HID Lamp as night dive and focus light - Help Needed

Fellow divers,

I have finally ordered my UW photo rig (Sea&Sea housing for Canon 350D, 2 YS-110 strobes, S&S glass dome port, flat port for macro).

Next step is to figure out how to use a dive lamp with this gear (in the Netherlands it is always pretty dark underwater).

I have a Canister HID light 21W (Salvo light) which I use in my dives. I was wondering whether I could get in any way this light attached to my housing and use it as focus light in addition to the strobes.

Would this light work for both macro and wide photo? I am not sure whether the HID is to strong and would appear in the photos.

Thank you very much in advance for your help.

Regards,

Nuno Sanches e Silva

Nuno, I have a Salvo 21W light as well... It's way to strong for a focus light if you're shooting macro and will create a hotspot for wideangle. I tried a night dive with it once when I was still using a canon pt n shoot (S70) and you could kind of use it for a focus light if you just get the subject in the edge of the light beam. You could possibly mount it on an arm. But I think you'll find that the 21W will just scare off most critters!!! haven't taken it with me with my 350D/ S&S housing as I use a Fisheye Fix LED adjustable focus light as a primary nite/ focus light. I just save my 21W salvo for wreck penetrations w/o camera or diving locally in murky Hong Kong waters...

Nuno, I have a Salvo 21W light as well... It's way to strong for a focus light if you're shooting macro and will create a hotspot for wideangle. I tried a night dive with it once when I was still using a canon pt n shoot (S70) and you could kind of use it for a focus light if you just get the subject in the edge of the light beam. You could possibly mount it on an arm. But I think you'll find that the 21W will just scare off most critters!!! haven't taken it with me with my 350D/ S&S housing as I use a Fisheye Fix LED adjustable focus light as a primary nite/ focus light. I just save my 21W salvo for wreck penetrations w/o camera or diving locally in murky Hong Kong waters...

Salvo has a video reflector available for these lights, which spread the beam evenly at an 90-100 deg angle. You could also go the cheap route and use lumedyne flash reflectors, which are available at around $20 from Adorama, B&H etc. It's the same reflector that Salvo uses, you'd just need a way to figure out how to mount in on the light head. Basically just some plastic pipe and some bungee might do the job.

//LN

Thanks for your replies guys. Anyonw had experience with such video reflector for macro photography?

cheers,

Nuno