Ikelite just finished my housing

I have a Sony F707 and I sent it into Ikelite to get a custom housing. They have used my camera to create a templete and will now offer the housing. Here is a link to pics of my camera http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/sony_f707.html

I am also getting a DS-125 substrobe. I should have my camera back along with the housing and light in a week or so. Then it's off to Port Hardy BC for a week of diving with my new toy.

Sweet! Ikelite just makes great stuff.

How does the 707 stack up, for macro, and general closer range focus? Does it have a near/far switch, called "macro", like all the rest??

Does it do a pre-flash?

Looks great. Please share your thoughts and results!

Don

It has a great macro with a range of 3/4 inch. That means the housing can touch whatever I am taking a pic of if I want to be that close. That with the 5 megapixel and a 5 time optical zoom gives it an excellent close up shot.

It does have a preflash which is another reason I like the Iklite strobes.

[Edited on 3-27-2002 by underexposed]

I do have a Coolpix 995, and I have tried a friend's F707, but the great thing about the 995 is that even you can be as close as you can be with the F707, you can use a medium zoom range in the macro clos ups.

I have tried the F707 in macro, but I couldn't get 3/4 inch shots with medium range zoom in the lens, which can only work at 3/4 inch at full wide.

So, from my point of view, you can't get as good macro shots as you can get with the 995 and for 3/4 inch shots the 5x zoom is unuseful.

Am I right or am I missing something?

PD: I'm considering selling my 995 and buying a F707 with a 10bar housing, but the macro ability is what hold me with the 995, what I adore from the F707 is the low light performance and the one button white balance (which 995 has owful)...

thanks for any advice,

Luis

Yes, that was my thought to, from playing with a 707 briefly. The LCD isn't very bright either. Though below 30 feet, I doubt it would be an issue.

I saw at your website that you also have a G2 setup.

Do you prefer the F707 underwater? why?

Have you already tried it? Do you have some test photos with the 707?

Which would be your recomendation for me.. keep the 995 because of the macro ability or change it to the F707? (I mean, how worse do you think is the macro of the F707 compared with the one in the nikon series)

thanks again,

Luis

I haven't tried a 707 underwater. Just on land. I vastly prefer the G2.

The 995 macro blows all the others out of the water...

Outside of macro, the G2 produces better images, (mostly due to better optics), than the 995. But it isn't huge.

The G2 raw mode is really fantastic.

Between the 995 and 707, it is a tough choice. The 707 has great battery life, and a great lens. But it uses memory sticks, which really limits the shots you can get per dive.

I'd go with a D60 or D100...

Housing for "underexposed" seemed reasonably good. We did find that Sony utilization of preflash on the F707 is completely different than other cameras. Compatibility can be achieved, but we ran out of time before his trip, probably leaving him only manual flash capabilities.

ike

Geeze, Ike. You're back in Pasadena again, and didn't even stop by to say, "Hi."

Ike is correct, I was unable to use the TTL and most of my pics were taken in the 1/8 position. I took over 700 pics averaging about 63 per dive with a 128MB stick and the camera set at its highest resolution. I believe I got some very nice pics that I will attempt to post this weekend. I found the macro more then adequate and was able to focus on something pressed up against the housing lens.

The Ikelite housing gave me access to all the features I needed and I was able to review, delete and edit shots under water. I found this very helpful at the end of a dive when my memory was full and I found something cooool :cool: I will get the 256MB stick when it comes out and that should not be a problem.

Originally posted by underexposed

:cool: I will get the 256MB stick when it comes out and that should not be a problem.

Hurghs?!?!? In my opinion it is a real (financial) problem. The memory sticks are far more expensive then similar compact flash cards. Or has this changed significantly since the last time I looked it up? Also other media types for digital cameras are far more developed than the sony memory stick. It was the main reason why I did not buy a SONY digital camera.

It might be a nice choice if you are a SONYist and you can use the memory stick for lots of other equipment, too. But if you can not benefit from the interoperabilty of the stick - I think the price difference doesn't pay off at all...

regardz .oOo. Andi