Accessories For Olympic Tg-4

[Rachael_243]

Hi all,
I'm new to diving and as I have a real passion for photography I want to invest in a camera I can take on dives with me. Most of the divers I've been out with have the gopro hero 4 but I'm mostly interested in macro shots rather than filming so I'm keen on the tg-4. I'm a bit confused as to what accessories I require though. I'm looking at the pt-56 underwater housing and I'm guessing I need a red filter to stop pictures looking green? What sort of mount or strap would you guys recommend? Also do I need some sort of lighting?
Thanks in advance!
Rachael

 

[Skeptic14]

I'm currently using a tg-4, ys-03 strobe and pt-056 case. I suppose you could look for filters designed for certain depths, but the tg-4 has an uw mode which I believe adjusts the white/color balances. Also, an external flash (strobe(s)) will become more and more important the deeper you dive to try and bring some color back into the photos.

The pt-056 case is probably a must to go with the tg-4 to go deeper than 50 ft, and I have a lanyard type strap I put over my wrist that is attached to the pt-056 case.

 

[JackConnick]

I think Skeptic 14 pretty well summed it up.

The TG-4 has some good built-in color correction modes. I would go for the PT-056 housing and an external flash like the Sea & Sea YS-03 package for sure.

 

[hdtran]

I just bought Optical Ocean Sales' package of TG4/PT-056 housing/S&S YS03 strobe. Jack was very helpful offline with questions between the TG4 and the Canon package (I am upgrading from a 5-6 yr old Panasonic P&S for UW). My limited experience with UW is that an external strobe is *VERY* useful, and paradoxically, shooting with no strobe but setting white balance manually is also useful. I don't think that I would suggest a red filter (e.g. blue-blocking) to enhance reds at depth--you lose too much light. A white balance card or a small slate for setting white balance at depth is good. The TG4 can shoot RAW (ORF format). I played a bit with correcting colors using RAW white balance correction on Olympus's software. This is pretty easy if you have a white slate in your field of view. Above water testing is pretty easy if you have poor indoor lighting (yellow bulbs, etc.) Put a bunch of colorful items on a table, and one white item. Take an indoor picture (no strobe). Then, using the Olympus software, do the gray point white balance correction using the white object. This is really good at bringing the other colors to true life.

Setting up the YS03 as a slave flash is not as obvious as it appears. While Optical Ocean Sale's "setting up the TG4" article is a good summary, it took me a while to get to the correct setting; I'll post a separate thread on that.

Some of the accessories which I will buy from Amazon:

• Extra battery & charger
• Floating strap, just in case I go snorkeling or shallow-diving without the PT-056 housing
• One extra memory card (I have an 8GB class 10 SD card that I am recycling; I am buying a 32 GB card; I intend to shoot raw+jpg)
• A camera case, some microfiber cloths

What do you all suggest as additional accessories? Do I want to use the Olympus coupon (good for the next 20 days, I think) for Olympus-specific items? Are any of them useful?

 

[Skeptic14]

I'm using the exact same setup as you also purchased from Optical Ocean Sales.

Regarding setting up the flash, unless I misunderstand you just make sure to have the camera set to fill-in?

I did some research and the Powerex IMEDION batteries seemed to be highly recommended for the strobe so I purchased those and the smart charger and the only other accessory I have is the UWL-04 wide angle lens that mounts directly to the PT-056 case. If you are planning to do more than macro I highly recommend this lens... it's made an incredible difference in my photos (that and I suppose my skill is increasing a little too). Eventually, I'm probably going to add another strobe, but right now this setup is more capable than I.

Link to a few photos from my current trip to Maui with this setup Tg-4 At Mala Pier Maui