Jumping Into The Deep End

3 hours ago, MattPNW said:

I’m getting married in Cozumel (our first vacation together was to Cozumel and that’s also where I proposed… while diving of course)

Very cool! Congratulations!

It sounds like you want to travel with your rig so a rectilinear lens in a large dome is probably not what you want - a 230mm dome is very large and difficult to travel with.  Best option for multi purpose use might be a 28-60 Sony lens with a WWL.   To go with a fisheye you would be looking at an adapted Canon 8-15 or Canon/Sigma 15mm in a smallish dome.   You'll want a macro lens for Lembeh I think. The WWL could also be used there for big subjects like giant frogfish.

As far as video goes, I'd get comfortable with photography first - it's so easy to make a complete mess of jumpy video clips - you tube is full of them .  You want to sort out diving with a rig first and you only need to stay still for 1/100 of a second to get a still frame. after all.  There are lots of compromises with video the most significant being that many cameras will do a 1.5x crop at high bitrates.  The A7SIII has the advantage of using the whole sensor directly to shoot 4K I believe without interpolation,  or line skipping like some cameras do. Have a read of some of the posts in the video forum to see some of the issues and when you are ready ask the question there.

Once you have sorted out your lenses and worked back to a housing, you will be looking at lighting, a set of strobes to start with for still frames - it's all about the lighting.

Since you already have the A7R IV and a 16-35mm f/4, your least expensive path forward would probably be a SeaFrogs housing with an 8-inch dome. It won't give you the same image quality corner-to-corner as a 230mm glass dome, and it won't give you the ease of use of a Nauticam housing, but it will cost a small fraction thereof and provide you with most of the capabilities. I've met several people who were shooting Sony 16-35 f/4 in the SeaFrogs 6-inch dome and were perfectly satisfied with the results, albeit on 24MP A7 cameras, not the A7R line. Several people here on Wetpixel have expressed opinions that the Sony 16-35mm f/4 specifically is more tolerant of smaller domes than other rectilinear wide-angle lenses, performing satisfactorily in 180mm domes, although I have not seen a comparative test.

The 28-60mm + WWL combination can also work with a SeaFrogs housing, they have the appropriate port and zoom gear, but keep in mind that only the original WWL-1 lens in 67mm mounting will fit it - the WWL-1B uses Nauticam's proprietary bayonet mount, and while an M67 to bayonet mount adapter exists, it does not fit SeaFrogs ports due to a wide front flange.

For macro, the Sony 90mm is an excellent, if expensive, lens - at least the flat port for it is relatively inexpensive.

I'll second @ChrisRoss on lighting - it really is the make-or-break item. With a full-frame camera shooting wide-angle, you can't really skimp on it either. If you were doing exclusively macro, you could get away with small strobes such as Inon S-2000 or Backscatter MF-1, but for wide-angle you want at least Inon Z-330, and preferably something like a Retra Pro or OneUW 160X. On a limited budget, a cheap housing with good lighting will perform a lot better than an expensive housing with cheap or no lighting.

@Barmaglot @ChrisRoss Thank you both for the recommendations. As a landscaoe photographer I completely understand that lighting will make it break the shot. I’d actually feel better about a cheaper houser and nicer strobes/video light than a nicer housing and even the nicer lens. Garbage in = garbage out. 
 

There were a few strobe recommendations, but what is a good compromise between price and quality? How do those stack up to YS-D3s or Ikelite DS160/161s?

@Barmaglot With respect to Sea Frogs housing, I’ve read that some people have to deal with lack of buttons and need to program the custom buttons different in order to compensate. Is this much of an issue with the A7R IV housing? How is the bouyancy on their housings?

25 minutes ago, MattPNW said:

@Barmaglot @ChrisRoss Thank you both for the recommendations. As a landscaoe photographer I completely understand that lighting will make it break the shot. I’d actually feel better about a cheaper houser and nicer strobes/video light than a nicer housing and even the nicer lens. Garbage in = garbage out. 
 

