Finding the right tray & arms

I use their arms and they are good. No idea how good the clamps are. I bought ones from Aquatica and I am reasonably happy with them. On here people swear by Ultra light control system (ULCS) arms (there will probably be a few posts that recommend them). I haven't used them, but I have used really cheap clamps before and those were no fun, so the recommendation to not skimp on arms/clamps because you will keep using them even when you upgrade your camera, is a sound one.

Chris, hyp says it all. Buy once, buy well. Buy ULCS. 

I slept on it for a night and think I'll invest a little more in a ULCS system.

I still have a few questions about this:

- is it enough to take a single handle tray to start with? If I see correctly, the trays can be expanded later with a second handle (I will start with one strobe first).

- I have put together a design with two arms but am unsure how long they should be (as I said, I shoot more in the macro range). Are 5"/15cm and 8"/23cm enough?

- It would be ideal if the construction including camera and housing is neutrally balanced. Unfortunately, I can't find any weight specifications for the components and it's hard for me to choose a suitable buoyancy arm

I slept on it for a night and think I'll invest a little more in a ULCS system.
I still have a few questions about this:
- is it enough to take a single handle tray to start with? If I see correctly, the trays can be expanded later with a second handle (I will start with one strobe first).
- I have put together a design with two arms but am unsure how long they should be (as I said, I shoot more in the macro range). Are 5"/15cm and 8"/23cm enough?
- It would be ideal if the construction including camera and housing is neutrally balanced. Unfortunately, I can't find any weight specifications for the components and it's hard for me to choose a suitable buoyancy arm
 

Just to add to the very good advice from Pomacentridae, it's definitely worth having two arms on each side because of the flexibility this provides. 5" and 8" are good choices. 

You could always start with a setup for one side and then add a second side ((handle, arms and clamps) when you feel the need or you would like to try out a different lighting arrangement.

As Pomacentridae sets out, for many situations one light works well enough - even in wide-angle shots. 

I didn't go the float arms route but instead used Stix floats. I find them very flexible in terms of being to add or subtract buoyancy. In practice though I very rarely change the number of floats I use whether I'm shooting a 105mm, 60mm, 10-17mm or 10-24mm with their differing ports etc. My system is very slightly negatively buoyant and switching lenses and ports doesn't, I find, make such a significant difference to the buoyancy characteristics of the system that it warrants changing the floats.

One more vote for stix floats. They are definitely the value for money option and also the most flexible. 

Many thanks for your advice, you have already helped me a lot! Stix Floats sound great, I'll try that.

Just to be sure, my design then consists of these components:

1 x TR-D Tray with TF-DHB Handle
1 x DB-05 5" double ball arm
1 x DB-08 8" double ball arm
3 x AC-CSF clamps
1 x AD-IN adapter for INON strobe

Am I ready to order? 

2 hours ago, Chrisew said:

Many thanks for your advice, you have already helped me a lot! Stix Floats sound great, I'll try that.

Just to be sure, my design then consists of these components:

1 x TR-D Tray with TF-DHB Handle
1 x DB-05 5" double ball arm
1 x DB-08 8" double ball arm
3 x AC-CSF clamps
1 x AD-IN adapter for INON strobe

Am I ready to order? 

Yeah, that all makes good sense.

A couple of tricks for saving money:

- Neutral buoyancy is not critical, as long as the rig is not too heavy. Personally I like a system to be heavy enough that I can put it down without it floating away. Unless you are going deep, chunks of cheap closed cell polyurethane foam work nicely. I currently use a swimming 'noodle' cut into rings. In the past I have used strips of a swimming float and duct tape. Both compress with depth (and age), so buoyancy decreases with depth, but not so much that I have ever found it a problem.

- Prior to getting a second strobe, for macro you can use a white card to reflect some strobe light and help kill harsh shadows. 

On 2/13/2023 at 10:13 AM, JohnLiddiard said:

- Prior to getting a second strobe, for macro you can use a white card to reflect some strobe light and help kill harsh shadows. 

thank you for this advice! You may have just saved me a few hundred bucks - I was thinking of getting dual backscatter MF-2 units for macro, but worried i would be getting in over my head going from onboard flash only to 2 at once.  

On 2/13/2023 at 12:13 PM, JohnLiddiard said:

Prior to getting a second strobe, for macro you can use a white card to reflect some strobe light and help kill harsh shadows. 

I wouldn't disagree with John's thinking. But do bear in mind that it's quite likely you would need to hand hold a reflector - leaving you with only one hand to hold your system. It's not that easy and may well require a good bit of juggling!

I use INON clams and arms and they are great as well. Before we end up in fanclubs, who writes the first UCLS vs INON clam review?