To DSLR or not to DSLR

Well due to an unfortunate incident with my boat I had to sell it for way less than I paid. However I'm making lemonade out of the lemon. I've now got a little cash to throw into my newfound hobby. I've been using an SP-350 housed with an FL-20 flash since I started. I've purchased a couple of different complementary strobes but the one I have now is the YS27DX.

My ONLY issue with this setup is that to fire the YS27DX I have to attach the fiber optic cable to the flat port of the FL20. This has proven to be a somewhat flawed method which has lead to numerous problems underwater with the 2nd strobe not firing. However, when I do manage to get both working correctly, I'm happy with the results.

Now on to this extra cash. I'm troubled on how to use it. Its about a $1000. Along with the value of the SP350s, 2 housings, 2 strobe housings, wet lenses and the YS-27DX used once, I think I have enough to purchase a low end DSLR (Canon xti, Olympus E510 or Nikon D80 are the 3 I'm looking at). I believe I could also find a housing of reasonable cost. If I go with this setup, its almost certain I'll end up with a cheap optical strobe or something along those lines for awhile in the beginning.

The other option is to sell a few things and purchase two really nice strobes along with the Athena or Heinrichs adapter for the SP350 and stop having to worry about lighting. I might even be able to fit a used DSLR in for topside stuff.

Nice dilemma to have as I convinced the wife it would take about a $1000 as a salve or balm to help me over the misery of losing my boat. But here's the use model. My wife and I do some topside shooting while on hikes etc. I dive about 20-50 times a year depending upon where my job takes me. I'd call myself an opportunist because I don't really go specifically after a subject. I'm a little more than a snap happy tourist as I will take the time to shoot a subject several ways. Truth be told I'm not that good compared to most on here but I enjoy it a lot. I enjoy the SP-350 but there have been a few occasions when I yearned for something a little more. From what I've read on here the DSLR is a completely different experience. Ports, domes, dipotres, lenses etc, weight, size, all have me concerned that I might take a step back with the learning curve.

I'm sure this has been hashed over before but also any underwater input you have on the 3 cameras listed would be great. An example might be the flash sync speed...is that important?

Anyway sorry for the long read,

Interesting dilemma :-) You won't be able to get a DSLR and housing for $1,000 though you will sure get a good start. I wouldn't expect to get too much for your existing set-up. Maybe $500?????

Anyhow, maybe you can use the 27DX w/ your new setup? Does it accept a strobe cable? It may be a good slave strobe for macro shooting also. Like get a Inon strobe and use the 27DX as a slave to the Inon?

Or if you get a Seatool housing or Nexus, then you can use optical TTL with compatible strobes.

James

Thanks James - Here's my thoughts on the budget.

2 SP350s - $220 total if sold on ebay

Housing - $250 total for two housings

Two addon lenses - $150 total

2 FL-20 housings $150 total

These are estimates based off of items sold within the last 2 weeks.

So yeah, like $1720 if I keep the YS27. I've seen some of the DLSR's for about $800 with just the kit lens to start. I think I could push the $$ just a little, afterall, I am feeling a LOT of pain over my boat. :?)) I know Fantasea makes some cheap housings and I think Ikes are around $1.2K to 1.5K without the port. So I guess I'd have to dig a little deeper. Aren't Seatool and Nexus expensive? In any case, I think the larger question I have to ask myself is do I want to try and "graduate" to real photography....haha. Thanks,

The biggest benefit I saw (and was my justification) when I moved from P&S to DSLR underwater was getting rid of the shutter lag. It may not seem like much, but shooting fish and other moving animals is extremely difficult with a P&S because by the time the camera takes the photograph, the fish has found a mate, spawned and died.

The other thing I find is more accurate focus and so more shape images (as it getting sharp images more often).

Hi!

The Olympus E-510 just got the EISA Award for the best Consumer DSLR in 2007. I had the chance to test it (surface only) for two weeks. It' great to handle and you wouldn't like to miss the image stabilization any more. The finder is bright and clear although a bit small.

LiveView is a nice additive feature too. The fact that you can't see what's going on during the AF lock makes action shots difficult (the only camera that had a P&S like LiveView is the Olympus E-330).

The image sensor cleaning system is a feature you'd learn to love as soon as you've seen others trying to clean their cameras. I haven't had any dust or artefacts on the image sensor of any of my Olympus cameras yet.

There's currently no housing available for the E-510. UK-GERMANY has announced one already.

The Nikon D80 is a nice peace of a camera too. Had it for a short test as it was first shipped. Very intuitive to handle, good display, quite a good finder too.

There are already several housings available, as I remember.

