Buying slr package for cocos trip- Rebel 350D

Hi all

New member - just signed up but have been following this site for a bit. I am going to the Cocos islands in Aug and want to upgrade (previous camera was canon s70 housed).

I have been pricing out varying options and am thinking of the 350D rebel (USD800), ikelite housing (appox USD1400), the DS125 strobe package (USD800). Need to add a lens or two to this and port. For this trip I will require mostly wide angle angle but it would be good to have a flexible lens (I know they do not exist). A bit of advice needed.

1. lens -- prefer a good but not too expensive lens for wide angle and another for Macro. Will this be enough?

2. do I really need 2 DS125 or will one do okay.

3. am I missing anything.

4. any dealers (or links) where I can get a good package deal (i live in NY).

I prefer to keep it under USD4000 if possible.

Thanks and look forward to getting some picture on here from my trip.

When I went to Cocos I used the 17-35 with an F100. I doubt you will shoot any Macro. I would get whatever the Cannon equivalent to the 12-24 is. I understand the Sigma is very good though the quality is suppose to be inconsistent.

I would take two strobes. You might get by with one strobe but it is a long way to go and trust your strobe doesn't fail. Bring extra synch cords as well.

Be sure to make the night dives. The white reef sharks in their frenzy are not to be missed.

I also brought a Nikonos with a 28 mm lens. Diving with a pod of dolphins on the way to a dive shot I got my best image ever with that rig.

Where to buy? From B&H in NYC. www.bhphotovideo.com

They have everthing, housing, ports, camera, lenses. You can get it all in one box in th email or pick it up in store. They also have the best prices anywhere. The general rule is if you find a place advertising a price more than a few dollars lower then B&H it is a scam.

Lenses.

An Ideal kit would be the EFs 10-22 and EFs 60mm macro.

A cheper alternative to the 10-22 is the Sigma 15mm FE. Will be similar to about 11mm on the zoom. Although you give up the ability to zoom, you would probably find that you allways used the 10-22 at 10mm anyway.

Other options for wide angle are the kit lenses (18-55 or 17-85) You will need one of these lenses for land photography so if on a budget you can use it underwater as well. Another advantage these lenses have over the 10-22 or 15FE is that they will also function as a Macro lens (will fill the frame with an object about 3 inches) so if deside to go with one of these lenses, you would not have to choose between WA and macro before you dive.

As I suggested above in less you only plan to use this camera under water you need a lens in the normal zoom range.

Strobes. I went a year with one DS-125 before adding a second. To be honest I dont feal that the second strobe has really improved my photos that much.

Memory. You need at least 2 memory cards. 1GB each minimum. Unless you plan on bringing a laptop, I would recomend getting 4GB cards.

I was in Cocos last August and used almost exclusively my Nikon 12-24. Something like the 18-55 might work pretty well, with a dome port. You likely won't get too many chances to be close up to the hammerheads and others. I wasn't shooting full wide most of the time. Sometimes the hammerheads will be close enough for your strobes to be effective, but sometimes not. You'll be able to live fine without macro on this trip. I'd go for the Canon 10-22 with a dome port or fall back to the very economical 18-55 kit lens ... but use it in a dome port because you'll be shooting wide most of the time. We had lots of hammerheads in August, along with lots of other sharks, marble rays, a few eagle rays.

There are several site sponsors who would take the time to answer your questions, and ship to New York, and you'd avoid sales tax kind of thing...

Personally, I would use Ryan at Reef Photo. Not only is he a real straight shooter (OK, pun intended), he can really help build and support a system, where the online outlets are not equipped for anything but sales.

He also has been quite competetive in our dealings.

ryan@reefphoto.com www.reefphoto.com