Post a Picture of Your "Rig"

All right, I FINALLY got my setup back from my friend and have posted a picture. I had to get the "studio backdrop" out for this one...hehe:

As you can see, the strobe is bigger than the housing... I got this strobe for wideangle shooting w/ my Nikonos 15mm and I hope to use it with the 19mm Nikon(NICE!) converter lens for the coolpix 5000.

I forgot to mention - you can see the triple clamp and flashlight holder on the top of the handle. It's nice for night dives, both for focusing, and not having to carry a separate dive light. If I had an Ikelite strobe I wouldn't need this...

Cheeers

James

[Edited on 3-4-2002 by jamesw]

Aquatica 995 Housing

ULC arms

ULC short tray w/ removable handle

YS90DX Strobe

Ikelite DS50 Strobe w/ slave sensor

Underwater Kinetics Focus light (w/ diffuser)

Wow, that Aquatica housing looks nice! Thanks for posting the picture.

I've got a couple of questions if you don't mind:

Since the housing is angled at 45 degrees, is the tray "crooked" making your strobes point forward?

Why didn't you use a sync cord to sync your S&S YS 90DX?

Actually, now that I look at the picture again, it looks like your this picture is just for demonstration purposes. Sorry about the questions. My guess is that you use a sync cord w/ the YS90 and use the TTL slave sensor to fire the DS50.

Cheers

James

[Edited on 3-5-2002 by jamesw]

The tray is parallel to the bottom of the housing so if shooting horizontal, the handles/tray would be angled 45 forward (very comfortable).

Sync cord for ys90 should be here in a couple of days.

Here's a pic of my PT-010 setup with the Olympus 3040Z , dual YS90-DXs, Inon wide-angle and macro lens, and the ULCS arm and tray system.

All this is maintained by Señor Beaker at the Muppet Labs. Meep! Meep! Meep!

Just got this today. Aquatica housing for the Nikon CP-995. TLC arm parts pilfered from my housed F-100. SB-105 strobe pilfered from my Nik V set up. Will get it wet in the morning. Let you all know how it works out.

[Edited on 5-25-2002 by rooster]

I'm invicible now. MUHAHAHAHA!

UK Germany D30 housing, ULCS Subal tray and arms, dual Ikelite DS-125 strobes, dome port for Sigma 14mm (22.4mm equivalent in 35mm cameras):

Holy moly! You actually got it. Way cool.

Wish that d100 would hurry up.

Have fun Eric. I take it those are Ike ds125 strobes? Should be a great setup.

Hey, Don -

I've been trying to get this rig together for weeks. The final parts (the D30 -- which I had to ship off for awhile, the housing itself, and strobes) all arrived today via UPS.

Good thing. I'm leaving for Kona on Monday.

what ports and lenses?

Does the housing give proper conversion, so ttl works right? What about e-ttl? Some folks seem to swear by how well it works for fill flash.

Are we going to get a daily web cast, from Kona?

Do you have broad band access there? Do you want it??

Jim has DSL at his house, but at night, I'll be at a banana plantation, sleeping (cheapest bed I could find...) Why? You have broadband access in Kona I can use?

I'm shooting manual, all the way. I shot E-TTL with a housed 550EX, but it was a pain, because there was no access to the exposure lock button. My new housing has access to the button, but I'm no longer using strobes that can do E-TTL.

If I have access to broadband, I'll be posting photos daily. That's the way it usually works.

As for ports and lenses, I have a 6" dome port for the Sigma 14mm, and a flat port for Canon 100mm macro. A 50mm macro port is available, too, but I should be able to just use the 100mm port for awhile. If I have focusing problems, I'll have to get that as well...

[Edited on 3-21-2002 by echeng]

Awesome set up! I came >> << that close to ordering the same set up.

Just couldn't justify the expense for a once or twice a year diver.

Enjoy!

UK Germany is really lucky because Canon didn't change the form factor (read body) of their camera when going from the D-30 to the D-60.

Now you can "upgrade" your whole system to the D60 for the piddling price of only $2,200, right Eric...hehe. Still better than having to buy a new camera AND a new housing.

Cheers

James

I took my first few shots with the new D30 setup today. It's going to rock. The 14mm sigma seems a little soft, though. I have to use it becase of the 1.6x effective multiplier, though. phooey.

We're hoping the D60 arrives here within the next week, so we can take it underwater while I'm still here in Kona.

My new rig:

Weather premitting, we're going diving next weekend!

Cheers

James Wiseman

Hi James.

Very nice! I'm curious about your strobe setup. Different strobes? Do you like it that way? It appears that you have the more powerful strobe on the left. Isn't that reverse of usual?

Can't wait to see some pix, and hear about your usage experiences!

Great stuff.

Don

Hi Don,

Yep, I really like it that way. I used to only have one strobe and I shot it on the left, like with a Nikonos stock arm/clamp - because that's what I'm used to.

Now that I have a second strobe (slave) it goes on the right with the primary strobe on the left. Again...it's just what I'm used to.

I am very pleased with the effect that I am getting from "mixing" strobes. You can especially see it in this picture:

Notice that the shadow on the right side is darker from the more powerful Nikon strobe to the left of the camera. That shot was taken with both strobes in TTL. TTL doesn't change the strobe power remember, it just cuts them both off at the same time. The unequal lighting will look great once I go diving, IMO.

The camera had no problems firing two strobes wit the dual sync cord setup. It's really a pleasure to use.

Cheers

James

Is there a particular reason you're using the Ike strobes rather than a housed Canon strobe using UK-Germany's canon strobe housings? Wouldn't you get ttl exposure that way?

Curious because I'm hungering for that housing, and already have a 550ex...

It is generally agreed that housing a surface strobe is not as good as getting a dedicated underwater strobe.

The color temp is different, (need more warmth, since every foot of water eats the reds).

The whole strobe is typically cheaper than the housing alone, for a housed strobe.

Here's a picture that Dave McConnell asked me to post. I'm sure he will post the information about his rig in this thread so I don't have to do it for him...:-)