Snooters (and macro photographers) - do you practice above water? Any advice for a beginner?

My old camera (a compact Nikon aw130) died after 5 years of hard use, so I upgraded slightly to a tg6 and backscatter wet lens. I’m also planning on getting the MF-2 flash and the snoot. The thing is, I’ve never used an external flash or a snoot underwater. I’ve used studio lights plenty of times in my former life as an event photographer during college, but it was only in the last couple of years that I really ignited a passion for macro photography. I’ve been taking three months off each year since 2016 (except during the pandemic) to go diving in the Philippines, and share the photos mainly on social media. I mainly do macro - I do have a pair of old MaxPower UXDS-1 strobes (and a really old Nikon 1 which I don’t use anymore now that I have the tg6 and m52 air lens) for wide, but that only accounts for maybe 5% of my shots.

The thing is, during the nine months I’m at home, I’m working an incredible number of hours (remote work as an attorney) and can’t really take the time to drive out to Florida (I live in Louisiana, where there’s no clear water anywhere remotely close… unless you count a nearby swimming pool). I was planning on getting the flash and snoot and just practicing at my house with stuff that’s approximately the same size as nudis up to small fish. That way I wouldn’t be going into my next trip later this year totally unprepared. It’s not ideal, but it seems practical. Is there anything I should know about in advance? Or about snooting in general? The only thing I can think of is to be very careful to not overheat my flash, since it won’t be water cooled.
 

Are there any ”must read” articles (or even books) on the subject of UW macro photography with a beginner/intermediate system like the tg6/mf2/snoot? Or just books on UW snooting in general? I’ve googled and found enough to make me think this is something I want to advance to. I guess I just feel insecure, because what I’ve read makes it sound fairly challenging to become even ‘adequate’ with. I’m really excited to take this next small step up from what I have been using, but I don’t know where to put my foot so that I would be in the best position possible for when I go back to Asia in November/December. 
 

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and hopefully respond.

Hi!

Snoot macro shots have become a real favourite of mine over the last few years.

The trick, I found, was getting the aiming light and the strobe output to light the same place; then understanding what extra exposure you need to compensate for the limiting of the strobe output created by the narrowing of the light by the snoot. 

You can certainly work on both these elements on dry land - being careful as you say of overheating the strobe especially as you start to increase the power. But getting the alignment right between strobe and aiming light can be a huge help.

If you have a strobe where the aiming light is in the centre of the flash tube, this is straightforward. But if the tube is offset from the aiming light it is much more tricky. If you now plan to buy a strobe for shooting this is worth bearing in mind. I’ve not used the MF-2 so I’m not sure how that works but certainly worth checking. A snoot like the Marelux SOFT Pro contains an aiming light so à combined system should work well. But is very expensive. I use the Retra LSD which works extremely well with the Retra circular flash tube but, I found, much more difficult with an offset tube as used on the Inons. 

Hope this helps a bit. Shooting can be a slow, frustrating business to start with but I find it really absorbing with the potential for great results.