Canon 20D freezes underwater

Hi,

I took my Canon 20D in an Ikelite housing with one DS-125 and a Tamron 17-50 (17-50mm F2.8 XR Di II LD) down yesterday. After a couple photos the whole system froze up. Essentially, it behaved as if the shutter was pressed, except that it wasn't. The info screen and viewfinder showed aperture and speed info (I was shooting in program mode) and none of the buttons/wheels worked. I powered the camera and strobe down and when turning the camera back on, it went immediately to the "shutter pressed" state regardless of the strobe. Power cycling a couple times did not resolve the problem.

Once back on the surface I tried it once more and everything went back to normal. I hope it stays so, but did anybody encouter the same problem? My housing was completely dry inside, although the water outside was cold (50F).

Thanks, Sergio

Usually these problem occur when 1 of the buttons is being pressed. Could be any buttons.

Thanks a lot for the tips. I did a dry-run outside the housing and the dof-preview indeed does cause the symptoms I experienced. None of the other buttons does, though. Looking at the Ikelite housing, the dof button is managed by a turn/push wheel rather than a spring-loaded button. That wheel can be pushed into the housing by increasing water pressure and activate the dof-button as I went deeper, hence no problem back on the surface. All makes sense, I am going to verify this during my next dive.

A number of years ago I had this problem with a Nexus D100 that had been roughly handled on the boat. It behaved exactly like buttons were being partially depressed yet I could find no such problems. Turned out to be a sync cord. Sync cords, being tied electrically into the camera, can create infuriating symptoms.

I had this problem on a recent trip when my lens was getting pushed to the side in my port by a mis-matched gear. If the lens is not making proper contact w/ the camera you can get the Err99 or other weird errors. Something to check.

James

Sergio -

Wow, what a coincidence. I had a similar situation with my camera, also a 20D, a few weeks ago. Mine would work fine down to about 25 ft, then bam, no more autofocus. I was stuck using manual focus for macro. Given that I am totally nearsighted (more in one eye than the other), do not have a corrective mask, and often in the drink before 5:30 am (bleary-eyed and barely awake in the dark), this was not a great situation! I asked here, and Matt S suggested the DOF preview thing, as well. While this wasn't the issue with my camera (caused a similar issue on land, but not UW), it gave me a place to start - I brought it back up and did a dry run until I figured out what was being pressed in on the housing, then worked it out during a dive or two.

Hope this works out for you. As an aside, it has been ridiculously cold here lately - we did wreck alley last weekend and registered 47. 47!! In June!! That's not appreciated.

Allison

Hope this works out for you. As an aside, it has been ridiculously cold here lately - we did wreck alley last weekend and registered 47. 47!! In June!! That's not appreciated.

Allison, I know about the cold. I did the Yukon and Ruby E on 06/01 and got 50F down there. It hurt until the face finally numbed down. Those wrecks are still worth it every time

On topic: Thanks everybody! I appreciate all the tips.