Ikelite Housing for Rebel T1i AND Rebel XSi

Amigos,

For my personal use and anyone interested check this out:

http://www.ikelite.com/web_two/can_500d.html

TTL circuitry that will work (with Ikelite DS strobes of course) on both the NEW Canon Rebel T1i and Rebel XSi camera.

I recently had a T1i in my hands for a day and think the HD capability is much simpler to initiate and use than the higher priced (although beautiful and more MP, etc.) Canon 5D MK II.

For 99% of users setting the Rebel T1i at 720P (where it runs at 30 FPS) is more than enough to capture some really cool video clips in between shooting 15.1 MP stills......

Plus US pricing is $799.00 USD for a Rebel T1i body!

Technology marches on............

YMMV

dhaas

P.S. - If you already have an Ikelite Rebel XSi housing there is an upgrade program (at very modest cost) to get the extra video control and TTL circuitry upgrade so your housing will work with either camera.

TTL circuitry that will work (with Ikelite DS strobes of course) on both the NEW Canon Rebel T1i and Rebel XSi camera.

 

I recently had a T1i in my hands for a day and think the HD capability is much simpler to initiate and use than the higher priced (although beautiful and more MP, etc.) Canon 5D MK II.

 

P.S. - If you already have an Ikelite Rebel XSi housing there is an upgrade program (at very modest cost) to get the extra video control and TTL circuitry upgrade so your housing will work with either camera.

Could you expand a bit on the TTL circuitry issue? I'm assuming that Ikelite has had to reverse-engineer the eTTL II protocol for the circuitry, but according to spec the 450D and 500D both use eTTL II? I probably wouldn't bother upgrading for the video control alone, or even accurate TTL as I expose manually 90% of the time, but camera lock-ups would be pretty inconvenient...

It seems some more testing is in order here. I already had the 450D housing in water with the 500D and the old video button is ergonomic enough for me, but didn't have time to test strobes.

Lauri,

My understanding is even though you could slap on a surface mounted Canon dedicated eTTL II flash on any model dSLR Canon has, when converting for use UW with Ikelite DS series strobes the least little change in "line code" of each individual model can make the camera lock up, do bad exposures, etc.

Not sure if you're shooting Ikelite DS strobes as you say you're setting manual flash exposures. I shoot ALL TTL these days wide or macro. Too many missed opportunities when animals start moving if shooting manual flash exposures YMMV of course.....

The video record button control ALONG with the TTL circuitry upgrade is an all or nothing upgrade, as it should be. Plus it's very cheap!

I already have several XSi housing customers who will upgrade knowing they'll likely get a Rebel T1i as a second body and want the flash protocol to work with BOTH the T1i and XSi.

Good luck!

dhaas