Canon HF10 & HF100

Hi,

I just ordered the Ikelite 6090 housing for my Canon HF10. I am new to UW Video and couldn't find any info on the cam in this environment so I thought it useful to use this thread as an open exchange on this cam, available uw equipment for it and user experience/suggestions.

Is there anybody out there using this combination or any other HF10 set-up already and would like to share his/her experience or suggestions on additional equipment or technique?

I also ordered a Raynox5050 Pro as an internal wide converter solution with a flat port extension for the housing. After much research on the web and calling many retailers the external wet lenses (Inon, Epoque or Fathom (Mangrove WP80) seemed too uncertain with regards to performance given the apparent novelty of the HF/Ikelite combo. In addition, the guys at Ikelite even suggested going for the internal option as the best bet. Is there anybody with experience on the matter? Anything to watch out for when using the internal Raynox solution?

I am hoping to get my kit into the water in September an will hopefully be able to add some impressions after that.

Cheers

Hi Peter, I've got an HF100 being delivered soon (for all intents and purposes it is the same as the HF10) and I'm going the same route with an Ikelite 6090 housing.  Where did you order from?  I'm lucky to have some great shore diving nearby so I plan to start without a wide angle adapter and see how I like it.  I'm guessing it won't be long before going the Raynox 5050 Pro route but what made you choose the flat port instead of the dome port?  I'm not sure if I understand the differences completely.  It seems to be a tradeoff between the ability to shoot macro with the flat and ability to shoot fully zoomed out with the dome port?

I'm also hoping to hear from anyone else using this setup already.

Edit: just saw this thread http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=24708

If you haven't made a choice on the WA option yet:

Seems like Ikelite is now also selling the WP80. Not sure how it differs from this WP80 except for the price.

PB

I've got an HF10 and Ikelite housing too but its not got wet yet. Thoughts on the WP-80 are interesting. If you look in Google's cache for the WP-80 on the aditech site it says

Furthermore the WP-80 can also be used with most of the Ikelite video housings just by replacing the original flat port with the optional adaptor ring designed by ADITECH. The WP-80 is also compatible with the Mangrove colour correction filter CF-127.

but the live link doesn't have this. As Peter says, prices seem to differ a great deal for what seems to be the same thing.

Instead of starting a new thread I'll ask you guys who have the HF-10 my question. How do you find the absence of a viewfinder on the camera in comparison to ones that have them, easier, unnecessarily shortens battery life, screen dazzles, hard to align to subject? This camcorder is number one on my list but its clearly in its infancy in a housing. Reading the other thread it almost seems like I can safely wait to get a housing (Ikelite) due to port issues. Anybody use Nero to manage the AVCHD format? I am going to buy online, so locally I have looked at the unit at Best Buy, where the staff is clueless. Does the camera use the SDHC card as a direct source for recording or do you have to transfer after its recorded, or both?

Thanks, looking to be a HF-10 owner by Oct. 26

Chris

Instead of starting a new thread I'll ask you guys who have the HF-10 my question. How do you find the absence of a viewfinder on the camera in comparison to ones that have them, easier, unnecessarily shortens battery life, screen dazzles, hard to align to subject? This camcorder is number one on my list but its clearly in its infancy in a housing. Reading the other thread it almost seems like I can safely wait to get a housing (Ikelite) due to port issues. Anybody use Nero to manage the AVCHD format? I am going to buy online, so locally I have looked at the unit at Best Buy, where the staff is clueless. Does the camera use the SDHC card as a direct source for recording or do you have to transfer after its recorded, or both?

