Strobe selection for D70s and Ikelite Housing

I would like to congratulate all fellow divers New Year with this opportunity.

I used to shoot with Nikon Coolpix 5700 in Ikelite housing and had SS200 and DS50 substrobes which i was using seperatelly.

Recently i decided to switch to digital SLR. Therefore i bought a D70s and an Ikelite housing after quite a long decision period.

In february i will have a vacation in Maldives and i see this as an opportunity to start shooting wide angle. For this purpose I bought Nikon 10.5mm in addition to the camera kit with 18-70mm zoom.

I think in order to have proper lighting with 10.5mm i should switch to dual strobe usage.

Since the potential subjects to shoot are sharks and manta rays, based on the information i got by reading similar topics here the more powerful the strobes i will be using the better chances i will be having to get good results.

Considering that i already have one SS200 i think the best solution would be to get another one. This would provide me with two powerfull strobes, with the same parameters, with very short recycle time. And also i shall be buying only one strobe and making economy. (even though economy is not the first concern in my choice)

I am fully aware that with SS200s i will only be able to shoot in manual however again after reading related topics in wetpixel.com i am not afraid to go manual.

In some internet shops i have already found second hand SS200 with 6months of guarantee from the internet shop company.

However i have read also among the forums here that some fellows who are trying similar setup (Ikelite+D70s+2xSS200) had problems even in strobe usage in manual mode.

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showt...=11195&hl=ss200

Living in Moscow Russian Federation, i will hardly be able to get help if conversion circuitry of the housing will need to be modified. I am afraid if i need this i will need to send the housing back to the states and this probably will be too time consuming.

As an alternative i could buy two strobes like DS125 and would start to use them without any problem but would their performance be close to SS200 while shouting sharks, manta rays and whale sharks??

I would be happy to hear advices to help me make up my mind.

Mehmet Gungen

Hi Mehmet

I think the SS200 is an absolutely fantastic strobe, as you say, powerful and quick recharge. However, if there is a potential compatibility problem and money is not an issue then you would probably be smarter to go with the 2 DS125 option. I would hate to go on a big trip like you are planning and have a strobe problem.

The 125s are certainly powerful enough to shoot mantas and sharks. I know a lot of top pros who use those strobes exclusively and report no problems whatsoever. And as an added bonus they are smaller and lighter for easier travel

Hello Mike,

I checked your site. There are nice manta ray and shark photos there.

Which Ikelite do you use?

If SS200 is it in full power?

Perhaps using 2xDS125 will provide me with the ease of digital TTL compatibility. However on the other hand there is a big power difference between 2x200watts second and 2x110 watts second

I can not imagine whether i need this while shooting big, fast mooving subjects or not.

On the other hand full power recycle time of DS125 is ~%50 faster. Thus i can shoot 3 full power shots in 3 seconds with DS 125 instead of 2 with SS200 which may also be an advantage with a camera like D70s which can shoot lots of frames (even in RAW format) in a raw.

Mehmet