Video lights for 7D housing

I did a quick glance through some of the forums but I dont see this question answered.

I got my new 7D Aquatica housing last year and for a bunch of reasons, havent gotten around to using it until this past week - which is also why I have been away from WP for a very long time (friendly advice: if you want to dive, dont run a dive center!).

Now, most of my underwater shooting is stills and that wont change. I have 2 Inon Z240 strobes that have lasted me a few years and are going strong. However, several times I see stuff I want to get as a video - either for putting on our dive center's website, for compiling into a DVD that we can sell to our customers or just for my own personal use.

So I'd like to get 1 or 2 video lights to affix to the housing - if 1 light, then on top, where the focus light would go. If 2 lights, then via a tray that attaches to the bottom of the housing. This going to be used with a Tok 10-17 fisheye lens.

If I am shooting something, I'd like to get good results. And if it goes well, I may get a dedicated video housing in the future.

So 2 questions:

1/ 1 or 2 lights? I dont think a single light will give enough coverage for a 10-17, correct?

2/ Recommendations - dont want top of the line, dont want junk. Would like to keep it at around $1000 or so, if that is realistic.

TIA,

Vandit

Well if you want to shoot wide angle with lights, you will need a lot of light to fill the foreground subject a scene properly exposed to the background water in daylight. For 2 heads and battery pack for under $1k, I'd say your best bet is to look for 2nd hand lightheads capable of handling 24V 250W halogen bulbs like the Aqua Lights from Watervision or Hartenberger. Bulbs are like $8-10 and battery packs will cost you maybe a few hundred dollars to repack but you get super output. The packs will be heavy but I'm assuming you are leaving them at the dive shop and not travelling?

I'm pretty sure you can get an old halogen system which gives great light output for cheap but is bulky and heavy.

Video lights powerful enough to fill the coverage of 10-17 fisheye lens for $1000 ? Let me know if you find something.

In the mean time, practice setting manual white balance and adjusting ISO, aperture, shutter. You might be happy with the wide angle video results without lights.

Ron the Aqualights from Watervisions sold for around $3-400 new in the 90s. Should be able to get them cheap. Battery packs aren't that expensive. I'd sell him mine if they weren't stolen from LAX!

I have a Canon 7D which I mostly use with a Tokina 10-17 FE.

On the rig I have dual Ikelite DS161 strobes, which have built-in 500 lumen LED video-lights.

In tropical waters during daytime the LED lights are really not bright enough, at 20...30 meter depth they bring up colours in video only at really - and I mean really - close up. Near surface you see almost no difference.

On night dives they are more useful, but at 10 mm focal, the lights do not cover edges and corners too well, at 17 mm the coverage is obviously much better.

I could maybe post some sample videos to youtube someday.

In the darker waters of the Baltic Sea and similar environements the video lights are more useful. Here you can see an example clip:

Park Victory Video

The brighter beam on the video you see comes from a 1000 lumen HID (15 Watt bulb), focused to a narrow 6 degree beam. On some places you see what the light coming from the LED lights looks like. Probably two of these 1000 lumen HID lights with video reflectors on them would start to be a good solution, but this starts to make a really complicated and expensive rig. Certainly well above $1000.

SOLA 600's?

SOLA 600's?

That's what I was thinking Mike. They don't quite make it under the $1000 bogey for a pair but they appear to be an option. I've used one for some 60mm video testing and it appears to be a very even light for macro work. I haven't tried two for W/A with the 10-17mm.

If you want the ability to carry lights for both stills and video on the same dive, their small size makes them a viable option. Mine's in the shop or I'd give it a try. Anyone have experience shooting video with them?

Cheers,

Steve

When you use small lights with a big lens like 10-17, you get the headlamp effect, where it looks like you are driving on a highway with 2 headlamps as illumination. The problem is for the smaller powered lights, in order to look like the illumination is good, they narrow the beam to about 70°, which is fine for macro as it doesn't matter as much how wide the beam is. However for wide angle daylight, narrow beams illuminate better but show up as almost spot lights. Plus you need a lot of light.

Now the watervisions are dome design lights. So the beam is about 180° or really wide. That's why you need a lot of power to get the illumination as the power is pretty spread. Unlike narrow beans, wide beams tend to illuminate every little bit of particle around so one has to watch for the placement. Still, bang for buck, halogen is a great deal. It just needs a big battery pack.

Are the Watervisions still being made and sold or are they only found used ?

I'm pretty sure Pauline is still in business. She still runs one of the premier UW production houses in BC.

Ok, if $1000 is a pipedream, then how much do you reckon I should spend? Can up the budget to ~$1500 if need be.

@Drew - you are right, I wont be traveling with it. Will leave it at the dive center. So land weight isnt as much of an issue. The thing is, I personally dive with no weights with my gear and my Aquatica is festooned with various buoyancy floats from Stix, so I'd prefer something that is more or less neutral in the water.

