Nikon D100 UW - anyone tried it?

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John Mathieson

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Would love to hear reports from anyone who has tried a Nikon D100 underwater - (for that matter, would be interested in your thoughts on it on dry land as well)
 
My local camera shop has sold a number of these and had one left which I was somewhat interested in. After asking alot of questions on this board my conclusion is to go with the Fuji S2.
The main reson is that you can't just use any strobe with the D100, you can only use Nikons. If you use Nikons then you must house them. Also, you can rig the D100 to use different strobes but you will not be able to use TTL. Some of this information came from Stephan Frink who e-mailed me directly, he is currently using the D100.
Dive Safe,
Caymaniac
 
The main reson is that you can't just use any strobe with the D100, you can only use Nikons. If you use Nikons then you must house them.


Getting even MORE expensive. Hmmm. Will be a while before they turn up on eBay. Cheaply that is.
 
You can use any strobe with the D100. It just won't support TTL. Nikon digital SLR's use a new sensor. They refer to this as D-TTL. It is proprietary and won't support existing TTL. As a matter of fact, you must use a non-TTL sync cord, which Ikelite makes.

Yes, Aquatica and Seacam make housings for Nikon speedlights. The speedlight must be a DX version to do D-TTL. You can only use one though, so no dual strobe setup. The speedlight is weak for underwater and the color temperature isn't perfect either, but of course with digital, you can correct it fairly easily. The speedlight option works for macro, but overall just using existing strobes in manual is preferred by most.

The S2 uses the existing Nikon TTL sensor and is therefore capable of running any TTL strobe in TTL mode. The color is considered more vibrant in the S2, also.

Although it would seem that the S2 is a better choice, there are other factors. Ikelite is the only manufacturer that has anounced its intent to house the S2. It will be in an MD size case, which is quite bulky. Housings for the D100 be available from Ikelite, Sea and Sea, Aquatica, Seacam, and Amphibico?

Nikon Capture 3 software allows for easy manipulation of RAW images. Exposure can be changed +/- two stops and white balance adjusted after the shot has been taken. This lessens the pain of no TTL.

Ikelite and Sea and Sea are supposed to have their housings ready in September. Aquatica hopes to have prototype at DEMA in late October. Seacam hopes to have prototype at DEMA and production in the spring of 2003. Remember, these announcements are often like vaporware.
 
Sorry, forgot to answer the original question. Have not used it underwater, because no housing is available. I believe an Ikelite unit was tested. Check www.reefpix.org I think.

I've been using the D100 for about a month and just love it. If you buy one, purchase the D100 Guide by Thom Hogan at www.bythom.com. It will shorten your learning curve tremendously.

Here's a sample pic of a Rafael Palmeiro home run. 80-200mm zoom at 200mm, open wide at 2.8 at ISO800 !


aab.sized.jpg
 
Thanks to both of you for the information - NICE picture!!! - are you using a microdrive for storage? I have only used a 2 MP camera digitally, and have been all right with a 128 MB card, but with something like the D100 I would think even the biggest microdrive wouldn't be too hard to fill up.

So, the strobes sound a bit problematic - am I correct in my understanding that you CAN do TTL but only with a single strobe?

I know almost nothing about UW photography, so please exuse my ignorance. I have done a fair amount of Macro 1:1 with my above water Minolta Maxxum over the past 15 years, and I think I would enjoy UW Macro quite a lot.

I am ordering a case for my little Canon Elph s100 just to get started. I would like to get a new digital SLR to replace my Maxxum even if I didn't do anything UW, but if I am going to spend the $$ might as well have one that would be as good UW.

Thanks again.
John
 
First, thanks to Dee for fixing the image.

You can use a TTL strobe, but TTL will not work at all. The strobes must be set to manual.

You can shoot any number of methods with the D100. TIFF, RAW (Nikon Nef) or JPEG fine, normal or crappy. For important shots, I shoot RAW. This stores the raw pixel data plus a header. I can then alter the exposures and white balance on the raw data. Each image is around 10mb, so I get around 10 images on my 128mb card. I have an 1gb microdrive that will store about 100.

Shooting JPEG fine allowed me around 150 images on a 256mb card.

They now have 512mb and 1gb compact flash cards, but they are still a little pricey.

I love underwater macro. It's actually a little easier than topside in some respects.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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