced Ivanoff-Rebikoff design (sometimes referenced as IR design). All three approaches have their caviats. And as you have just read 3 instead of two, yes Rebikoff fronts glas uw correctors Ivanoff-Rebikoff corrector ports Dome ports ..share some commonalities in what’s possible concerning their optical limits. Most importantly the entrance pupil position problem cannot be thrown overboard with any of the above design. Furthermore they also benefit all from the same factors defined by the hosted dry air lens inside of them. The Ivanoff-Rebikoff design and Domeport have in common that they will extremely benefit from lenses that do not very much move the entrance pupil, most commonly found with fixed focal length. This explains also why Alex‘s IR-corrector port works splendid with a certain 20mm lens and created dismal results when trying to apply „the cure“ to other lenses. While everyone of you can easily work on optimal dome port position, you will very much likely fail in computing and manufacturing the exact Ivanoff Element for an Rebikoff-Ivanoff underwater corrector port and your lens; for the sake of beeing extremely costly. My suggestion for everyone is, if you are into exploring paths offside your dome port try to find large 2nd hand Rebikoff underwater corrector ports and start approximations with lenses from your camera brand, Nikon Z, Canon RF or Sony E-Mount. The latest UD elements and other 21st century master technology may help you to luck into a system that outperforms other optical underwater solutions you dived. For some extended reading about Rebikoff and Ivanoff .. their work and later collaboration I recommend these articles: https://blueexplorermag.com/2023/10/28/illuminate-the-abyss-the-innovative-inventions-of-dimitri-rebikoff-coloured-the-underwater-world/ https://spie.org/news/photonics-focus/julyaugust-2023/dimitri-rebikoff-pioneer-of-underwater-photography https://frogmanmuseum.free.fr/html/camerasandvideosrebikoffen.htm https://www.collection-appareils.fr/x/html/camera-5074-Alpa_U-Phot.html
-
New Seacam water contact optic
I totally agree to your impression and did not understand why Seacam picked this particular difficult focal length to run their tests and first Ivanoff-Element (the part that screws onto the lens). It‘s worthwhile mentioning that a Rebikoff-Ivanoff optic will not be designed for zoom flexibility and you run into similar entrance pupil positioning issues as with wide angle zoom optics behind a dome port. The Ivanoff-Element is the part that will make your system afocal again and tries to get rid of chromatic abberations etc. The optical designers of the Ivanoff Element will have to make compromises in optimally correcting it for different zoom positions. When the lens is off these positions the underwater photographer will have to sacrifice IQ. As with Domeports and Watercontact Optics finding the right „Symbiosis lens designs“ from the topside lense choice will keep playing the critical role.
-
New Seacam water contact optic
Nope. It‘s complete as it is and delivering dent sharp underwater images. All required optical elements are included in the main module. There is Ivanoff style and Ivanoff Rebikov designs, plus multiple variations derived from this principle.
-
YAFS: new strobe Atom Flash from BACKSCATTER
Tales from the YAFS* corner… (YAFS = Yet Another Fu…. erhm Fabulous Strobe) BACKSCATTER announced the Atom Flash: Backscatter.comBackscatter Atom Flash Underwater Strobe AF-1Backscatter Atom Flash Underwater Strobe AF-1: With an underwater guide number of ƒ28, the Atom Flash packs serious flash power for its size, lighting everything from the biggest wide-angle scenes to
-
Canon R6 Mark III might fit in R6 II underwater housings and natevily offers now X-Sync speed of 1/320
Are you sure ? It's heavily marketed everywhere! I still hope that the combination of Electronic Shutter + FullFrame Res will allow you to have X-Sync of 1/320s That would explain the above exeptions.
-
Inon S-220: A SERIOUSLY impressive (tiny) wide angle strobe
If people are on a limited budget or have limited luggage the INON S-220 is the goto strobe ! If you can crank up the ISO of your camera a little you can compensate, not bringing a large gun such as the HF-1 or Apollo III 2.0.
-
Canon R6 Mark III might fit in R6 II underwater housings and natevily offers now X-Sync speed of 1/320
The new x-sync speed is a real treat and makes me consider it as another camera body next to R6II. The additional megapixel count raises the attractiveness even more.
-
New Seacam water contact optic
I did quite a while ago in this forum. It is very funny how similar it looks to the new Seacam solution. However it‘s noteworthy that I can use mine without a 2nd component on the lens: Thread name: Ivanoff Style underwater corrector port on a Canon Marelux MX-R6II
-
New Seacam water contact optic
What an irony 🫢🤣 I am diving my Ivanoff Optic now for 6 month at a fraction of the costs and with more corner sharpness I observe in the sample images on the Seacam page and in the teaser. But I am sure Seacam users will buy this anyway. Glad to see some general progress and competition in the underwater optics field again.
-
SmallHD 502 Bright - Still Viable or Something Else?
Found it 🤦♂️ https://waterpixels.net/forums/topic/2417-list-of-underwater-monitors/?&do=getNewComment
-
List of Underwater Monitors
Thanks Davide, for the amazing compilation! Do you mind adding a column to show the monitors resolution. The nits values are nice but an important information might also, if they do 720HD, 1080HD or even 4K.
-
SmallHD 502 Bright - Still Viable or Something Else?