Helge ;-)=)

Hi Gary,

You can buy the Olympus E-410 kit with 14 -42 mm zoom, which has the same image quality as the E-510.

Olympus PT-E03 housing and PPO-E05 port and zoom gear (for the 14 to 42 mm lens) for a total of about $1700.00 in the U.S. That is a complete camera, lens and port.

This housing can use fiber optics to fire strobes in manual or TTL, (depending on the type of strobe being used).

Not a bad way to get started with a DSLR and very expandable with a number of additional port and lens choices down the road in a variety of price ranges.

http://wetpixel.com/i.php/full/olympus-e-4...rwater-housing/

Phil Rudin

Phil,

Excellent write up. The E410 is also attractive to me because my wife owns the E-500 already and we could share lenses down the road.

ATJ - Yes the focus lag along with shutter lag is annoying. The shutter lag, for example when taking a picture of a little fish that never stops like the drum. The lag between shots when shooting RAW is also a bother.

Hi!

There's a nice strobe solution for the PT-E03: You may replace the Olympus proprietary bulkhead with a Nikonos N5 bulkhead so you may connect any strobe you like. Together with a TTL converter you may even use TTL with compatible strobes (those fast enough to provide the pre-flash bursts).

The E-410 is an amaingly small camera. Besides the image stabilization and a few menu items that have been left out compared to the E-510 it is a great camera too. I hat it for a test a while ago and I was amazed about the weight and size. It nevertheless has a great image quality.

Be careful when your wife is around. She might swap the cameras if you leave it for a second :-) The E-410 is just the size most female photographers like. Small and lightweight but yet powerful and with good image quality. Quite a lot of my freiends lost their E-400 or E-410 to their wifes or daughters ...

Helge ;-)=)

Cost and performance wise I think fiber optics are the best solution for the PT-E03 housing if you do not already own strobes. See this thread.

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=20377

Phil

Things to consider to justify an upgrade to DSLR:

How serious are you about your photography?

How happy are you with your present system in terms of image quality & shooting flexibility?

Do you currently have enough computer capability to handle larger files (fast CPU, multiple large hd's, etc)?

If you travel do you currently have a laptop or other system for downloading files?

And don't forget about spare parts for anything electronic (very important if traveling).

If the answer to these (& other) questions lead you down the upgrade path be prepared to whip out your plantinum card on several occasions. Purchasing a complete system with support hardware isn't cheap.

The YS27DX strobe is comparable to the 90DX in terms of light ouput, its just slave only. It would be fine with a DSLR system - just make sure you have the parts to fire it.

I can only tell you my experiance from upgrading from a C-8080 point and shoot to the olympus E-330 has been a wonderfull experiance, and I'm very happy with the results.

I think it would benfit you, being the wife all ready had the

Olympus E-500, If you stayed in teh Olympus family for your underwater set up, you could share your lens with the E-500 and the camera you decide to buy.

There are many write up's on the froms here, with some great reviews on the E-330, E-410, and E-510.

Like Phile said, if you can get into a E-410 with the Oly housing, ports, etc, your off to a great start for under 2k.

Only thing would be pairing it up with a nice strobe or two, which would beinfit you greatley shooting your new camera set under water.

Here's a great thread also to read, plenty of comparisions from people all over the world, some great reading , and possibley help you make your choice :

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=19828

It's on the E-330, E-410, and E-510

Be sure to let us know what direction you decide to go !!

"Cost and performance wise I think fiber optics are the best solution for the PT-E03 housing if you do not already own strobes. See this thread."

Phil,

sorry for being such a pain but I did read through the last thread and you talk about using fiber optics but do you have a picture of how those fiber optics connected to the camera itself? I know with Inon they usually have some slick port mounting device.

JC,

Thanks. Those are good questions.

fltek - thanks. I think I might take the plunge if I can squeeze together some more fundage.

Personally, I'd be inclined to avoid Olympus DSLRs because they use the Four Thirds system, which means small sensors (2x crop instead of the usual 1.5-1.6x) and a narrow selection of lenses. (No Tamron or Tokina lenses AFAIK, and while Sigma do sell some of their lenses with 4/3 mounts, the wide angle lenses won't be anywhere near as wide as they should be due to the increased crop factor.)

Hi!

Personally, I'd be inclined to avoid Olympus DSLRs because they use the Four Thirds system, which means small sensors (2x crop instead of the usual 1.5-1.6x) and a narrow selection of lenses. (No Tamron or Tokina lenses AFAIK, and while Sigma do sell some of their lenses with 4/3 mounts, the wide angle lenses won't be anywhere near as wide as they should be due to the increased crop factor.)

