New 10d housings at DEMA

James, Eric,

Any ideas/knowledge about the S&S and Inon housings for the Canon 10d as far as price and availability?

How would you compare them to other housings you have seen/have experience with?

I thought I was most interested in the Johah housing but now it looks like a few more options will be available soon (how soon and for how much is the million dollar question). Based upon your hands on experience with these housings, is it worth waiting?

Thanks, Bill

I saw the Jonah housings and wasn't impressed by their finish quality. As James told me, however - they work! In that price range you should see an Ike housing - their small and sleek new box, and an Aquatica housing before xmas. In that price range, and Ike's should be even less, I'd be most tempted to go with Ikelite. Save a few bucks, and never have corrosion issues!

Sea and Sea had a housing at DEMA - but much bigger than the new Ikelite. Didn't notice Inon's

Ya, Inon didn't show a housing for the 10D at DEMA.

As for the pricing and availability of the other housings - only the manufacturers know at this ponit - and heck, most of THEM don't even know.

Sorry I can't be more helpful.

The Jonah housing that Fred Dion had at the UW Photo Tech table was probably a "Test Housing." The finish on the Jonah ND-100 that I tried was very nice. I don't think the finish should be a concern with that brand, as Dr. Kim is a very thorough manufacturer.

Here is my opinion on availability of 10D housings, TOTALLY NOT BASED ON FACT:

UK-Germany (Available)

Subal (Available)

Jonah (Almost available)

Sea and Sea (Very soon)

Ikelite (Doesn't have a prototype yet, but should be soon)

Cheers

James

Hi Bill,

I just ordered a Jonah housing from Dave Marsh at uwphoto.com (located in New Hampshire). I went through the same survey of 10D housings that you did:

Approximate prices quoted with a FE dome, Macro port and ULCS arm set x2 were:

Subal C10: about $4.9k (housing only 2.9k)

Sea and Sea: about $3.8k (housing only 2k)

Jonah: $2.8k (housing 1.9k)

UK Germany housing only 2.4k (not quoted from uwphoto.com)

Had very good service from Dave through the phone from their store. They are the East Coast dealers for Jonah should you decide to go that way.

I was vacillating between splurging for a Seacam 1D housing to get away from the awful 10D focus, but in the end could not justify an extra $3-5k outlay (depending on how conservative I wanted to be with strobes, ports etc).

If you are starting from scratch (no ports from previous housings), I would look at the Jonah quite seriously. The Sea and Sea looks nice, but it Definitely looks like it is missing one button on the series of three near your thumb, and also missing one from the top row of four buttons near the top LCD display, as someone pointed out on another thread). Only plus (according to Dave) was that S&S has a depth insurance policy for the 1st year or so where they will replace your equipment if the housing leaks for ANY reason.

Again, double check on all this -- I wasn't seriously looking at the S&S housing so I wasn't perfectly thorough. Again, the Jonah, Subal and S&S are all in stock from uwphoto as of yesterday (Confirmed).

Email me at chng@fas.harvard.edu if you have any more specific questions regarding the choice.

Good luck,

Yeang

http://www.pbase.com/ychng

P.S. As to the finish of the Jonah housings, I noticed that the one on display at DEMA (from photos) indeed looked rougher as James points out, and in addition lacks the decal labels for each of the buttons, which the one on the Jonah website shows. This would lend credibility to the hypothesis that the one at DEMA was unfinished.

Yeang

http://www.pbase.com/ychng

Whoa nelly! Let's not make any assumptions about the Sea and Sea 10D housing based on the few photos posted here from DEMA.

The Seacam and Ikelite housings both have "multi-function" buttons and dials that can be used to press more than one button. That could very well be the case w/ the Sea and Sea housing folks. We can't say for sure until we hear from them or get a housing to review.

It looks like they put a lot of thought into the housing design and I find it pretty unlikely that they would have left those controls off.

Cheers

James

True, true -- as I said, I was just repeating an observation made in another thread. Again I did not give the S&S careful consideration due to port issues.