I'll check out the halogens - how are they re light temperature? A bit on the warm side, right? I'd rather up my budget than get used, to be honest (unless the seller is reliable)... trying to get anything repaired takes ages in the Andamans.

@ileiman - yeah, 2 1000lumen HID light starts to sound scarily expensive/complicated.

@ron - well, I have done a fair bit of still shooting with manual w/b and available light and on our reefs, where the best soft coral and variety is > 20m, it doesnt come even close to producing the same kind of pop that strobes put out. Being a reasonably competent still photographer, I guess I get camera-OCD when the results arent up their max potential.

The crazy thing is, 3 years ago I had picked up a couple of Czech-made HID lights for my wife from a guy who was here with a group - paid 500 euros for the pair and they were awesome. Wifey didnt like diving with the lights, they lay around and the batteries crapped out. Snap.

V.

Even new I'm pretty sure you can get a halogen setup for less than $1500 with super output. Why settle for 1-2k lumen output for $2-3k when you can get 2x9000lumen from halogen.

Now I must say that halogen is of course toxic (bromine etc) and not very environmentally friendly, and they aren't the most efficient. Don't use them at home!

Macro, closeup and night video with lights can match the color pop of photo with strobes. I don't think I have seen any super wide angle video though. You need a lot of power and light for that. Have you seen some video that you are trying emulate ?

This is probably the one the best super wide angle videos with lights I've seen. Shot with 2x50 watt HID and 5x200 watt HIMI lights. However, it still does not have the lens coverage of the Tokina or the color pop of photo with strobes.

[vimeo]7577736[/vimeo]

Wasn't that clip by Jorgen done with HID lights? I can see they are using 200W HMI around (that sort of power is unmistakeable) but whatever is on the housing can't be more than 50W HID, judging from how far it's illuminating the scene. Those 200 HMI have about 11-14k lumens on a pretty narrow beam. With 250W halogens (HLX) you'll have a much wider beam with less penetration.

@Ron - not really trying to emulate anything. It is just that if I take out my housing, I either have a macro lens on it (50 or 100) or the 10-17. The sites on which I will most likely end up shooting video are also the sites on which I'll be taking the fisheye for still photography.

So given that the video opps will happen when I am out shooting stills, it pretty much selects itself

I am looking at some gonzo halogens - I think they are a good starting point and if I ever outgrow them, I can donate them to the dive shop to use for rentals.

V.

Drew, is there any video shot with the Watervisions lights available for internet viewing ? Real curious to see some. I am a halogen fan, using them for night and macro video.

Vkalia, expectations can be a funny thing. I know I was very disappointed when I started using lights. I was expecting the colors to pop like you describe in photos shot with strobes. What I found was, I could only get great colors on night dives and closeups. I gave up on using lights for wide angle during the day.

Have you seen video shot with lights where you said, I want colors like that on my video ? I ask because what you are looking for might not be feasible.

That was really great use of lights on that video.

Cheers, Simon

Vkalia, expectations can be a funny thing. I know I was very disappointed when I started using lights. I was expecting the colors to pop like you describe in photos shot with strobes. What I found was, I could only get great colors on night dives and closeups. I gave up on using lights for wide angle during the day.

 

Have you seen video shot with lights where you said, I want colors like that on my video ? I ask because what you are looking for might not be feasible.

Hmm, good point, Ron. I am not really basing this on "oh, I want my video just to look like that one" but more along the lines of "I want to avoid that look."

One of our dive center instructors has been playing around with his new video rig (a fancy Panasonic pro camera)

In both the cases, he's done some editing in order to try to fix the colors. Now it could be that he's still learning his rig and editing software, so the results are not optimal, but in my head, I guess I see a huge gap between this and the results with strobes - even if video lights bridge that gap by about half, I'm still ahead.

But you are right - I have seen some very good videos shot with available light (incl those being sold the u/w video guys at Layang Layang - Scubadoo or whatever they are called).

V.

I see what you mean. I wouldn't want that look either. But it looks like a limitation of the camera and lack of white balance.

Here is a video I shot in Indonesia. Day shots were without lights. Night shots were with lights and the colors pop like you are looking for.

[vimeo]945492[/vimeo]

Here is another video from Indonesia. Mixture medium angle without lights and macro with lights.

[vimeo]931226[/vimeo]

For daytime, I don't recall seeing any wide angle video footage shot by anyone, where the colors are vivid like night or macro with lights. Not saying it can't be done. I just haven't seen it. Then again, I have not seen video shot with the lights Drew is recommending.

I currently use this. Great power, built like a tank. Burns the battery quite fast though, but you recharge it to full capacity in one hour. Useless at 10mm coralscape if you're only using one. I've used it in night dives and I don't think I'll want for anything more out of it. I'm planning to buy another one soon.

http://www.backscatter.com/hostedstore/pro...fe-led1000.html