Mezzo Canale Shoal [Tuscany - Italy]

I'm a bit embarassed to post a low quality video like this but the dive was amazing with a huge biodiversity of deep bentonic species.

I'm servicing my housing so Nauticam lent me a NA-A7 housing with a Sony A7 and a 10-80mm lens.

I used the camera without having the time to study all settings and for the Murphy's Law I had the wrong format: a 1440x1080 mov at 12Mbs

Moreover I had the camera set to FF while the lens is APSC. I thought that zooming in a little bit would do the trick but I was wrong.

Anyway, Next video with this setup will be better, I hope

Mezzo Canale Shoal ( http://goo.gl/maps/mGpNj) allows you to experience in a single dive most of the excitements which attract us to the underwater world: the encounter with rare and captivating sea creatures and the sense for both adventure and exploration of a spot in the middle of nowhere. Feelings enhanched by that sense of peacefulness and inner silence, typical of underwater diving.
The huge biodiversity of bentonic species of this shoal reminds us of how the Mediterranean sea would be and what it is we've got to lose with our social behaviour.

Dreams Are For Everyone!

Music Track: "Sea Waves" from the album Cristal Soup by Epsilon Indi epsilonindi.it/

Shot with a Sony A7 + Sony E 10-18mm f4 OSS and a bunch of wrong settings.
Nauticam NA-A7 housing + Ligths Keldan Luna 8 CRI.

So you went A7 route not continue on the m43s - hows it going?

Pluses / Minuses?

Colours are great btw!! and I've never seen so many basket stars in one place - ever!!! WOW

So you went A7 route not continue on the m43s - hows it going?

 

Pluses / Minuses?

 

No no M43 will be my choice for the future.

As I wrote I sent my beloved NA-GH2 to Nauticam for annual service. In the meantime Nauticam Italy lent me this gear to shot during the summer.

This is the first A7 nor A7S or A7R... So maybe the video quality is not the best one.

They gave me the whole setup on the boat while traveling to this dive spot so I had just one hour to check for video settings on internet.

I set everything to 1080@60p 28Mbps but once in the water I pressed a custom button loading a custom setup previously saved hence the camera recorded everything in a ultra-compressed 1440@30p MOV. One minute file is 80MB... One minute on my GH2 is 1GB.

The 10-18mm lens is APSC and on the boat they told me to zoom in a little bit to cover the FF sensor. Actually later at home I discovered that the camera has a special APSC Crop Mode for this. So my shots exhibited a strong vignetting while with this mode everything is ok.

I would have eaten my fins...

Last week I made a two days trip to an amazing WWII wreck in the South of Italy. This time I used the correct settings and everything is ok. More video to come

For the moment my feedback is:

Shots from my old GH2 are razor sharp while here images are soft.

The Sony sensor records wonderful colors by itself. The above video has zero color correction. I could not touch the files being so compressed. So what you see is what I got in camera.

The FF has a huge dinamic range.

Looking at the Sony lens catalogue there are no FF lens for WA shots. This APSC 10-18mm f/4 zoom it's the only viable solution at the moment

I have a small dome. Nauticam said me that the correct one would be a larger crystal dome very expensive.

Sony menu/settings are really a PITA. The movie record button is placed in awkward position and there is no way to map the normal shutter button to record video or even another button.

When you start recording the camera will mantain the focus set via the shutter button or a focus obtained via another button(*) so before start shooting you have to half press the shutter button to focus and then press the movie record button.

The NA-A7 Nauticam housing is of another league. Command placement is really comfortable. You control nearly everything with two fingers without moving you hand from the handle.

The movie record button is better than on the naked camera

(*) to get something similar to the normal Panasonic AF-Lock button you have to set 10 different menu and the result it's not the same....

PS

A note about Sony...

They made three different models in three years A7/A7R A7S A7SII/A7RII (I don't even know if I wrote them correctly). This A7 was already obsolete after one year. A Nauticam housing is dressed around the camera so this housing is obsolete as well. Do yo know how much the whole setup cost? .... How someone can afford all of this when a company came with a new model every year?

The diving looks amazing, and the housing feedback here is interesting.

What is the water temp?

A7 definitely isn't the top choice for video shooting, but it is serviceable. A7S is outstanding.

Sony has a 16-35 f/4 lens in the FE (full frame E-) mount that has been available for a few months, and works well in the 180mm glass dome. This is actually one of the best wide rectilinear zooms I've used, and I am really impressed by the performance in the relatively small dome. FF systems from Canon or Nikon typically require something much bigger...

I really like Sony's strategy with the "purpose" built models that use the same lenses, and go in the same housing. A7, A7R, and A7S all use one housing, A7 II and (fingers crossed) A7R II should use another. This allows me to have high resolution (A7R) and highly sensitive (A7S) bodies that I can use interchangeably, as needed, in one housing. These have been my primary two travel cameras, using A7S for video and at night, and it has made flash obsolete.

That dive site looks amazing. How deep is it? And what dive centre did you use?

What is the water temp?

 

At that depth 60-80m (200-260ft) is about 14/15°C (59°F)

Now we are in the summer hence there are strong thermoclines and temp at the surface is about 26°C (79°F)

The diving looks amazing, and the housing feedback here is interesting.

 

What is the water temp?

 

A7 definitely isn't the top choice for video shooting, but it is serviceable. A7S is outstanding.

Sony has a 16-35 f/4 lens in the FE (full frame E-) mount that has been available for a few months, and works well in the 180mm glass dome. This is actually one of the best wide rectilinear zooms I've used, and I am really impressed by the performance in the relatively small dome. FF systems from Canon or Nikon typically require something much bigger...

Ouch, I did not notice the 16-35mm. It's very expensive I see.

What's the choice or Fisheye?

Are you forced to use a metabone adapter? In that case the lens position inside the dome is different. Does it work?

I really like Sony's strategy with the "purpose" built models that use the same lenses, and go in the same housing. A7, A7R, and A7S all use one housing, A7 II and (fingers crossed) A7R II should use another. This allows me to have high resolution (A7R) and highly sensitive (A7S) bodies that I can use interchangeably, as needed, in one housing. These have been my primary two travel cameras, using A7S for video and at night, and it has made flash obsolete.

 

Next time I service my Pana, it would be nice test the A7R-II

That dive site looks amazing. How deep is it? And what dive centre did you use?

Black Coral forest (Anthipates Subpinnata) ranges from 66m to 80m (216 - 262ft).

Basket stars are all around below 50m.

Other species filmed around 65m.

The diving center is Argentario Divers

Bye

it is very nice...

Thanks for shearing

Very nice. And beautiful soothing sound track

Thank you.