Help on Digital Photography

Well it seems like I have gotten hooked into underwater photography. As a beginner I was looking at the seaandsea DX750G, I also have seen the newer model DX860G and am kinda leaning towards that one. My question is I would like a camera that takes good quality, reasonably priced,and something I can grow in as I advance, not out grow, or be out dated, or discontinued in a year. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Man I don't know much other than get ready to spend a bundle. I think alot of it has to do with having great strobes so I would look into something that is interchangable like the Green Force lights

You'd be lucky if whatever you buy now isn't discontinued in 6 months, much less a year! I wouldn't worry about that part of it, frankly.

I'm not a huge Sea&Sea fan but if you have a bit of a look around here you will find some current thread on these models with users sharing information and images.

There are tons of options out there - have you checked out the Sticky at the top of the forum yet? You can get there by following the Pink Link in my signature. Inside it you'll not only find a lot of info on getting started, settings, resources and the like, but also lists of various potential choices complete with links to images and discussions on them. It's a great place to start narrowing things down.

Ask a lot of questions! Let us know more details about your diving and goals - how often, where, what kinds of things do you think you like to shoot, your budget etc...

One idea is to get an "inexpensive" kit and learn how to use it knowing full well you'll replace it in a couple years anyways after you have outgrown it.

I went from a S&S MMII 35mm to a digital S&S 8000G and was very disappointed with the lack of artistic control. Without being able to control f-stop I was unable to control depth of field. Also, I wasn't happy with the metering and autofocus system. The 8000G is Ok for snapshots in clear tropical water, but just didn't work well in the murky Puget Sound waters I call home.

I was very close to going for a full DSLR but ended up "settling" for a Canon G9 in an Ikelite housing with dual DS-125 strobes, ULCS arms, and Inon lenses. I'm very happy with it but The Chad is right, be ready to spend a bundle.

I have a digital rebel DSLR as well as a sea and sea 860G. I didnt like the idea of having to buy an expensive strobe and housing for my rebel so I purchased the 860G kit with strobe. My sig has a link to the photos from the first time I took it out.

Quick things I like and dont like:

Likes: It takes fairly good pictures underwater and good photos dry as well. The 6MP sensor gets good detail and doesnt generate a lot of noise if you set it for ISO100. The underwater housing is very rugged and compact. The light arm and strobe are easy to adjust underwater and come with a diffuser.

Dont Likes: Doesnt shoot RAW. Access to ISO and Aperture settings are archaic and not straighforward. It takes some time to get used to the focus lag. Its a little expensive for a 6MP camera. (they claim 8 with interpolation, but its basically a 6mp sensor)

Overall I like it and will probably continue to use it for a couple of years until I can afford to go for a HD video setup.

Check out the photos, the first few dive sites were fast drifts and the very first time I had the camera underwater so the shots came out a little blurry.

BrianDiver:

One idea is to get an "inexpensive" kit and learn how to use it knowing full well you'll replace it in a couple years anyways after you have outgrown it.

I went from a S&S MMII 35mm to a digital S&S 8000G and was very disappointed with the lack of artistic control. Without being able to control f-stop I was unable to control depth of field. Also, I wasn't happy with the metering and autofocus system. The 8000G is Ok for snapshots in clear tropical water, but just didn't work well in the murky Puget Sound waters I call home.

I was very close to going for a full DSLR but ended up "settling" for a Canon G9 in an Ikelite housing with dual DS-125 strobes, ULCS arms, and Inon lenses. I'm very happy with it but The Chad is right, be ready to spend a bundle.

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I like the G9 a lot, but to be able to buy more toys, I went with a fuji F50 (ok, I had several earlier versions on the manual F series), and the S&S YS110. I used a pair of relatively inexpensive Reef Master SL960D's first, but the quality of construction sucks. I don't mind the manual adjustment, but they are not worth their price.

The F50 is, in some ways, better than a G9 and others worse. But the big difference is price, as an F50 with uw case can be bought for under $500 (including large memory card and extra battery) Add a YS110 and use epoque tray and arms, and you have a complete system for around $1,000 - a lot of money to say the least, but the list of other camera's with the same image quality and cost is, well zero.

