First Shots - Canon 40D

I'm pretty much a newbie when it comes to shooting underwater. All though I've been a member here for a couple of years I've mostly just been reading.

I just recently got myself some new gear, and I'm looking for some help to improve my photos. I have a few that I really like, but I find that on a dive I'll take a couple hundred and only end up with one or two that I like. I'd like to up those number so that it feels like the ones that do turn out aren't just by fluke.

I'm shooting with a Canon 40D in an ikelite housing, with one Ikelite DS-125 Strobe. Right now I only have the kit lens 17-85mm with a dome port. (i'm saving up for a macro lens)

Here are a couple that I would like some help with:

This one is lacking color... Do i need a second strobe to be able to take shots like this? or is there something I can do with the set up I have to bring out the detail in the turtle?

I know the golden rule is to GET CLOSE but I find with my set up if I get too close my camera can't focus. Is it because of the dome port? is there a way to get closer and have the auto focus still work?

There's just something about this one that seems to be a bit lacking, and I'm not sure what it is. Any suggestions?

First off the lionfish photo is superb. With a seahorse, you might try getting close enough to fill the frame. If you can't focus that close, try a diopter.

You pretty much have to be within 12ft of a subject for your strobe. That pretty much gives you the 24 feet of your guide number when your strobe is at full power. If you were using TTL, chances are your camera wouldn't tell the strobe to do a full dump because of the ambient light you had. If you had the strobe on manual and at full power, then it possibly wasn't aimed correctly.

One point I'd like to make is I often shoot in RAW for this reason. On shots such as this one you can white balance the photo after the dive and bring back some of the color. Very hard to do with a jpeg. I messed with your photo for about a minute in photoshop but a RAW file would have saved this one.

thanks for the feedback... for the seahorse i was as close as i could get and still focus... correct me if i'm wrong, but i don't think i can use a diopter with a dome port.

for the turtle i actually did shoot it in RAW.... and this jpg was after messing with it in RAW converter. I guess i need to figure out how to better aim my strobe. good to know thats what the problem was. I'll work on finding a better placement for it.

thanks.

Were you shooting the strobe on manual and at full power? That could have been more of the issue than aim. On the dome port, yes you are correct. You could possibly use a diopter inside the dome but that would require some experimentation. The best thing to do is to get a macro setup. The problem with DSLR is you have to shoot the lens and setup you have. So on something like a seahorse with a 17-85mm you are stuck with cropping it in after the fact. The problem with that photo is the seahorse gets lost in the busy background. The nice thing is it is sharp enough to where you crop in 50% or so and it would look better.

Take the turtle RAW file and use the white balance feature in your RAW converter. Try and sample one of the lighter places on the turtle. It should bring the color back.