Fujifilm S2Pro: time to upgrade?

Hi guys and gals,

I am currently using an aging Fujifilm S2Pro in Ikelite housing, purchased as a set 2 plus years back secondhand to ease the entry cost to DSLR underwater rig. Done a fair bit of photography with it, and consistently upgraded my rig from 100A to DS-125, added second strobe DS-160, AFS60, AFS105 and Tokina 10-17.

Been happy with the rig so far, but some part of me is always itching to upgrade the rig to D300, as my topside camera is a D300. Cost of entry - one Ikelite D300 housing.

My main issues with the Fuji are:

- difficulty in locking focus in macro. I struggled a lot to try to get that dendronyphthya crab in focus and got only 3 shots after a 10min attempt.

- limitation of 2GB CF means I had to open the UW rig up to once a day on the dive boat.

Since I do only 8-12 days of diving in a year, the other part of me says "stay with S2Pro until it breaks".

What would you suggest I do?

Will I get a much higher hit rate with the D300?

Thanks.

A cheaper option would be to buy a good spotting torch and articulated arm for it! Despite 'only' being a 6MPixel camera, the S2Pro is a good performer (I still make A3 prints from my S2 files) given the focus/card capacity limitations. A good focus light will solve one of these, but as far as I am aware there is no simple solution to the 2Gb card limit - although it might be worth googling or contacting Fuji in case there is a workaround.

I used to own an S2pro and Ike housing and I loved the camera. It has the resolution of a 9 megapixel x-y sensor type camera, so going to 10 or even 12 megapixels won't get you much on the resolution. What you will get from an upgrade is a better AF system and lower noise. Also, you'll get a MUCH smaller housing as the Ike S2pro housing was a giant.

I personally would wait until the D300 gets replaced, then buy a used D300 setup :-)

Cheers

James

A cheaper option would be to buy a good spotting torch and articulated arm for it! Despite 'only' being a 6MPixel camera, the S2Pro is a good performer (I still make A3 prints from my S2 files) given the focus/card capacity limitations. A good focus light will solve one of these, but as far as I am aware there is no simple solution to the 2Gb card limit - although it might be worth googling or contacting Fuji in case there is a workaround.

Thanks for the suggestion. I did buy a 5W spotting torch but did not seem to notice a great deal of improvement. I guess I should try and try again instead of throwing money to overcome what maybe my skills of managing macro focusing - perhaps I will get some focusing speed and accuracy improvement but more improvement may come with practice instead.

I will see if I can get a workaround 2GB limit. Thanks.

I used to own an S2pro and Ike housing and I loved the camera. It has the resolution of a 9 megapixel x-y sensor type camera, so going to 10 or even 12 megapixels won't get you much on the resolution. What you will get from an upgrade is a better AF system and lower noise. Also, you'll get a MUCH smaller housing as the Ike S2pro housing was a giant.

 

I personally would wait until the D300 gets replaced, then buy a used D300 setup :-)

 

Cheers

James

Yes noise performance was what drove me to change to D300 topside. So far I did not really feel constraint by keeping to ISO100 and ISO200 of the S2Pro while shooting UW.

Maybe sell my S2Pro housing + camera now while it still have some residue value?

Thanks.

I tried to sell my S2 Pro (2 bodies, no lenses) with Subal housing and large dome & macro ports for only around USD2300 but go NO takers - so I gave it to a young person. The pictures it took were faultless but the LCD and viewfinder were very small. Like Paul, I still convert the old files, which got a new lease of life with the later versions of CS.

The flip side of that is the disappointment in increased quality I got from going to a D700 from a D200 (which I still have and frequently use).