Just purchased 1st DSLR/Housing

I just upgraded from using a P&S and purchased a used Nikon D100 with Nexus housing. I'll be shooting with a Nikkor 105mm micro (macro) lens and the Nexus 105 port with manual control. I have a single Sea & Sea YS-110 strobe.

Looking for recommendations on where to start with some of the following settings:

- How should I set the white balance (manual with white card or auto)?

- Recommended aperture and shutter speed?

- Sea and Sea strobe will be used in manual mode - where should I start?

Any other thoughts/recommendations to make my first experiences with this setup would be appreciated. I'll be going to Roatan for a week in late January.

Thanks!

Use RAW. I can't emphasize that enough

I use WB set to auto although I have seen some good results with the WB set to flash where strobe light is the primary exposure component.

With the 105 I'd start with f22 at 125th. You'll probably hear a lot of technical reasons why, hypothetically f16 or lower will yield sharper images but in my experience the increased depth-of-field at f22 gives better results. Use shutter speed to control the amount of ambient light you want to have or to create motion-blur at slower shutter speeds.

Thanks for the suggestions. I've never worked with RAW files. Will I be able to import them directly into Corel Paint Shop Pro X? I know the program handles RAW, but if I understand right, every manufacturers raw files are a bit different. How much do I lose if I use JPG??

I don't even know where to start with processing RAW and then how do I convert to a final file?

I'm not familiar with Corel Paint Shop Pro X so I can't comment on that. I use Nikon Capture 4.4 and occasionally Adobe Camera Raw.

"How much do I lose if I use JPG??" IMO you lose a great deal. You lose the the huge range of adjustments that RAW makes available. As an example, if you shoot with the camera set to daylight WB, with JPEG that's what you get. The white balance of your image is fixed. With RAW you can set any WB you want when you process the image.

You can get the most out of your image if you shoot in RAW.

I'm not familiar with Corel Paint Shop Pro X so I can't comment on that. I use Nikon Capture 4.4 and occasionally Adobe Camera Raw.

 

"How much do I lose if I use JPG??" IMO you lose a great deal. You lose the the huge range of adjustments that RAW makes available. As an example, if you shoot with the camera set to daylight WB, with JPEG that's what you get. The white balance of your image is fixed. With RAW you can set any WB you want when you process the image.

 

You can get the most out of your image if you shoot in RAW.

I agree with Larry on shooting RAW. If you don't want to pony up the license fee for Nikon Capture or Capture NX, I believe you can download NikonView and/or Picture Project from the Nikon website for free. These programs don't give you the ability to make adjustments like Nikon Capture / Capture NX. They will let you open the RAW files and save them as JPG's though. This would allow you to keep a copy of the RAW file for future use should you decide to invest in Capture / Capture NX and let you create JPG's to edit in Corel Paint Shop Pro X ... just a thought. I have been using NikonView as a browser since 2001 when I bought a Coolpix 5000. I shoot a D70 now and use Capture NX to edit RAW files.

I agree with Larry on shooting RAW. If you don't want to pony up the license fee for Nikon Capture or Capture NX, I believe you can download NikonView and/or Picture Project from the Nikon website for free. These programs don't give you the ability to make adjustments like Nikon Capture / Capture NX. They will let you open the RAW files and save them as JPG's though. This would allow you to keep a copy of the RAW file for future use should you decide to invest in Capture / Capture NX and let you create JPG's to edit in Corel Paint Shop Pro X ... just a thought. I have been using NikonView as a browser since 2001 when I bought a Coolpix 5000. I shoot a D70 now and use Capture NX to edit RAW files.

Thanks for all the help and info! Looking forward to trying out RAW.