Somebody tried to make a recent underwater monitor market comparision table, but I do seem to find it anymore in the forums? 🤔
-
Canon R6 Mark III might fit in R6 II underwater housings and natevily offers now X-Sync speed of 1/320
I have the impression, this is just a slight perspective shift resulting from two different photos taken. Putting myself in Canon's product management shoes, I would try to utilise the same body tooling + parts when the design change and upgrades are all internal. So I conclude the camera body is very likely to fit in all existing R6 II underwater housings in the market. Let's wait and see for the confirmation.
-
Canon R6 Mark III might fit in R6 II underwater housings and natevily offers now X-Sync speed of 1/320
The today freshly announced Canon R6 Mark III might fit in R6 II underwater housings and natevily offers now X-Sync speed of 1/320 putting it close to this charming Sony A1 feature 🤩 https://m.dpreview.com/reviews/canon-eos-r6-iii-initial-review Flash sync speed 1/320 sec
-
Backscatter HF-1 versus Retra Pro Max II
I think the above image by @Dave_Hicks already answers your question.
-
Backscatter HF-1 versus Retra Pro Max II
Though I am very happy with the HF-1 in that particular point I do agree with you, Dave. To what manual power setting do you reduce the HF-1 to archive 30fps? When I set my Backscatter HF1 to 1/4 power setting it will hardly do 8 - 10 fps with many blackout frames or dark frame variance. In that discipline 1st price goes to Apollo III 2.0 which is slightly stronger in full MTL mode and will have zero blackout frames and no variance in light output.
-
Backscatter HF-1 versus Retra Pro Max II
The HF-1 is the most powerful of the named strobes. Also it will shrink your battery handling substantially down. I refer to just two batteries per strobe and having to change/recharge these every 2 - 1.5 diving days. As you may guess from the above, I am a happy HF-1 user and owner. If recycle time is an issue consider the Marelux Apollo III, the latest version is about as bright as HF-1 in Full mode (not +1 or +2) and will deliver more fps without variance or blackout frames. As a Sony owner you might clearly lean into HF-1.
-
MARELUX Aquista 100 - experiences, sample pictures, image quality tests ?
Hi, just became recently aware of MARELUX's 1st new real water contact optic which seems to compete against the Nauticam WWL-1 line-up. I think it's very interesting, as it seems a little more lightweight + smaller ( and more affordable? ). The name says 100, assuming 100° degrees but their specs says it has even 110° diagonal viewing angle with a 28mm lens. The very interesting part is that it was really engineered and developed for full frame cameras. Also it lists some freaky lens combinations: https://www.marelux.co/pages/aquista-100-port-chart ..some lenses + cams were not mentioned to be compatible with exitisting Nauticam Water Contact Optics. So some fresh wind here in the industry to have a closer look at :) I know that @Phil Rudin has already done some pics with the prototype on Sony. But anyone else already using it on Canon or Nikon Systems? Will be interesting.
-
Canon RF 11-55mm for Full Frame
After the above cinecam bummer, a more realistic powerzoom seems to be on the horizon for full frame: Canon RF 20-50mm F4 PZ source: canonrumors.com Let‘s wait and see, if it will outperform the existing RF 24-50mm in line resolution and other optical performance factors.
-
UWT with HSS on other than Retra strobes?
It‘s called M-HSS for a reason 😉 But you will find leaving the HSS power dial on full for most of your shots, I suppose.
-
Canon RF 24-105mm F4-7.1 IS STM for underwater photography - the overlooked flex lens in the RF system
Hi everybody, while well served at the super wide end with the Canon EF 8-15mm fisheye + Teleconverters (FCP at a more compact size and reasonable price) and having the currently best full frame Macro in the industry with the Canon RF100 USM; I was looking into a mid-range flex lens in the middle for that little kick of flexibility. I was even looking into buying an old SIGMA 17-70mm for EF mount, which had this amazing close focus an Macro ability in the DSLR era and was used by many shooters behind a dome. While researching options I stumbled across Canon‘s very own RF 24-105mm F4-7.1 IS STM that was launched + bundled together with the RF mount R6 cameras a while ago. Compared to it‘s much more expensive sister the RF 24-105mm USM which is not really attractive for underwater use it features dent sharpness and much less travel weight on land. So I bought myself one and also tested it heavily against the widely for UW shooters recommended RF 24-50mm STM shard by Canon. The winner is certainly the RF 24-105 STM which offers very decent close focusing distance and even some macro capability. You can use this behind very large 9 and 8 inch domes, but also it is a very interesting candidate for water contact optics. Behind my Ivanov Optic I can use it from 24-75mm or 32-85mm depending how I set up the extension rings. This might not be useful information for others,… as this underwater lens is simply not available for sale anymore,… but,… I think it has high potential for Canon RF underwater contact optics use, when you are willing to ditch the 24-27 zoom range and start using it at the 28mm focal length. With water contact optics, I am referring to the Nauticam lineup and the shortly available Marelux Aquista 100 and Marlux Aquista 120. The sharpness Sweet spot of that lens in land tests is at F8. I wonder why this baby has not made it into many manufacturers port charts. Hopefully we can bring this up on the radar of gear makers. PS: zoom gear of the RF15-30 STM fits also this lens 🫶✅ But to avoid people using the 24-27mm range or extruding the lens too far out, housing makers might want to produce a gear with Zoom-limiter to perfectly match their water contact optics best results.
-
New Canon EOS C50 Cinema Camera
The camera will have a full frame sensor it seems, but it's unclear if the 11-55mm will be a CN-E cinema lens or not.