digital photography

can anyone give me advice.

i just returned from elphinstone.

i used a olympus c-765 digital camera in housing-using only the camera's flash.

they were all drift dives.

i wanted to esp take stills of dendronephthia-soft coloured corals which are in profusion there.

i tried using automatic but the flash will only work if it feels appropriate-ie/ not all of time.

i used the white balance turned to full red which was suggested to me -that i could use this instead of a blue water filter-my experience was that i still would need a filter.

i tried also using program mode and tried also adjusting the flash to maximum;i tried using faster shutter speeds or wider aperture.

most of the pictures were blurred;with the automatic the flash sometimes didn't work.

the depth of field often was narrow and most was blurred.

someone had advised me to use programme mode and prefix exposure to the blue water above.

i don't want to buy expensive lights-i used to do video u/w but want the better definition of stills.

in realise the shutter speed at the best of times is slow with the c-765 -i use the 10x optical magnification for above water nature shots.

can you give me any advice to improve my results.

i took 931 photos-probably 800 were ok but the drift dive with soft corals was a blur-i realise a drift dive doesn't help.

when i speeded up the shutter speed the exposure was underexposed

steve waldman

Steve,

Tough call. Your camera doesn't shoot RAW so adjusting the exposure on a computer isn't a real good option. Because your camera has a manual white balance option my first inclination is to tell you about the magic filter http://www.magic-filters.com/ however you'll read on the site that these were designed for DSLR's and not point and shoot cameras. I have used this filter with my Oly Housing and its somewhat difficult to do. You have to cut a piece of paper to the size of your opening inside your housing. Then use it as a stencil to cut the gel filter. Inserting it and getting it back out is tricky. Reef (link on the right of this page) can get you one filter for about $20. That filter should help you with the color issue below the water.

Your margin for error, using a small point and shoot camera with no external strobe on a drift dive, is slim. Larger panoramic reef shots would definitely be blurred because your internal strobe would be ineffective and your camera would try and compensate by slowing the shutter speed and opening the aperture. Getting close to individual corals would be your only hope of getting a halfway decent shot. Fighting the drift to steady yourself for a shot may be an option if the current isn't that bad. I usually don't get any motion blur when my shutter speed is about 165 however, some of my shots come out underexposed at this speed. Fortunately with the camera I use, I take RAW photos and can adjust the lighting somewhat with computer software.

Since I'm new to the underwater gig there are better people than to give you additional help. I would resize a couple of your photos in question to 600 x 600 and post them here http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showforum=26

later,

Gary