L&M Bluefin Canon XA10

Hi Guys,

Can anyone tell me how this works? Is it one touch? Is it really WB or select from small library? How does it perform at depth? What don't you like?

Craig

Can't comment on the XA10 in a L&M housing but did put it in a Gates housing and love it. In the Gates housing it is pretty much neutral and easy to handle. The flip out screen is easy to see in even bright light and dealing with small subjects. We shot it with a pair of L&M 4000s and of course natural light. With the L&M 4000s my better half shot it in Auto quite a bit and it did a good job. Took a week of diving 3-4 dives a day to fill the 64gig hard drive. When in Manual we had no problem setting the MWB. Do have to get used to setting the "exposure". Have yet to get it in our green, low light waters but soon. Really happy with the camera and with a +5 Diopter shot excellent (IMHO) macro.

Here are a couple of clips straight from the camera, untouched. Will have a longer clip from our Philippines trip in the next week or so.

http://vimeo.com/user9619671

I did a couple of dives with the L&M system. Ok, the first real dives I've done with a proper video system... :-)

You have to drill down once and "teach" it the manual WB steps, if I remember correctly, every time you power it up - then there is a macro that runs off the handles and drills through the steps automatically to make it "one touch".

Jack

You have to drill down once and "teach" it the manual WB steps, if I remember correctly, every time you power it up - then there is a macro that runs off the handles and drills through the steps automatically to make it "one touch".

That is not correct, there is no teaching required. The macro is saved in the handle.

The underwater white balance function on my L&M housed XA10 is in fact a TWO-BUTTON function.

First, one of the UP/DOWN keys on the LEFT handle needs to be pressed to assure the FUNC rectangle (AKA box) is HIGHLIGHTED/SELECTED. Usually it is the UP arrow.

Then the WHITE BALANCE button on the RIGHT handle can be pressed. Manual white balancing is then completed.

If you press the white balance button when the FUNC rectangle is NOT HIGHLIGHTED, you will be treated to a wonderful display of blinking and jumping around from place to place on the screen, resulting in who knows what? The built-in macro has executed some other sequence, likely having nothing to do with white balance.

When (if?) this happens you will need to execute the original procedure of HIGHLIGHTING the FUNC rectangle and hope that nothing else has come adrift while you were taken on this random ride. To do this after an inadvertent white balance macro execution, it is sometimes necessary to use the ARROW KEYS and the ENTER button on the left handle to get the FUNC box properly highlighted.

Maybe I don't read so good. Maybe this is explained in the instruction given for the housing and I missed/misinterpreted it. I don't recall. I do remember asking Paul if this was really a TWO-BUTTON function, and having him reply in a way that convinced me that the above procedure is correct. HIGHLIGHT FIRST, WHITE BALANCE SECOND. The only time you can WHITE BALANCE first is if the FUNC box is already HIGHLIGHTED.

This isn't a complaint! It took several dives for me to figure this out. It would have been convenient to know this sooner.

Knowing how to do that now, it's a non-issue. I hope it saves someone some frustration.

Tom