General opinions in different price bands

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daptonema

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I am about to buy a digital underwater setup. Not quite sure how much I'm willing to spend or whether I will go PnS or DSLR yet. I can see the advantages of both and am still trying to weigh up a faster system that would also be good on land, against an easier system to use that I don't have to preset before going underwater (I think I've got the essentails covered there, feel free to correct!).

My biggest problem is I set a rough budget, then realise that for a a bit more money I could go for something better. Therefore, hopefully people will post their best suggestions for setups in different price bands (with maybe a couple of points why that is the best choice). Suggested price bands could be <US$750, $750-1500, >$1500. The cost should include camera and housing.

I'm thinking of buying something in the middle group that will grow with mine and my wife's underwater photography (I'm the one with a bit of underwater photography experience but she knows film cameras above water). If anyone wants to offer suggestions to me feel free (either in a reply or a PM). I know that there are lists elsewhere but there seems to be a lot of contradiction (such as people saying that the oly 350 is a good camera for UW but all the mainline camera reviews saying it has poor shutter response time and that there are better cameras out there)
 
No comparison between PnS and DSLR in quality or price.

DSLR with two strobes, housing and an assortment of lenses and lens ports is in the area of $5,000. or more.

IMHO for PnS it is the Canon A640 or G7. Both are 10 mp. Neither have RAW. Canon has removed RAW from all their PnS cameras.

The G7 will have more to offer for land use such as a 6X zoom versus the 4X on the A640. The G7 has image stabilization, another plus for land use.

The Canon housings are available for both.

The Ike housing is available for the A640 and a December release date for the G7.

My choice for underwater use only is the A640.
 
Be careful about the reviews you read, too. They are land based and sometimes uw work has different needs.

Shutter will be an issue on anything bar a dslr. There are ways around it if the rest of the camera meets your needs. I still love my Oly 5050 and she's s-l-o-w! LOL

If you're not in a place to spend at least $3000, then stop thinking about dslr at this stage.

There are some very nice compacts as you can see by following the links from my Pink Link in my signature. The Oly 350 is a great set-up and you can add lenses easily; Canon has several to choose from to suit pretty much any budget - even their older models are still great. Double check that you can add wet mate lenses to the Canon housings, some models do not allow this and you will need to go Ikelite instead. All of the compactswill allow you to add an external strobe or two.

You can't go too wrong with any of those listed. You can drive yourself crazy trying to pick the "perfect" system though :wink: Best to get a short list of models, then a short list of criteria and start tossing. It's tough to choose, but any camera that you own and dive with is better than anything still sitting on the shelf in the store!
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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