Sea & Sea TTL III

OK there needs to be a big disclaimer here. I really want to post a few pictures from my very first dive with an SLR set up. This has been a huge "culture shock" of sorts comming from a small point and shoot. The surge and currents were really bad this weekend around the Channel Islands and I'm surprised anything was in focus. Those dual arms act like sails and really push you around. Kind of fun if you like carnival rides!!

I was on the Raptor with Ventura Dive & Sport for the first time also. I've got to say the boat and crew surpassed my expectations. Very friendly and helpfull getting this monster in and out of the water with me! I've got to say, the boat will get a little crowded if there is a full load of divers and equipment. They don't allow you to take your dive bag on board with you. Empty it into the crate under your seat and leave it on the dock.

The S&S TTL III worked very well, I thought. The problem, if any, came from me not getting my strobes pointed correctly. I kind of thought TTL would work with my f-stop and aperture settings to increase or decrease the output from the strobes. I still had to do a lot of resetting of the aperture between shots to get something that was lit properly. The histograms for most of the shots showed a nice bell curve not too far off of center, if that is any consolation? Not having used another system, I don't know any better? So here goes a couple of better picts.

Bat Star

Spanish Shawl, "Flabellina iodinia"

So here is an example of what I think is incorrect lighting, either by incorrect strobe positioning or a failing TTL? I'm really asking a question why the "white haze" is in this picture and a few other I took? What causes this?

Please don't mind the fact that the picture isn't in sharp focus. As explained earlier, I was dealing with a number of other issues. Not every picture I take of a moving fish is in focus!

Hi Pat, thanks for sharing your information.

In case of the "white haze" it usually happens when the picture is overexposed, maybe you have to compensate -1 or -2 points on TTL in order to fix it.

regards

So here is an example of what I think is incorrect lighting, either by incorrect strobe positioning or a failing TTL? I'm really asking a question why the "white haze" is in this picture and a few other I took? What causes this?

There are several thing that will produce such a look in your pictures. Overexposure is one of them though I'm not sure this is the case in this image. Most often it is the waters impurities that reflect a milkish hue back to the camera when the strobes illuminate the water between the subject and the camera.

If the strobes are placed to close to the camera pointing forward the effect is usually not flattering. As you get direct backscatter.

If the viz is poor you should adjust your strobes so that just the edge of your strobes light the subject and the rest of the light fall behind the subject leaving as little as possible light to create a fog between the camera and the subject.

If you have your camera set on raw this could also make a more foggy image than what you normally would expect. Images shot in raw retain more information (less contrast) and thus get a milky look at times. A quick fix in PS or any other software fixes that.

If your histogram is centered and the edges are not cut in either side your TTL is working. Its when it doesn't that it is a problem. Strobe positioning is the key to producing good photographs underwater.

Happy snappin!

Espen

Thanks Augusto and Espen! Yea, I think it was strobe positioning. Like I said, there is a fairly big learning curve with 2 strobes. Most of the close up macro shots came out very nice. It was only when I went to fish portraits or pulled away slightly to include more background that the white hue showed up.

Can't wait to go try it out again!

Pat,

First off, I wouldn't call the photo overexposed (unless, of course, you adjusted it severely in Photoshop).

To confirm this, I opened up the photo in PS/CS and selected the pixels around the eye (indicated by the blue lasso); and looking at the histogram of only that area, there was no indication of blown pixels.

Next, take a look at the shadow angle also circled, especially under the fin: This tells you the angle of the light.

Lastly, you have a speck of dust on your CCD, as indicated in the upper right corner.

If you shot this as a .NEF (CCD-RAW) file, you can definitely get a lot more out of it, as the information, judging from the gradiations, still seems to be there; i.e. you can expand the range without worrying too much about posterization.

So here is an example of what I think is incorrect lighting, either by incorrect strobe positioning or a failing TTL? I'm really asking a question why the "white haze" is in this picture and a few other I took? What causes this?

 

Please don't mind the fact that the picture isn't in sharp focus. As explained earlier, I was dealing with a number of other issues. Not every picture I take of a moving fish is in focus!

Pat,

where did you buy the TTL III converter? I'm looking for it but I'm not finding this converter to buy.

regards

Pat,

 

First off, I wouldn't call the photo overexposed (unless, of course, you adjusted it severely in Photoshop).

 

To confirm this, I opened up the photo in PS/CS and selected the pixels around the eye (indicated by the blue lasso); and looking at the histogram of only that area, there was no indication of blown pixels.

 

Next, take a look at the shadow angle also circled, especially under the fin: This tells you the angle of the light.

 

Lastly, you have a speck of dust on your CCD, as indicated in the upper right corner.

 

If you shot this as a .NEF (CCD-RAW) file, you can definitely get a lot more out of it, as the information, judging from the gradiations, still seems to be there; i.e. you can expand the range without worrying too much about posterization.

Dan, Thanks for your informative reply. All of my pictures were shot in NEF-RAW and JPEG. When I up-loaded the picture to this thread I actually e-mailed it to myself and moved the picture to my desktop so it was easier to find. When I did this, Aperture automatically chose the JPEG version to send.

BTW, the 3 pictures I posted were untouched by PS or Aperture to hopefully show more accurately what the TTL III was doing. I did, just now, go back to Aperture and work with the picture a little more. Opening the aperture and increasing the contrast did a pretty good job. Now to work on focus!

I need to respectfully disagree with the diagnosis of a speck of dust. If that were true, the speck would show up in every picture, no? It was just a really bad day for wide angle with so much"schmutz" (technical term) in the water.

Pat,

 

where did you buy the TTL III converter? I'm looking for it but I'm not finding this converter to buy.

 

regards

Augusto, When I originally ordered, I had ordered the TTL II, but a couple days after the order went in I looked on the Sea & Sea US site and found it under DX-D80 accessories. I called the Sea & Sea office myself to change the order because it hadn't shipped yet. And, fortunately they some in stock to release. One of the main US Sea & Sea offices is here in Southern California not too far from my house. I don't know if that helped or not?

I had actually called Sea & Sea previously to confirm that my order made sense and that I wasn't missing anything. My LDS, local dive shop, doesn't know much about underwater photography and finding the rep. was nearly impossible. So, I did all of the research into what I needed myself, then had the LDS do the actual ordering. I kind of went around the shop when I changed my order.

You are in Brazil, correct? Try finding the phone number of the Regional distributer to deal directly with them. See if they have one they could send to your dealer.