 

Thanks, looking to be a HF-10 owner by Oct. 26

 

Chris

Consider the HF100, I bought it on www.newegg.com for $645 which is a ridiculous price when you compare it to what they want in Australian stores here.  I'm okay with NTSC and prefer the 30p mode anyway.  The HF10 only has the additional 16GB of overpriced onboard RAM, and it is black.  I was able to get two 16gb SHDC cards for great prices from Newegg along with the camera, and 32gb cards are just coming on the market.  It doesn't make sense to pay for RAM that is stuck in the camera.  Recording at FXP quality, 16gb gives you two hours of recording time, enough for any of my double boat dives.  Your standard battery will only last 50 minutes, so I recommend the HF100 plus a BP819 battery, that gives you 2hrs of record time.  I'm waiting on my housing and adapters, but I will soon have HF100 + BP819 + 16GB SDHC + Ikelite 6090 + 9403.1 flat port + Raynox 5050 Pro.

As far as the HF10, I am pretty sure you can swap recording media (onboard or card) between takes.  But since you have to open the housing after 2hrs max for a new battery, there doesn't seem to be any benefit to packing 32gb yet.

WA adapter and flat port is waiting at the post office for me, local dive sunday to test the housing (sans camcorder of course). Just with it in the house I find the view through the backplate to the lcd quite okay, better than I expected. Build quality seems very nice. I doubt that I would mess around underwater with the joystick though, that's a bit of a pain. I also thought the rec trigger should be spring loaded as it feels too easy to knock it and pause the recording by accident (already did it once, and that's without gloves on).

Note the extra milling in the backplate that gives room for the BP819 high cap battery, which is on the camera in these pics.

Ikelite is an extremely good company. Let them know about the need for a spring loaded control, and they will probably change it (i.e. design). They like happy customers not those who miss the whale shark because you bumped the control.

I am considering getting the Canon HF100 and Ikalite housing, but have not found any reviews, comments and experiences anywhere for it. Hoping someone here can share some. I'm especially interested in two areas. First, how well does the housing allow you to manipulate the canon's joystick. Is it easy or cumbersome? Second is how this outfit does without addtional lighting in tropical waters say at a depth of 40 feet.

I would welcome any and all comments.

Greg

I am using that setup, but I have the additional flat port which allows for a Raynox 5050HD wide angle adapter to be fitted on the camera first.

Here are some of my first few videos, but they're a bit rough still as I'm learning everything at once. Shark City would be the best to date..

http://www.vimeo.com/user636668/videos

So far I really like it, and at 40ft in tropical waters I think you would be really happy. The joystick manipulation is tricky to manage underwater, until now I haven't bothered with manual white balance for that reason. The cost of additional lighting is simply too much for me to consider, I'm happy enough with this setup, even down to 30m when the vis is good. I just got back from 4 days of diving and have lots and lots of footage to work though.

The camcorder screen looks like it's not fully open in the housing ?

Correct, the LCD screen is held half open at the angle you see in the photos. Far from ideal, but also far cheaper than a housing with a high res external monitor. I'm getting much more used to the FOV of the camera + WA adapter, I don't look through the housing to the LCD all that often, it's more like point and shoot (it's not that comfortable to me to hold the camera out and upfront where I would be able to watch the LCD all the time anyway).

Thanks C8X. Those are some great videos and some of the first UW I've seen for this camera. Overall the clarity looks good, but the colors seem to lean towards the green side. You mentioned not having supplemental lighting or manually setting the white balance, but are you using a red or green filter? What was the water color/clarity like on those dives?

Greg

Hi everyone,

I enjoyed reading this discussion as im the proud owner of a HF100.

The thing is, ill be going to indonesia soon to do some diving and id love to buy the Ikelite 6090 for that purpose.

Ive understood that an external wide angle lens is not very recommended, and I also see that they are quite expensive.

I read you writing about an internal alternative with the Raynox 5050 Pro.

Thats clear. But what is it about the flat or dome ports?

Im not native english but I suppose that has to do with the extra room in the casing for the wide angle lens.

Can someone explain and tell me best option. BTW, im not in it for macro so much but more broad use.

Thanks and hope to hear from you!

BRs

Niels

Although there is not much info on this camera for UW use, I've decided to go with it. I ordered it, the Ikalite housing, and the extra capacity battery (BP-819) from BHPhoto and 3 16GB SDHC cards from Amazon. It all should be here this week. I'll hold off on lights and wide angle lens until I've worked with it a bit.