There are already more ZUIKO lenses available than I can afford :-) The range of 3rd party lenses may be weak at the WA side but Olympus provides 3 excellent lenses The 11-22mm (max. 89°), the 7-14mm (max. 114°) and the 8mm FE (180°). Olympus announced another lower priced WA zoom lens to be available within the next year (the 7-14mm isn't the cheapest but worth every cent). The 50mm Macro is absolutely great, a 100mm macro lens is announced too (should be available within the next year). What lenses are you actually missing?

The ZUIKO lenses are designed for digital use from scratch. This avoids several of the problems that may arise from using older lens designs with DSLRs. If you haven't got a huge bag of lenses already, the E-System is an interesting alternative to the other brands.

Helge ;-)=)

Gary,

Below you will find options for attaching fiber optic cables to the PT-E03 housing from Athena and one coming soon from Inon, others use a stick on type system. I have just moved to the Inon Z-240 strobes with fiber optics for my housing with the Athena mount.

DaveS seems a bit behind the times regarding Olympus DSLRs. Olympus has the largest set of lenses designed for digital use. Camera reviews on the E-410/E-510 have been excellent including the 2007-2008 EISA award for best consumer camera for the E-510. The E-410/E-510 share the same image quality and the quality of the Olympus Zuiko lenses is second to none.

Canon and Nikon build fine equipment and you will find more housing options for their products, so if you think bigger is better then thats the way you should go but don't dump on Olympus because they have designed lenses and a chip that match each other perfectly.

I agree that Olympus has a fine range of lenses for underwater use. With the fisheye, WA zoom, and 50mm macro you are pretty much all set. What they are missing is a broad range of support from third party lens makers, but that is improving. What would be awesome would be a lens like the Tokina 10-17 fisheye zoom.

In any case, the statement that Oly has the largest selection of "digital designed" lenses isn't really true anymore and may never have been true. Nikon started the design for the D1 in the mid nineties and pretty much all of the lenses they've produced since then have been designed with digital use in mind. That doesn't mean they didn't work on film camera, just that they were designed with a digital future considered.

This year and last year has seen a HUGE raft of digital only lenses announced by Canon and Nikon. I'm not going to list them all here, but I think it's time to re-evaluate the claim that Olympus has the market share of "digital designed" lenses.

Cheers

James

"Can't we all just get along?" <sniffle>

James,

I would guess that B&H sells all of the Canon, Nikon and Olympus lenses made. It looks to me as if Canon has five digital lenses for the 1.6X chip, Nikon has ten for the 1.5x chip and Olympus has sixteen. Canon has no lenses designed for the 1.3X chip.

If you are going to tell me that sticking a 35 mm film lens on a sub 35 mm chip makes it a lens designed for digital then we would need to count all the lenses that Canon, Nikon and Olympus have ever made since I have an adapter (never use) to mount Oly 35 lenses. If this is the case you would be right since Oly has made less lenses than Canon and Nikon.

Regarding the 35 mm chip some film lenses work very well and others do not, thats why they are being redesigned.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller...0.0&mxp=0.0

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller...0.0&mxp=0.0

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/3results/contr...7EBrand_Olympus

Phil

Hi Phil,

Sorry to sound contentious, that's not really what I meant. I just want to clear up the myth that Canon and Nikon don't have a lot of lenses designed for use on digital cameras.

Nikon changed the rear element design and rear element coatings on many of their lenses released in the 90's because they wanted them to perform better on their upcoming digital cameras. That's a fact that can be backed up by someone who wants to dig up the info.

One good example I think is the 17-35. That was an awesome lens which I used on digital cropped sensor and FF cameras.

So I'd probably add to the list of DX lenses let's say:

17-35AFS

28-70AFS

All of the exotic telephotos

24-120AFS

And on the Canon side I'd start by adding the:

17-40L

24-70L

24-105L

Cheers

James

Phil and everyone,

Well I've learned that I should probably just decide and then buy followed by as much immersion as possible. I have already been leaning toward Olympus for many reasons, even though I'm not thrilled with the high ISO performance, the 410 sounds like a great camera to get my feet wet. Pretty much any DSLR will be a step up from what I've been using so the decision might be already made since my wife has the E-500 and sharing glass would be cost effective. In any case, the excellent review of the camera by Phil did it for me. It answered every question. The fiber optic connection was important to me. I'll keep you posted on my decision as I'm in no hurry. BTW RogerC's live demo was also excellent as it helped me understand the lag issue and when its created. I'm sure it will take a little longer in the pool to perfect but very doable. Thanks all for your input.