Strobe selection, Seacam Seaflash 100 vs 150 vs Inon Z330...any advice, experience?

Hi,

I recently purchased Seacam D800 housing and collecting my gear, step by step.

Housing is equiped with S6 bulkheads. I found strobe selection is more challanging than thought, considering price of S6 cables.

Due to available budget at the moment Im considering purchase of one strobe (Seacam Seaflash 100d or potentialy 150D), and use setup initialy for macro only.

Later, hopefully,will upgrade with second Seacam strobe.

As alternative, I was considering purchase 2x Inon Z330 instead, but there is significant investment in S6-Inon cables where pair is at price of one Inon strobe. Also, there is no TTL support in this case, although not necessery. But Inon is lighter and more travel-friendly (not to mention price difference).

Upgrade to WA (fisheye) will come also in second/third phase, when budget allows....

Please any experience, suggestions abour Seacam strobes, reliability, durability..., from lucky owners?

Is Seaflash 100 powerful enough by your experience? Or should I go with 150? I like color temperature of circular bulb strobes... when WA comes.

Should be better investment (and good enough) to go with 2xInon Z330, giving up TTL?

Price of 2xZ330 + 2xSeacam cable S6-Inon is compareable to 1xSeaflash with one S6-S6 cable included.

Thanks in advance!

Marko

Inon and Seacam strobes, - both are very worthy. I tested a lot of them.

As for me, i would by Seacam strobe for pleasure, because of its ring shape tube. Ring tube gives much better uniform lighting on the square of the shot, and much better TTL control capability (because of burniing time 4 times longer than linear tube has).

But if your aim is baggage weight reducing, the Z-330 is champion of course.

Hi Pavel,

Thanks for feedback.

Now Im using Ikelite DS125, previously I used DS160 and 161, with my Canon setup and Ikelite housing. (But now Im moving to Nikon D800 with Seacam housing...and would like to setup my gear properly as much as budget allows, or at least to wisely select what I can afford now and to be able to upgrade and expand setup later on protecting investment).

I like color temperature of those, but i have some difficulties with DS125s. They are rather old and not reliable anymore. So I need to upgrade.

Do you have experience in comparasion Ikelite DS160/161 vs Seacam Seaflash? Price difference is significant and I wonder is it worth of it? Seacam provides wider angle and build quality is surely much higher. Are they reliable regarding faults, errors...? Dont have experience neither know anyone really own them among my friends.

Inon...many people have good words about them, many friends of mine own Z240s, but Im not sure what to think about heat issue, cold temperature, and two separate xsenons... plus separate cables which price is really significant and still lack of TTL without separate electronics.

Dilema... 🤔