Manual or Automatic shooting

I have been doing u/w photography for about three years with only a Sealife Reefmaster camera. Although I've taken good pictures with it the limitations with this setup are a big problem. In the next few months I'll take to plunge into u/w digital so I'll be breaking the bank.

Here is the question. How many of you guys and gals shoot only manual or automatic? Should the housing I purchase have full maual controls or do most people shoot in auto mode, letting the camera do most of the work. I've noticed that a lot of housing do not provide controls for the aperture or shutter settings.

Hi Manta Ray,

I have noticed that most "consumer" digital cameras do not work that well underwater in automatic mode. My feeling is that the camera designers have different goals than us when they design the internal software for the camera. They are more interested in "mom getting a good shot of Jimmy at his graduation" or of their baby's first steps, that kind of thing.

So when I took my camera underwater and tried to shoot photos in Automatic mode, I was ending up with F2.8 on almost every shot. The camera was always going for the fastest shutterspeed that it could get - no matter what.

What we want is to shoot with an external flash at the (usually) the highest f-stop we can get. That's why I use Aperture Priority or full Manual on my camera.

HTH

James

I agree with james. I shoot in manual.

U/W is the exact place where you need to use the non trivial option (full auto). The conditions W/U are usually radical: little amount of light without flash, maybe too much with flash at close shots, movement of the fishes...

As James said, when you use external strobe you have to control the F-stop and again you can't do it in auto mode.

I find myself doing a lot of over/under exposure (usually with lousy results but I can see an improvement - I hope )

:

:

So you can understand that I think that manual and the semi automatics options are critical to W/U camera.

On my first dive trip with an UW housing I left my camera in automatic mode (Sony F707). I got some nice pics that way.

Analyzing them afterwards shows that a lot of them are in th F2.8 range. I've been in the pool only once afterwards, playing around with the manual mode and I'm glad I can operate that under water.

It takes more time to get it right, but I think in the end it's worth it. So if you can afford a housing that lets you adjust the camera in manual mode, go for it.

It depends on how ambitious you are.

If your only goal is to take some snapshots and use the builtin strobe, auto-mode is ok.

But if you want to learn from your mistakes and start shooting the best possible picture under the given circumstances, you'll need the ability to take full (i.e. manual) control.

As the others said, most consumer digicams tend to open the aperture as much as possible (F2.8) and use slow shutterspeed (1/60 or slower) in automatic mode, which results in a small DOF and makes it impossible to shoot moving objects, like swimming fish. If you want to use an external slave strobe, manual mode is the only way to get some decent pictures.

Sabine

I use a housed SLR (Canon D60) and found that for wide angle, in general, shooting in aperture priority or shutter priority and telling the camera to underexpose by 1 stop (because water is dark) works pretty well and exposes the scene properly. The water should be the right shade of blue (or green as the case may be). This of course can vary depending on how your camera (and you) meter the scene, etc.

As for the strobe, I use a housed Canon 550EX with a diffuser added, which seems to work pretty well but depending on what I'm shooting I sometimes have to stop down the strobe as well by up to a stop -- pictures of divers in their black wet suits or stingrays with their dark skin are a typical example. Coverage is really the problem I have with my current setup; I will probably get a second strobe but I'm still thinking about that.

For macro, or wide angle on night dives, I set the camera to full manual and let the strobe electronics do all the work. This works really well for the first 40 shots or so, then the batteries on the strobe start to get weak! I really hate AA's.

Previous to getting the SLR housed I'd used a few different housed consumer digicams and always had the problem of it typically overexposing. Be sure the camera you get lets you do exposure compensation easily while housed!

Hope that helps,

Sean

Knowing that I'm not even an amateur photographer but had the money to spend on a 5megapixel cam and a housing (not a bag), would I benefit from setting the camera up on land or just shoot full auto underwater (not including the white balance)?

Yes, you would definitely benefit.

