HELP!!!! TOO MANY OPTIONS!!!!

Hello there!

Please help! I am looking to purchase a camera setup for a trip to thailand next month and am totally confused as to what to go for! I already have a canon eos 300d for land use but the housings are in my view expensive! I am looking to spend no more than £650 - £700 - and want to get as good a package as poss.

the contenders are

- Fuji F30 with inon wide angle lens and basic strobe (fuji uw 120 strobe) - great low light facilities (iso range - 100 -3200) but no manuel WB and only 5cm macro - £650 all in

Sealife DC600 Elite package - includes strobe and wide angle lens - i'm worried about the lack of ISO range compared with the fuji. £599

Canon Ixus 800 with inon Wide angle lens - better macro at 2 cm and manual white balance and better x4 magnification but again an 80-800 iso range - less than the fuji - £574 without a strobe

some people also seem to recommend the olm SP350 - which has got the manual WB, good macro at 2cm but again a smaller ISO range at 50-400

OR..........???? What do you think? Which camera and why or should i go for something else? If i'm going over old ground to some - i'm sorry - i hav searched through this forum and others for help but there is nothing specific regarding these camera's. thanks for your time!

Regards, Keef.

IMHO the most important feature for underwater is the possibility to shoot RAW to be able to do correct whitebalancing (after the dive). All other features (Iso Range, Shutter Lag, Focus Speed) are secondary.

So if you buy a Camera especially for UW don't buy one without RAW support!

I don't know know about the Fuji and the others but the Ixus does not support RAW.

I don't have a good marketoverview about the current Compact Cameras so maybe someone else can jump in with a suggestion.

If you want to go the Canon way maybe look at one of the older S-Series Cameras (I think they dropped Raw with the S70?) so maybe the S60 with the Canon Housing. You can add a Ikelite Strobe with Sensor now or later, depending on your budget.

But given the "cheap" Dollar you might rethink and order a nice Ikelite Housing for your EOS from the US.

Maybe it is better to spend a bit more now than craving a better rig in half an year.

Simon

Thank you Simon - i appreciate the time you've taken to reply - your comment about the importance of RAW processing is something i hadn't even considered - the olympus SP350 is the only one of the selection to offer JPEG RAW.

Some good advice. Thank you.

i would second the 350 as well.

Have just stumbled on the Fuji FinePix E900 - 9mp, mwb, iso - 50-800, RAW processing and 1/10 second shutter lag - what do people think?

I had virtually decided on the SPC 350 but this has opened the discussion again in my mind.

I could get the camera, an Ikelite housing, Sea & Sea YS25 strobe and either a inon or epoque WAL for £774 as opposed to £700 for the SPC, olm housing and same strobe and WAL setup.

Any advice?

I was in the same position last fall looking for an underwater setup.

My final decision was between the Oly SP-350 and the Fuji E900 since I wanted to have RAW. I ended up with the Fuji E900 / Ikelite housing and am very happy with my decision after use on a weeklong dive trip.

Seems like most SP-350 and E900 owners are happy with their choice, so you probably wouldn't go wrong either way.