There were a few strobe recommendations, but what is a good compromise between price and quality? How do those stack up to YS-D3s or Ikelite DS160/161s?

@Barmaglot With respect to Sea Frogs housing, I’ve read that some people have to deal with lack of buttons and need to program the custom buttons different in order to compensate. Is this much of an issue with the A7R IV housing? How is the bouyancy on their housings?

You need to think about how you want to trigger strobes longer term. With your Sony you will be using either a LED trigger or electrical triggering.  IMO fibre optic triggering is the most trouble free setup - complicated by the fact that not all strobes play well with LED triggers.  With electric sync cables you have another set of little o-rings to maintain and you need to be careful to keep the pins/sockets clean and not for example allow a drop of water to drip in when disassembling.

Ikelite strobes are electric sync only are big and heavy but have nice lighting with the ring flash tube they use.  YS-D3 some people like but we have had to trouble shoot a few of them on here as they didn't like playing with LED triggers.  The INON strobes are pretty rugged and easy to trigger, they are a solid choice.  Next step is the Retras and they have a reputation for nice light.  The OneUW are step beyond in price and they seem to be a solid strobe choice.  LED triggers come in two flavours, manual only and TTL capable triggers, manual is less troublesome and LED can be tricky - demanding the best quality fibre optic cable and a strobe that is fairly sensitive.

The Sea Frogs housings - you get what you pay for they work fine but there are compromises.  I'm not necessarily sure a 16-35 is the best lens to kick off with - with your list of subjects it probably only excels at wrecks and big pelagics.   For reef scenics or CFWA a fisheye or WWL would serve you better and the WWL will also do decent service on pelagics.  For travel to Raja and Lembeh, the WWL/macro option might be a good choice allowing you maximum flexibility for the range of subjects you might find at Raja Ampat and the macro options at Lembeh.   It will also be easier to carry on to the little planes that will fly you into Sarong for Raja Ampat.

8 minutes ago, ChrisRoss said:

You need to think about how you want to trigger strobes longer term. With your Sony you will be using either a LED trigger or electrical triggering.  IMO fibre optic triggering is the most trouble free setup - complicated by the fact that not all strobes play well with LED triggers.  With electric sync cables you have another set of little o-rings to maintain and you need to be careful to keep the pins/sockets clean and not for example allow a drop of water to drip in when disassembling.

Ikelite strobes are electric sync only are big and heavy but have nice lighting with the ring flash tube they use.  YS-D3 some people like but we have had to trouble shoot a few of them on here as they didn't like playing with LED triggers.  The INON strobes are pretty rugged and easy to trigger, they are a solid choice.  Next step is the Retras and they have a reputation for nice light.  The OneUW are step beyond in price and they seem to be a solid strobe choice.  LED triggers come in two flavours, manual only and TTL capable triggers, manual is less troublesome and LED can be tricky - demanding the best quality fibre optic cable and a strobe that is fairly sensitive.

The Sea Frogs housings - you get what you pay for they work fine but there are compromises.  I'm not necessarily sure a 16-35 is the best lens to kick off with - with your list of subjects it probably only excels at wrecks and big pelagics.   For reef scenics or CFWA a fisheye or WWL would serve you better and the WWL will also do decent service on pelagics.  For travel to Raja and Lembeh, the WWL/macro option might be a good choice allowing you maximum flexibility for the range of subjects you might find at Raja Ampat and the macro options at Lembeh.   It will also be easier to carry on to the little planes that will fly you into Sarong for Raja Ampat.

That’s very helpful. I guess with respect to wet lenses I’m at a loss. You can’t use those for above water shooting… that said, how is the image quality on them when compared to say a 8-15 with adapter vs a 90mm macro from Sony? Can I get the reach ranges required with just wet lenses and will I suffer in terms of image quality? It seems like Nauticam has the best wet lenses. Who do they play nice with for housings?

