ot? Flash in indoor pool

[Fredrik Johansson]

Hello everyone,
my problem is from shooting in an indoor pool. I use a Nikon Coolpix P5000 in an Ikelite housing with ttl-sync cord to an Ikelite ds-125 flash.
The indoor pool is lit with flourescent lights, and if I was shooting on land I'd gel my flash and set the camera for flourescent. But how to do this in a pool? It is not a huge problem, but the green shows up in the shades that are controlled by ambient light.
Gel the flash is an obvious answer, but the colortone is not working with standard gels, what do you use? I know that I could also add another or two more flashes to get better control of the ambient, but I can't afford that.

Any suggestions are welcome!

TIA!

Fred

[oly5050user]

you can shoot closer with a wide angle lens and go to a faster shutter speed,this way your primary source of light is the strobe.Background would be dark,but colors would be correct.
Or try shooting in black/white -no color.I am not sue how that would work out,but may be worth a try.

[Fredrik Johansson]

Hi oly5050user,
thanks for your reply.
I already try to shoot at as close adistance as I can get, problem is that I shoot small children (less than a year old), and it is almost impossible to control the distance fully. The problem with the ambient is not in every pic, but often enough to be anoying. Distance and shutterspeed are already thought of and as you point out, help alot in reducing the ambient. But I'd like to get more tools in the box if you know what I mean...
Black and white is not an option unfortunately.

Fred

[oly5050user]

do you have the white balance on automatic? that may help.

[M_Bipartitus]

Just a thought, if you have standard non-underwater flashes on the surface with optical slaves, you could overpower the ambient with a more controlled source.

[Fredrik Johansson]

@Bipartitus well, to be honest, I hadn't thought of that! Something I will definitely try, crosslighting with 2xstrobes might just work, though I've never ever tried to make them go off from a flash under water. Is there anything special to consider, apart from normal slave-mode use? I'll most likely place the tripods for the strobes in the pool @45 degrees towards subject.

Thanks!

Fred

[M_Bipartitus]

I'm not sure of any specific considerations short of keeping stuff above the water dry. I can't say that I've tried myself. I guess you should try and report back if it works