Night Camera Settings

For night dive photography, what settings would you recommend as you hit the water. I have moved on from a Nikonos and frame set for Macro where it was f/22, 1/60 and TTL and thats it. Now with the D80, ikelite and SB105, I am looking for some camera/flash setting recommendations (mode, shutter, flash power, etc) to start me off.

What recommendations would you have for the 60mm ?

What about the 10-17mm ?

(mantas in Kona coming up)

Thanks for ANY advice,

John

For night dive photography, what settings would you recommend as you hit the water. I have moved on from a Nikonos and frame set for Macro where it was f/22, 1/60 and TTL and thats it. Now with the D80, ikelite and SB105, I am looking for some camera/flash setting recommendations (mode, shutter, flash power, etc) to start me off.

 

What recommendations would you have for the 60mm ?

 

What about the 10-17mm ?

(mantas in Kona coming up)

 

Thanks for ANY advice,

 

John

I say pick one and just shoot, the manta are fast and powerful and swim around everyone during that dive. I don't think u will have time to play with settings too much. U can pick one, then shoot a bunch shots as they approach, change the settings, shoot a bunch of shots again, etc etc. Pack 3, 4 lbs extra because you want to 'sit' still on the bottom and not get knock around too much. It's an awsome dive.

Pack 3, 4 lbs extra because you want to 'sit' still on the bottom and not get knock around too much. It's an awsome dive.

It is a great dive, and definately extra weight. I was a bit underweighted and wish I had more extra weight, but of course it depends on body size and the rest. (I should have taken 6 I think )

Macro Settings:

Well, I assume that it depends on you.

The 60mm is a brilliant Lense, atleast the old version. It handles F22 just nicely & ISO100. I personally like center weighted and Auto Focus ( works fine when using a Focus Light). I assume that you are all Manual with the SB105, but I have no experience with those Strobes. I run TTL with the Macro Setup ( Heinrichs-Weihkamp Converter).

/Erik

With the 10-17 at night you may want to start at the 17 end, at the very wide end it will be a lot more difficult to light especially with all the chaos of the night manta dive.

It can also be very difficult not to blow out the highlights of the manta's white parts. Set your LCD / histogram to the setting that shows flashing blown highlights, so that you can quickly see if this is happening and you can decrease exposure with f-stop or strobe power settings.

damn the mantas threw this off topic...

what about settings for those 2 lens (60 mm and 10-17mm) for general night dive shooting. What would you recommend (settings you would setup before you hit the water for any night dive). then can adjust based on situation.

This was the type of information I was looking for some suggestions on. Mode (manual, shutter/aperture priority, ...), shutter speed, aperture, strobe power (full, 1/2, diffuser or not)

so far for the 60mm, I see f/22 & 100 ISO.

Thanks for the feedback!

I would think that the Nikonos settings are a good place to start:I use f16 rather than f22 with Inon strobes, but I'm often on half to a quarter power if I get close to a subject. I use a good focus light on my housing, too.

Tim

B)

Sorry, that was about a 60mm lens. Wide-angle/fisheye is much more challenging: two strobes for coverage, f4-5.6, 1/60, play with full and half power, and it still doesn't work...

... some of the best manta shots that I have seen at night were taken with video lights, and not strobes.

Tim