The WWL is generally regarded as superior image quality to rectilinear wides - it's not a direct substitute as it introduces barrel distortion.  The fisheye is probably a little better image quality than the WWL.  The Macro is a bit apples and oranges you don't take the same type of shots and have different concerns and you are mostly a lot closer so shooting through less water.  If you are worried about image quality I wouldn't put a 16-35 in an 8" dome. 

Here is a comparison shot in a pool with WWL/WACP-1/ WACP-C /rectilinear in dome.  Ignore the f4 stuff, that's special case use UW, f11 is where you will likely shoot, unfortunately the fisheye can only be compared with wet lenses on Canon, you'll have to take a leap of faith and compare the Sony images separately - it only shows the very corners up close. 

https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?vanity=NauticamThailand&set=a.494436099369728

You'll see they also show the WACP ports - they are dry water contact optics - quite a bit more expensive than WWL.

6 hours ago, MattPNW said:

@Barmaglot With respect to Sea Frogs housing, I’ve read that some people have to deal with lack of buttons and need to program the custom buttons different in order to compensate. Is this much of an issue with the A7R IV housing? How is the bouyancy on their housings?

I've been using a SeaFrogs housing with a Sony A6300 camera for about five years now, and the only issue with buttons that I've run into is that on the Gen.1 housing, the arrow buttons (up/down/left/right) wouldn't work quite right on the surface - I could page right and down, but not left and up. At a few meters of depth, with some pressure on the housing, they worked without issues. After about three years of usage, that housing developed a slow leak through the pistol grip port at the bottom, which corroded (a known issue on that specific model), admitting a few drops of water into the housing per dive - I contacted SeaFrogs and they replied that they don't have any spares of Gen.1 housings anymore, but they sold me a Gen.3 housing at half-price, which has been trouble-free so far; all its buttons work fine, on the surface or below.

The bare housing is buoyant, especially with a dome, but heavy strobes more than cancel that out, requiring substantial extra flotation to offset them. I use Retra Pro strobes with superchargers, and in my wide-angle setup, I use two Weefine WFA37 adjustable float arms with a bit of water admitted inside. In macro configuration (Sony 90mm lens), I add four Stix jumbo floats on my regular arms. I imagine that an A7R setup would be similar.

6 hours ago, MattPNW said:

There were a few strobe recommendations, but what is a good compromise between price and quality? How do those stack up to YS-D3s or Ikelite DS160/161s?

Ikelites are good quality, but bulky, heavy, use proprietary batteries, and worst of all, only electrical triggering (unless you buy add-on optical adapters). You can use electrical triggering with SeaFrogs A7 series housings, but Ikelite #45232 product page (dual sync cord for Nikonos bulkheads) warns that Meikon/SeaFrogs Nikonos-type port uses a non-standard layout and is incompatible. Sea & Sea D-series strobes have an unfortunate reputation for poor reliability, especially when firing repeatedly at full power, and they don't play very nice with LED triggers. Weefine/Kraken strobes have a circular bulb, but a poorly designed reflector, producing a fairly narrow beam with uneven lighting distribution. Although... I just had another look, and SeaFrogs A7R IV housing lacks fiber optic bulkheads - their newer offerings for A7 IV and A7S III have those, along with an optional ($68) trigger, but A7R IV is an older model that only has an electrical port. UW-Technics sells an adapter kit that replaces this bulkhead with an optical one, but at $620 it is more expensive than the actual housing, although it does give you TTL capability with most popular strobes. The most economical option, while retaining reasonable capability, is probably a pair of Inon Z-330s (or even used Z-240s) and a dual sync cord. It will mean a few extra o-rings to deal with, as the electrical connectors must be kept watertight (unlike optical connectors which are basically transparent windows and don't care about water), but it's a lot less expensive than a Nauticam, Marelux, Aquatica or Isotta housing.

