This focus light rocks!

After reading online here at Wetpixel that Nocturnal was selling their demos I went ahead and ordered the SLX focus light. Well today it arrived at 530pm and by 730pm I attached it to the Ikelite/D80 with a single DS51 and am very happy with the results! I did order the ULC arms to use the light with the 2nd strobe attached but it hasnt arrived yet. Four of us went out tonight to do a little freedive photography in the pitch black waters and the light worked very well. It throws a very bright but not harsh white light that didnt show up in a single photo out of 60 or so that I took. The light is brighter than the C8 ELed UK light as well and is about half the size. We were out just over 3 hours so I cant report on battery life other than the light hasnt faded at all in the time we were out. On a side note, I was after blue rings and although I saw two both slipped away mere feet from my face but I am not brave enough to poke in crevices and under corals for them. Anyway, here are some pictures, the Nocturnal light allowed the D80 to focus quickly, showed great color through the viewfinder and didnt screw up one photo with either color or intensity. I will admit that I thought there would have been some interference because the light is so bright.

Sorry for so many pictures, I am just trying to show a number of colors that would ordinarily reflect or might show washout from the focus light.

Nice pics! You did well

Nice shots and thanks for the report on the Nocturnal SLX... more impressive that you did this freediving!!

I appreciate the compliment Pakman buts its not as hard as it sounds. Whats so hard is the slow cruising deep enough to locate things to take pictures of. One of the things I immediately noticed when I got home that night and looked at the pictures was just how many turned out to be keepers. Ordinarily during the day I keep maybe 1 in 5 or so photos due to lighting, focus etc. On that night I kept 25 out of 60 photos taken. I attribute that success ratio change to the fact that the camera when using the focus light to focus was either locked on or still "hunting". With only one DS51 strobe most of the pictures are on the dark side but again that doesnt bother me too much. The camera was set at F10 and shutter at 1/160 the whole night and all I had to do was point and shoot the SLR, couldnt have been more pleasant!

With only one DS51 strobe most of the pictures are on the dark side but again that doesnt bother me too much. The camera was set at F10 and shutter at 1/160 the whole night and all I had to do was point and shoot the SLR, couldnt have been more pleasant!

Actually I think the darkness of the shots really enhances some of them. The squid in particular is haunting with the iridescent colors against the black. If you hadn't said you thought they were dark, I'd have thought that was your intentional choice for framing and exposure. Kudos!

The squid is one in which I did turn the strobe away from direct illumination. I was trying to catch the color changing that was happening and at first the glossy skin kept reflecting too much light. Later in the evening we found another one swimming in the dark which was a bit bigger (same species?) who had an altogether different color pattern...

Arent these cuttlefish?

Possible - I'm not entirely clear on the distinction between squid and cuttlefish, but from the 2nd pic, I would say it looks more like the latter. According to Wikipedia the difference is that they have a 'cuttlebone' for internal structural support - but how you could tell that vs. the cartilagenous 'bone' of a squid from the outside, I'll be danged if I know...

Anyway, another beautiful shot. And that could've been the same one. Their markings are incredibly flexible, just like the coloration of them.

EDIT - wow, I love this stuff - this thread made me check the Wikipedia article and gave me one of those 'neato' moments reading a bit more about them:

Credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuttlefish

The blood of a cuttlefish is an unusual shade of green-blue because it uses the copper-containing protein hemocyanin to carry oxygen instead of the red iron-containing protein hemoglobin that is found in mammals. The blood is pumped by three separate hearts, two of which are used for pumping blood to the cuttlefish's pair of gills (one heart for each gill), and the third for pumping blood around the rest of the body. A cuttlefish's heart must pump a higher blood flow than most other animals because hemocyanin is substantially less capable of carrying oxygen than hemoglobin.