Back-scatter

I've recently acquiired a Sea & Sea DX860G compact, with housing & strobe etc

I've taken a couple of hundred photos so far and as expected, many, if not most (ie around 95%) are just plain wrong, for a variety of reasons, which I'm working on.

However, one thing which has infuriated me, to some extent, is the back scatter problem; the strobe is slaved through a fibre optic to the camera flash and I've found that despite sticking some black duct tape over the diffuser provided on the housing, I'm still having the same problem, because light is still escaping the housing.

The strobe was supplied with velcro backed fabric and velcro tape, along with a pattern to cut it out to suit several other makes/models of housing, like Canon, Olympus etc except they haven't provided a pattern for their own Sea & Sea housing.

I guess I could always cut this out myself to suit but the housing is very curvy and I honestly doubt, being the cack-handed individual that I am, that I'd get it right.

It seems to me that a better and more workable solution for me would be to apply black tape to the inside of the housing instead. (actually a better solution would be for the manufacturers to make an opaque front to their housings but never mind that.)

Can anyone see any likely drawbacks with this idea?

Richard

Hi Richard,

Welcome to Wetpixel.

That black tape should work well.

Sounds like a job for duct tape. In a more general sense; it sounds like you know that the key to backscatter is not to light up any water between your camera and your subject.

Make sure you make a template of the required pattern first with notebook paper etc to fit the casing. The just lay the paper on the velcro and make the final cuts.