Ocean Images Underwater Housing for Sony HC7

As some of you will remember, I had been wondering what underwater housing and HD camera to get started with. I summed it up in a previous thread and include it at the end of this post for reference. I ended up buying an Ocean Image underwater housing for the Sony HC7. Will follow a review of the casing as I tried it yesterday in a pool. Diving on the Oriskany on April 14th, a more thorough review will follow soon.

From previous thread:

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I ended up going with an HC7 and an Ocean Image case. I had a few reasons for that, beyond the technical differences between the HC7 and HC3 illustrated in the prior post.

I hesitated for a while and will let you know within a month if I made the right decision but essentially:

* I wanted a recent camcorder. The HC3 is not that old and the HC7 not a necessary upgrade but I didn't want to buy a camera which had already been retired. I understand that 6-10 months from now the HC7 will be retired as well but at least it's not retired yet. In 6 months or so, prices will have gone down and I'll buy a second HC7 as a backup.

* I had been hesitating between buying a UW enclosure for my Canon 5D and buying a video camera setup. I realize that the image quality from the HC7 will be an order of magnitude below the 5D but it'll be comparable to the Canon S50 I took these with. Should be decent for a still here and there while shooting moving images.

* The price difference for the L&M case and lights was around $4k and that was for an HC3. The HC7 case from Ocean Imaging seems to have most of the features found in the more expensive case but is more affordable.

* While L&M is not a large company, I liked the idea of a small company like Ocean Image build a case for me. Sure they're kind of ugly but as my dive buddy pointed out, if it ever drops down to the bottom, the yellow box will be easy to see. Also, Keith at Ocean Image was very responsive over the phone and by email during my search.

* The Ocean Image case gives more control to the diver than similarly priced or more expensive cases from Seatools or Gates. It seems like a really good solution, truth be told.

Keep in mind I might have made a huge mistake but these were the factors to my decision. I'll get the forums know in a little over a month how everything panned out. I'll be testing the rig in the pool in a week or so, in a cold water dive in early April and on the Oriskani on April 12th. Hope for the best !

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As part of my divemaster training I have been doing some internships at the pool helping out an instructor for a PADI OW class.

I thought it'd be a good opportunity to bring the HC7 and its Ocean Images UW housing (sans lights) to try it out.

Let me describe the housing first.

The O.I. housing for the HC series (HC1/3/7 housing seem to pretty much look the same) is a large sturdy rectangular yellow box. It's pretty different from a standard L&M housing, close to something Gates would manufacture. It feels very solid and very sturdy. It feels custom made which is almost the case since they're pretty much made to order.

The back window of the housing is transparent and is affixed with 4 solid looking latches. I had mine configured with all options but the white balance card arm. That includes:

* Wide Angle lens

* Red filter

* Touch screen rods

* Pro digital control (Record, Photo, Wide, Tight, Manual Focus and Back Light buttons)

The housing is easy to use but it's also pretty easy to make errors setting it up. Everything has to be exactly in place and take a little bit of trial and error.

The first time I hit the pool, the control cable that connects the camera to the housing electronics was stuck between the camera lens and the wide angle port, leaving a dark shadow on the screen. Beginner's mistake.

The second time around the cable was not connected properly. Also, the camera was positioned slightly out of axis causing some vignetting on the right.

As I said it takes a little bit of trial and error to get right and certainly, I should have prepared and check my equipment more thoroughly before jumping in the pool.

Once in the pool I tried every setting of the camera. All outside button worked very well and I was able to zoom in and out, manually focus, use the back light option and take photos (while filming) very easily. The buttons are big enough and seem pretty solid (I think they're oil filled).

The camera wasn't able to focus zoomed in all the way on a subject 5-8 feet away or so, probably a factor of the wide angle port + max zoom. Zooming all the way on a subject that was close was no problem however.

Outside the housing, two dials control rods that press on the camera's touch screen and supposedly allow you to interact with every camera feature. And it works very well, I must say ! I was able to easily do a custom white balance which I thought was important. Other features like exposure, shutter speed, telemacro, ... were also very easily accessible. It might not look very elegant engineering wise but it works very well underwater. Probably a little tough with heavy dry suit gloves but I rarely dive dry.

I played a bit with white balance and while the camera didn't do a great job of white balancing in the artificial light of the pool, the custom white balance and/or red disk did a pretty good job. The red filter is not meant for freshwater so the results were ok but a little odd. I am sure they'll fare better in saltwater.

This time around I didn't use the lights (2x50 W Hallogen). I might use them in Pensacola in a few weeks but since we're going to dive wrecks it might not see any use.

Had some difficulties importing the HC7 videos in FCP (none in iMovie) but eventually found the right settings and imported the high def movies.

Anyway, that's not all I got to say about it but that's it for now. Overall, I am happy with this housing and camera but the real test will be in open water, deep on the Oriskany.

More soon. Ask any questions you like.

Thanks for the nice reports on how things are going. I read with interest and remembered my first pool dive and then subsequent dives with my new SR1 and Ikelite housing. It will be interesting to see how the wreck dives go.

Thanks for the review. Ocean Images housings rarely get mentioned on this forum but they're one of those "2nd tier" of companies, like for example USVH, that almost always get talked about in a positive light.

(Are there youtube-like services out there that allow for high def - a.k.a. better than youtube - widescreen content to be uploaded) ?

The best one at the moment seems to be www.stage6.com. You can upload a nice big clear DivX video to there.

Florida trip got canceled so I won't get to dive it this month but I'll keep you guys updated as soon as I do.

Thanks for the review. Ocean Images housings rarely get mentioned on this forum but they're one of those "2nd tier" of companies, like for example USVH, that almost always get talked about in a positive light.

The best one at the moment seems to be www.stage6.com. You can upload a nice big clear DivX video to there.

Incidentally I am now selling this setup. It was bought new for $4300 total. Entertaining all offers. Everything is in pristine condition