Beginner setup

Hi,

I'm looking to start taking photos during my dives, but I'm unlikely to be on dives more than three times a year so I'm not going to spend much.

I've been frustrated by unable to get any response to queires for housing for my Kodak DX6490 4MP (from Kodak, Ikelite, Ewa-Marine amongst others) other than that Ewa-Marine won't be producing anything.

I'm thinking of a second hand 35mm Reefmaster or somesuch, but I understand filters and lighting are pretty much essential.

Any suggestions would be appreciated...

Cheers,

Joe

My suggestion would be a Canon A Series Camera and the corresponding DC housing.

I've been selling a lot of the A75 ($250) and the DC-30 (Under 200), which is priced competitively to the reefmaster, but offers much more.

Starting off, I suggest you use the camera's internal flash and get very close to your subjects. Many divers get outstanding results with this technique...

The Canon Cmaeras with the rather cheap Canon Housings are a good Idea.

If you want to use the Camera only for UW the Ryan is right with is recomm. of the A Series.

If you also want a nice Camera for every Day use have a look at the S Series. It supports full manual shooting and RAW format two features you will like if your expectation grows (as well over and especially under water)

Simon

Yes I'm leaning towards the Canon A series, but over the last couple of days Olympus seems to offer more for less in the ealier models of the C-series, e.g. C-2040 has all the features of an A60 and more, even if it is a few years older.

The drawback here is that the underwater housings don't seem to be as profligate as the Canon offerings.

I agree with Ryan and the others, the Canon A75 is a nice set-up. I've been using an A70 for a bit more than a year (something around 80 to 90 dives with it) and I still like it. The Canon WP-DC700 case gives access to all the controls.

I wouldn't recommend buying an A60, 3,2 MPix should be considered the minimum number of pixels for the actual market. But that doesn't mean that you can't get very good pictures with an A60.

Olympus actually in my experience puts out better more consistent results in underwater photography, I use a C3040z and have used more basic models and recieved some great results, if you'd like to see something about those great results in a really cheap set up check out Issue 19 of Underwater PhotoMag http://www.uwpmag.com

I, too am an A-series user. Worked my way from A20 to A40 and now A80. I'm very happy with the results on land and in water.

Recently Canon has announced an A95 so watch prices of the A80 fall very soon.

Thanks for everyones comments so far

Well after several days on Ebay I've finally committed and bought an A60 for a price I'm willing to pay.

I was almost conviced by some Reefmaster offers between $60 and $150 but a quick chat with my friendly neighbourhood underwater digital retailer convinced me otherwise.

So now I have to accumulate the add ons and I have a further question:

Which Compact Flash module should I be getting? I understand there are types I and II, and Hi-Speed versions. My current understanding is that the A60 doesn't output large enough files to warrant an expensive Hi-Speed card...

Well after several days on Ebay I've finally committed and bought an A60 for a price I'm willing to pay

Congratulations for your purchase.

The A60 is easy to use and produces good results, you should have a look at the article of the UPMag Giles pointed out. You will see that you can achieve excellent results with a 2 MPix. The A60 has even more creativity control than the camera that was used in the article.

Ok now about the card. The A60 use only CF card of type I, as for the speed I personnally use a 256Mb Lexar 12x. It gives me around 120-130 pictures in full resolution. A 256Mb should give you around 200! The speed of the card may not be useful for the camera but it helps to speed the transfer if you use a USB2.0 card reader or dump the card on a portable disk.

Be sure to invest in a good set of AA NiMH. At first I bougth a set of 4 1850mAh Optex with a slow charger. Afterwards I had to bought a new charger working on both 110V and 220V. I selected a fast charging (1 h) Energizer one with a set of 4 1850 mAh. I got a better results from my Optex charging them with that charger and the Energizer batteries seem to last longer (there is no bunny on them though ). If you intend to use your internal flash as the main strobe select at least 2100 mAh batteries.

I've read the UWP article and it is very informative, I think it's reassured me that with some luck I'll be able to get a better result than my last 'film' experiment.

I think I'm just about set so I'll play with the camera so I'm familiar with the 'Cloudy' mode, macro settings and 'night-flash' - which I assume is different to regular flash.

Cheers all.

My suggestion would be a Canon A Series Camera and the corresponding DC housing.

 

I've been selling a lot of the A75 ($250) and the DC-30 (Under 200), which is priced competitively to the reefmaster, but offers much more.

 

Starting off, I suggest you use the camera's internal flash and get very close to your subjects.  Many divers get outstanding results with this technique...

I just purchased a Canon A75 for use as my underwater camera. I will eventually buy the WP-DC30 housing but have a few questions:

Is there a initial pre/post-dive checklist that I should follow?

Should I purchase spare parts? If so, what parts wear out soonest?

Somebody told me about something called a "Leek Detector" Has anybody used this? How does it work?

If the housing is defective for any reason, do I have a chance at all of getting a refund of the housing AND the camera???

Thanks in advance for helping out a Newbie Wetpixel-ite. The A75/DC30 are about as much investment as I currently want to dish out to get my feet wet in this field.

Scott

Is there a initial pre/post-dive checklist that I should follow?

Clean the O ring before closing the case - this forms the airtight seal. I did this the night before the dive in my apartment.

I didn't do anything post-dive other than rinse the case in fresh water, sometimes I opened the case once the days diving was done to review the shots on the way home.

Should I purchase spare parts? If so, what parts wear out soonest?

Spare O rings would be useful, not that I got any.

Somebody told me about something called a "Leek Detector" Has anybody used this? How does it work?

Not heard of it.

If the housing is defective for any reason, do I have a chance at all of getting a refund of the housing AND the camera???

No. I read the warrantee on this and they won't refund the cost of the camera lost.

***

I am very happy with some of the shots I got in Malta, I'll update the thread with a link later in the week but briefly - don't bother with the night-flash ever. The extended exposure always blurred my shots.

Macro with/without flash, and Auto without flash produced some fantastic results (IMO).

Joe

Is there a initial pre/post-dive checklist that I should follow?

Clean the O ring before closing the case - this forms the airtight seal. I did this the night before the dive in my apartment.

I didn't do anything post-dive other than rinse the case in fresh water, sometimes I opened the case once the days diving was done to review the shots on the way home.

Should I purchase spare parts? If so, what parts wear out soonest?

Spare O rings would be useful, not that I got any.

Somebody told me about something called a "Leek Detector" Has anybody used this? How does it work?

Not heard of it.

If the housing is defective for any reason, do I have a chance at all of getting a refund of the housing AND the camera???

No. I read the warrantee on this and they won't refund the cost of the camera lost.

***

I am very happy with some of the shots I got in Malta, I'll update the thread with a link later in the week but briefly - don't bother with the night-flash ever. The extended exposure always blurred my shots.

Macro with/without flash, and Auto without flash produced some fantastic results (IMO).

Joe

I didn't do anything post-dive other than rinse the case in fresh water, sometimes I opened the case once the days diving was done to review the shots on the way home.

Joe

When you rinse the case have it soak in water that is not much colder than the room temperature when you closed the case. Otherwise you may induce condensation in the case if the relative humidity was high. This can damage the camera.

Also avoid rinsing the camera under the tap with pressure.

When you open the case be sure it's dry and that the back section will open downward.