Many questions

Hi all!

I just recieved my new gear from Japan. The Olympus WA-lens, the Macro-lens, one fisheye tray/locline arm. The ys90dx is on its way. Previous equipment is the 4040 + pt-010.

I've only been playing around a bit above-surface, and all is looking good.

A question about the macro lens. Do I have to take the picture from exactly 10 cm to get the subject in focus? Thats what is seems like when I'm playing around with the thing. Isn't that very difficult? Without the lens, the camera does the focusing, but now it seems that I have to make sure the distance is right.

About the Wide-Angle lens. From what I understand reading this forum, one ys90dx will not be enough to take good wa-shots. I accept the truth in this, and since I won't buy another one, what kind of pictures should I go for with the above setup? Surely it is possible to light a smaller subject in the foreground with the strobe, and get the blue surface as a background? How about pictures in shallow waters, with a great deal of ambient light? What settings would I use for WA? I have absolutely no idea, but I suppose the settings I've used for macro won't do.

The loc-line arm is kinda short. It should be possible to simply buy an extra 5 units or so, to make the arm longer. Anyone with experience of this?

And lastly, night settings. I wish to take some night pics. For this a need a flashlight to light the subject so that the camera can focus etc. How strong does this flashlight have to be. Will a small pocket-torch be enough or will I need a $400 Kowalski 50 watt lamp? Settings on the camera when taking night shots?

That was all (for now )

Thankful for any advice or experiences.

Hi Paste,

Usually let knowledgeable "others" reply but on this subject I do have a little advice. Hope you can do the metric conversion.

The macro will focus down to 3". Do not use the zoom for now. Practice with that later. Bring it out to Telephoto and get close.

As for the single YS90dx being "Good enough", that's a personal question that you have to answer.

Here's a WA shot I took with a single YS90:

I use a 4 AA cell flashlight for the spotting lamp. Hope this helps.

Rand

One strobe is good enough for WA - trust me.

I use only 1 with a 12mm lens (with an angle of view of 165 degrees).

I think the 90 covers around 95-100 which is fine for your conversion lens, even if it were fixed rigidly over the top of the camera. When siting the strobe on an arm this angle can be manipulated to your best advantage by shifting the head around.

NONE of the WA images I have posted on this site have used more than one strobe!

If you use a 50W light at night you'll be on your own and won't have to worry too much about camera settings I fear. Just a low wattage 2 cell torch is ok and a max 20W general light.

The loc-line arm is kinda short. It should be possible to simply buy an extra 5 units or so, to make the arm longer. Anyone with experience of this?

 

And lastly, night settings. I wish to take some night pics. For this a need a flashlight to light the subject so that the camera can focus etc. How strong does this flashlight have to be. Will a small pocket-torch be enough or will I need a $400 Kowalski 50 watt lamp? Settings on the camera when taking night shots?

I sometimes use the "bendy" arms. Bought extra links from

http://www.mcmaster.com

I find that I like arms about 12-14 links long. The YS90DX will flop around on the surface, but it's very stable underwater.

I use two UK Q40's for focus lights. One's probably enough. I lined the reflectors with a crumpled up piece of Al foil to spread the beam.

Will a small pocket-torch be enough or will I need a $400 Kowalski 50 watt lamp?

I tend to shoot with a big focus light that doubles as my main light. I'm going to stop, though -- the main dive light will be only for spotting critters, and a smaller light will be for focus, because everything is scared of the bright light (I use a hartenberger maxi compact).