Cheers

James

So what I have gleemed from all these post is higher f-stop (smaller aperature) and faster shutter speed. I understand the faster shutter speed to capture a good Still in focus. I understand a higher f-stop for greater DOF. Both which require more light.

I gather that there is no magic number to set or the manual controls would be obsolete. Is there a setting that you find you most frequently use for specific pictures?

example: If I plan a night dive, pictures to be macro. Or if I plan a day dive, object is 1-3m away.

I'm ignoring the lighting because that is something I can control underwater. I can't control my f-stop nor shutter speed underwater.

I appreciate the info you've already provided.

Mark

Hi Mark,

Remember this, you can control the FOREGROUND lightingwith your strobes, but not the background. You use the camera's fstop and shutterspeed to control the background exposure. In shallow water on a sunny day you might shoot f11 and 1/125th. On a cloudy day at 70 feet you might shoot f4 and 1/60th.

That's why you have manual control. You use your manual control to set your background exposure - which basically will determine what color the water is (light blue or dark blue, or black).

For macro where you are providing 99% of your light via your strobes a tried and true rule is: Highest fstop and fastest shutterspeed that will sync with your strobes.

HTH

James

Very well put.

Mark -

Doesn't the F707 allow you to adjust f-stop and shutterspeed underwater? A housing in that price range absolutely should. I would have a chat with amphibico if I were you.

If you really cant make any changes, you may be better off staying with auto - perhaps with a -1 or -2 exposure comp to darken the water a little (and increase shutter speeds) if attempting wide angle. Most of the advice that you are reading pertains to shooting with strobes and wide angle. If you shoot mostly macro with video lights, the benefits of manual are insignificant - unless you try to create blue backrounds - that will be tricky.

If you do want to try manual, in tropical waters during the daytime and above 90 ft, f 5.6 and a shutter speed around 90 provide me with good results - as long as you shoot upwards towards the water's surface. You will need to watch your foreground exposure by dimming your lights, or moving them closer/further from the subject. Also - shutter speed does affect your foreground exposure when using video lights, so you may find that these settings will need to be honed to your system.

Good luck - and check with amphibico

Kasey

I just check amphibico's web site and they claim that the F707 provides access to all important camera functions. Well, I guess "important" is debateable, but what is more important and fundamental than f-stop and aperture?

Well, I sure didn't think so when when I returned my Amphibico housing.

Since I've decided to buy the Sony 717 I wanted to know if Amphibico was planing to build a housing for it. So I emailed Amphibico last week. They said that the updated housing for the 717 Sony would have manual controls for aperature and shutter and last picture review. You would not, however, be able to delete pictures underwater. The housing will probably be ready in the spring -late spring. The LSD, light sensor device, may help with exposure for those with the housing that doesn't have manual controls. Sony 707 and 717 cameras do not use preflash for exposure. It meters "through the lens". The flash only pops up if there is not enough light.

You are still limited to using custom white balance or a single white balance preset during the dive. That's OK for using lights but not flash.

I spoke with them about the problem recently. Perhaps they will fix that with the 717 housing as well. Sony needs to release the 256MB stick.

Question to Sean (and everybody else)

You wrote that you use a housed Canon 550EX.

What housing you uses?

How is does the 550EX under water? What is GN U/w? Does is light temperature is suitable?

Thanks, Alto

alto,

I got a UK-Germany housing (www.uk-germany.com) and they make strobe housings for Canon and Nikon strobes. I went this route because I already had decided on Canon gear for topside use, and didn't want to deal with full manual strobes.

The big downside of this setup is that there are no controls on the strobe housing -- you can't turn the thing off even, which is the biggest thing I want to do sometimes. You can of course change flash exposure via the camera, so that's no problem.

Color temperature is good, but with a 16mm lens and dome port coverage is not wide enough. Two strobe are probably in order, I'm still debating that (if one strobe is good enough for Roger Steene...). I added a diffuser and this helped immensely, widening coverage slightly and greatly improving how nice falloff is.

Hope that helps!