For editing I plan to give the included software a try, but by all accounts it sounds like it's junk. I'll probably go with Premier Elements, but I have to build a new PC first to be able to run it.

I have a trip scheduled to Cozumel so I'll try and post some footage by end of Feb for those interested.

Greg

To answer some questions, my videos were taken with auto whitebalance, which is never great but I haven't prepared properly to be able to do MWB easily, as I don't have a standard buddy who I can train to help me out or something like that.  Also, I have no colour filters on the housing at all, I bought a greenwater filter but it was for the original port and odesn't fit on the larger one that I got.

Here's the finished video related to the capture above: http://www.vimeo.com/2788037

If you get the internal dry lens, you must get a bigger port for the front, the current one is just like a flat lens that you unscrew and replace it with a larger one.  About the flat port with the dry WA lens: it has a tiny bit of vingette, and it doesn't give as much overall WA effect as the dome would, but it allows some amount of macro focusing and is good for split shots at the water surface (half in half out).  The dome port would allow full effect of true WA from what I understand, but you cannot focus properly for macro, and that's why I didn't go for it.  The water clarity there was not so good, it was rather greenish with lots of small particulate (referring to Shark City video).  The water for the link above was amazing, 35m vis and nice and blue.  Beautiful days, those were.

I am half leaning towards maybe selling my entire UW housing assembly minus (or maybe including) the HF100 and everything with it.  I am moving to Prague, Czech Republic, and am not likely to pursue diving too much besides once or twice a year maybe to the Red Sea or Croatia, and I don't want to be bothered with so much stuff to take on the plane, even though the 6090 is one of the smaller video housings you can find and the handle rack does come off for easier transport.  In case that gets anyone's attention please email earl (at) baconbomb (dot) com.

Actually, I am leaving tomorrow so I have to go finish packing and cleaning up!

I have now dove with this setup for 8 dives and found I generally like it. Here is what I've found so far.

White Balance

Using the red filter is a must even in relatively shallow depths (30 feet) Also manually setting the white balance gives good color up to about 70 feet. After that much of the color is lost. Other than manually setting the white balance there isn't much need for using the joystick which is good. At depth the knobs are hard to pull out of the the housing due to the pressure.

Controls

You need to be very careful as the lever to start/stop recording has a very short throw and is easy to bump. I'll look down 3-4 times during a dive and realize it's recording. Also the zoom control is hard to finesse when the camera is set to variable zoom speed.

Settings:

* Change the display to be brighter than the default as seeing it underwater can be difficult. The angle that it is at in the housing does not help.

* Using manually set white balance is a must for accurate colors. I've had a number of dives that the color has an overall yellow/green cast. I find setting the white balance once around 40-50 feet gives a good average for dives that range from 80-30.

* Change the zoom from variable to constant speed slow setting. This helps as the variable setting is too hard to control consistently with the housing knob

* I have not played with the vivid settings yet.

Battery Life/Storeage

Using the larger battery I have no problems with running out of battery on a two dive boat trip, even when both dives were ~60 minutes long. I'm using 16 GB cards which will hold about 2 hours of top quality recording. I used one for 6 stright dives without copying the recordings off.

More to come.....

I had been hoping to hear more about your work with the HF10 in the ikelite housing. Any other suggestions or difficulties.

It took me a little longer to build a PC that has the horse power to edit HD video. If someone if thinking of going with a AVCHD camera first make sure you have a pretty powerful PC. I ended up going a little overboard with a 4 processor 3 GHz machine with a 4GB memory. I plan to add a Bluray burner soon. Enough of the techie stuff.

The results direct from the camera on a 60" Sony HD tv is great!

I now have uploaded the first clip from my trip. I'll try and get more out there in the weeks to come.

http://vimeo.com/4462337 - Turtle Video

Greg

Looks good. How deep were you ? Were you on auto white balance ? Did you do any changes to color, contrast in editing ?