5 hours ago, MattPNW said:

That’s very helpful. I guess with respect to wet lenses I’m at a loss. You can’t use those for above water shooting… that said, how is the image quality on them when compared to say a 8-15 with adapter vs a 90mm macro from Sony? Can I get the reach ranges required with just wet lenses and will I suffer in terms of image quality? It seems like Nauticam has the best wet lenses. Who do they play nice with for housings?

It's not so much the image quality as the types of shots that you get. With a fisheye lens, you can get really close to your primary subject, and still have a lot of scenery on the periphery of the shot. There is tons of barrel distortion, but underwater, in most situations, it's not readily apparent to the viewer, as they don't have a mental frame of reference to detect it unless you're shooting stuff with lots of straight lines, mostly man-made objects like wrecks. A rectilinear lens keeps straight lines mostly straight, but doesn't get you that fisheye perspective which is a favorite of many underwater photographers. Me, I've been using a 10-18mm lens almost since I started (crop sensor, so broadly equivalent to your 16-35mm), and I've been doing okay, although there are times I've wished for a fisheye.

Regarding wet lenses, AFAIK when it comes to full-frame, Nauticam is the only game in town. AOI/Fantasea, Weefine/Kraken and Inon lenses work fine for compact and crop-sensor cameras, but I haven't heard of any full-frame users employing them successfully. Nauticam WWL-1 will mount on any port with 67mm threading, but WWL-1B and WWL-C require a Nauticam-specific bayonet base. Nauticam sells a 67mm to bayonet adapter, but its threads are on the inside of a narrow groove, requiring a port with a thin front barrel - ports with a wide flange, such as SeaFrogs, will not fit.

Het Matt, welcome!  I share a lot of background with you as a Seattle native (now living north of you in the islands), former mountaineer, and one-time honeymooner in Cozumel. I also now do more landscape and wildlife photography than UW, as the waters around here are less inviting than in the tropics.  

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Now the fun part on what I want to shoot… EVERYTHING! 

A word of advice if I may.  The ambition and enthusiasm are understandable but that is a recipe for mediocrity in the short term.  You’ll progress faster and make better images if you concentrate each dive on one aspect.  For a bucket list trip, sure, take the whole arsenal if you can, but try to get an idea of the highlights of a given dive in advance then rig and search accordingly.  You will inevitably see things you can’t shoot well, but you will get much better shots of subjects that you’ve optimized for.  Good luck and have fun! 

2 hours ago, troporobo said:

Het Matt, welcome!  I share a lot of background with you as a Seattle native (now living north of you in the islands), former mountaineer, and one-time honeymooner in Cozumel. I also now do more landscape and wildlife photography than UW, as the waters around here are less inviting than in the tropics.  

A word of advice if I may.  The ambition and enthusiasm are understandable but that is a recipe for mediocrity in the short term.  You’ll progress faster and make better images if you concentrate each dive on one aspect.  For a bucket list trip, sure, take the whole arsenal if you can, but try to get an idea of the highlights of a given dive in advance then rig and search accordingly.  You will inevitably see things you can’t shoot well, but you will get much better shots of subjects that you’ve optimized for.  Good luck and have fun! 

Appreciate the words of wisdom. That’s exactly what I’m trying to accomplish. Strictly wide angle for Raja for example and then macro for Lembeh. I wouldn’t be mixing and matching without a wet lens approach, but I’m not sure if that’s as economical for now. Have you had much luck shooting locally in the Sound? If so, what’s your go to rig?

I haven’t been diving in the sound since I first learned in Edmonds over 30 years ago. I have had the good fortune to live in the tropics for all of that time.  Now I am struggling to imagine gearing up for cold water and will likely travel to dive.

Knowing the limited vis around here, I’d probably focus on macro opportunities, either traditional or CFWA.  A friend up here shoots with a fisheye and compact dome and gets very good results up close.