Electrical or Optical

Hi All,

So - I finally bit the bullet and went digital, I am using up the last of my Velvia 100 in the old F90 whilst in the meantime getting to grips with the new rig. So far my D200 has rocked my world and my slick new nexus housing is awesome...... however I am struggling to get my head around my two shiny new Z240s - my SB105s seem like something out of the stone age now - So I have a few questions that I am sure the combined intellect of this forum can answer pretty easily . So here they are -

1) The big one - optical or electrical connection - obviously the question to be kicked back is well do you want pretend iTTL/sTTL or any other thing that isn't quite TTL - and I will answer - I don't really know. How useful is digital TTL underwater? What does the pre flash do in terms of spooking subjects? I am very comfortable using manual exposure both for WA and macro - do I need to bother messing around with fiber optics and putting tape on my D200 flash to stop back scatter etc? I would love to hear some opinions from both fiber and electrical users please.

2) If I do use the optical connections in my nexus housing will this give me digital TTL or will I need to use and electrical/optic converter that still attaches to my ttl ports on the housing?

3) Is there any form of guide table for the Z240 that give strobe to subject values relating to ISO and aperture (The old fashioned way)? Obviously time in the water and practice using the manual step control will help but it would be nice to have some figures to work from i.e at full power f/11 give you good exposure at Xft.

So thanks in advance,

Edd

I use a D70 in an Ikelite housing with 2 x DS125 strobes. Both strobes are cabled to the hot shoe on the camera and I get iTTL. Exposure is pretty good most of the time. I have the occasional overexposure (1 in 30 shots) but I'm happy with the results I get.

The only things that appeared to be spooked by the pre-flash is goatfish. I have hundreds of fish, octopus, cuttlefish, etc. photos and the subjects did not move from the pre-flash or the main flash. I have also have lots of photos of goatfish tails as they don't hang around after the pre-flash.

My previous rig was a Coolpix 4500 in an Ikelite housing and I used Slave EV controller and shot manually. While I had no issues getting exposure right, it was often hit and miss.