Carrying A Camera With A Strobe

I think the next step in my photography would be to add a strobe to my setup; though that would be for next years Expedition as I leave on this years in 2 days.

I see that most people carry their camera (well I guess it's the obvious thing to do) during the dive, however I am not able to do this.

Being a disabled diver I use my arms for mobility, and to some extent to keep still when not swimming, so wear my camera on a strap around my neck as we often do in the dry world, only taking hold of it when actually taking a photograph.

Would the addition of a strobe make this more difficult? I am thinking specifically would a strobe attached to the camera encroach into my vision or hinder the swimming arms?

As an aside, I found the PT010 housing excellent in this respect having a neckstrap as part of the kit. When swimming it naturally hung down against my lower torso. However the PT015 has no such facility, only a wrist strap to which I have attached a neckstrap. The main drawback I see to this is that it is attached to only one point instead of two. It will get it's first outing next week.

Things I have coming to mind in this situation are:

1. camera will be heavier and not as balanced with the strobe, may make holding it steady harder although i use one hand like this for many photos especially macro when i use my other to steady myself and it is possible.

2. the strobe may cause the camera to swing around more and hit stuff like reef and or you in places you dont want it to. it also makes it bigger meaning it has more reach when dangling down.

3. I do have a setup like yours with one strobe and with the use of lanyards i can copmpact it all very nicely and hold it out of the way with one hand. I don't see why you couldn't do like that and clip the dangly bit to the bottom of you BC and the top to your neck or BC ... i'll get alex to take a shot of this in the next few days and post it.

4. You abilities physically or diving wise shouldn't stop it from being very workable and practical for you though. there is always a solution in the diving world, we divers have so many gadgets.

5. You may even want to rent a strobe for the vacation to see if you like it or not, always an option. You may find you can work with the extra equipment but prefer not to have it ..you never know.

Giles