We are at a technical impass right now regarding image quality. It is now possible to make a sensor that is better than any lens, so sensor overall size is now the quality issue. Making more pixels will only result in poor low light responsiveness and no better images. As the compact camera's go, the Fuji has the largest, followed by the G9. Other camera's in the cannon line, that also have manual controls, don't have the same image quality. I hope there is a return to larger sensor, but that will take some time.

I agree that it all depends on how much your willing to spend. As opposed to most on this forum, I am a huge fan of Sea&Sea cameras and have owned 3 over the last few years. If you have the money, I would recommend the DX-1G or the 8000G. They take great pictures and are easy to use. See the pics in my gallery (click on "view gallery" at the left of this post) for examples of pics taken with these cameras. The Fiji shots were taken with the 8000G and the Galapagos shots were taken with the DX-1G. Also see Eskasi's thread Sea & Sea DX-1G in Sipadan, Mabul & Kapalai (Malaysia) Sea & Sea DX-1G in Sipadan, Mabul & Kapalai (Malaysia) on this board for other examples of pics taken with the DX-1G. These cameras have very little lag time between when you push the shutter button and when the picture is taken. They also can be used as a point and shoot camera as well as in manual mode. They both have an "adj" button that gives you immediate access to ISO and WB settings. I would also agree that to get the best pictures you will need a strobe since a lot of color is lost at depth. Just so you know, I think that the Cannons and Olys and Nikons take great pictures as well but I like the Sea&Sea cameras alot. If you have any questions email me at jamescrew6@verizon.net.

Regards,

Bill

IMHO, the limiting factor in nearly all current reasonably priced non-dslr cameras is The Lens. Since the discontinuation of the Oly C5050z, no lens has had the right stuff. On the front of the lens it says Olympus Super Bright Zoom Lens and 1 : 1.8 - 2.6. No current camera comes close. That lens was very expensive to manufacture and most buyers (topside) did not use it in ways that needed the extreme brightness. Since megapixels is what sells cameras to the ignorant masses and sensor technology has advanced but not gotten more expensive to manufacture, we now have 12 megapixel cameras that have cheap crappy lenses and need a focusing light in low light conditions, like underwater.

A recent thread included a link to an article about the print magazine industry that claimed more than 6 megapixels does not make for better images, just more information. By that they meant very large file size and lots of noise with no discernible improvement to the magazine product. Another thing the ignorant masses didn't use is RAW, so many new cameras with otherwise good products only record in jpeg. :11:

Yes the 5050 is long out of production. Yes it has annoying shutter lag and ttl is only available with an Ikelite housing or aftermarket modification to the Oly housing. Yes the write time for RAW images is troublesome, especially with the xD cards. All that said, hurray for eBay, because when my current camera or housing dies another is available for around $200 and I come back from every dive with many great images that newer more expensive rigs will only occasionally do as well and hardly ever do better.

A year ago I won an eBay auction for this rig; 5050 w/1Gig CF card, PT-015 housing, Epoque WAL, Sea & Sea dual tray, Jetton arms and two Epoque ES-150 DS strobes with fiber optic sync, all for $800usd. This camera has full manual control, 8 programable pre-sets (MyModes) for typical situations and takes great images in full auto w/o strobe! I'd gladly up-grade, if any manufacturer would actually make an up-grade!


Similar deals happen on rare occasions, but they do happen, and $800 hardly buys a decent new strobe, arm and tray! As with all eBay experiences and underwater imaging, YMMV!

hammerhead man:

I would also agree that to get the best pictures you will need a strobe since a lot of color is lost at depth.

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Love the shark shot.. almost looks like you were hiding from it.

I looked at Sea & Sea 1G and the Canon G9. I ended up going with the G9. I like the camera on land and in water. I went with the Canon housing for now and love the portability. I dive SoCal waters a lot but also like to go abroad. When I go on dive trips, it is not just to dive (mostly though). So I want a camera that I can take sunsets, sunrises, panoramas, canopy shots, etc. The Canon just won out in my opinion. The lag time to write to RAW was VERY negligible in my opinion. I do not take professional caliber photos, but between raw and photoshop, I feel I can get a lot out of my shots. I took ~350 photos in Roatan last week and have a ton of great shots.. no strobe, very few times using the flash. I found it easy to control aperture and ISO, although I am still learning. I often get confused on this stuff right now.

In a few months, I will prob get the ikelite and ds-125 setup and use that more locally, but I have a great setup for both land and sea now and feel I made the right choice.