Anything you want to know about professional U/W shooting

[Imagination]

Hi,

I'm a professional underwater cinematographer working in Santa Barbara. I film and edit 90% of everything for DiveIntoYourImagination.com, a professional underwater production company. If anyone has questions regarding underwater film making or editing, send em' my way. I will do my best to answer all question in a timely manner. Thanks!

 

[phmadeira]

hello, i am a french underwater cameraman
i start to write a book about underwater video
selecting camera, housing, maintening,shooting etc
if you have some tip to give me you welcome
specialy with light and white balance or other think that you found usefull tips for begener and pro


my email philippe.madeira free.fr

thank you

 

[ronscuba]

All of my diving has been in clear tropical waters. For setting manual white balance I have been using the white sand or my silver fullfoot fins as a reference and have gotten satisfactory results.

I have a trip scheduled for the Galapagos and wonder if the non white sand/gravel/rocks could be used as a MWB reference. I know the preference is a DSC color chart, but I don't want to have to carry anything extra and I won't be using my silver fins.

 

[TSwain]

Hello, I am new the underwater video scene. I am just getting things together and have a few questions.

I need to know what kind/color of filter to use while taking under water video. I am just trying to get everything I need to start videoing underwater in the near future. Also I am looking for a wide angle lens and dont know any thing about them. Is a .38 wider view than a .50 and what does a fish eye lense do compared to a regular wide angle lens?

Thanks for your help!
Todd

 

[vet_ca]

I'm looking for an inexpensive 37mm uw color correction filter. URPRO wants $70.00 US + shipping to Canada. $70.00 for a small filter like this is robery. I realize that they have patented this "color" (I didn't even know you could patent a color) but there must be something else out there that is close to this. I now dive only in Cozumel and I shoot HDV with a Canon HV10. Any help would be greatly appreciated. I have a URPRO filter which is slightly to small for the port on my Ikelite housing. Can this be cut and machined into a 37mm blank filter ring? Or, is there another workaround?

 

[C8X]

-what do you personally do for white balance? any neat tricks?
-what do you think are the top 3 things that a beginner does wrong that can ruin otherwise great shots?

From my short experience - AWB, camera shake, too much panning. I watched the crew videographer on my last liveaboard, and he took a lot of nice calm static shots, but to get variety he jumped around a lot very quickly between shots to get new angles.

 

[Empty V]

Lee Filters: Gel Sheet 779 Bastard Pink is a good cheap way to get out of buying one of those overpriced filters. I'm an amateur when it comes to U/W video but shoot professionally topside, I don't settle when it comes to quality. For my setup I use this Gel and I can't express how well it works. I bought a UR pro filter and went into Filmtools and matched the color. An employee and I searched through hundreds of gels and even tried combinations, this one single gel matched and neither one of us could tell a difference between the two.

I MWB off of a laminated white piece of paper. If you can use something white it's always better because that's what you're telling your camera white is supposed to be. With my setup it tucks right under some carrying straps I've got around my housing, it's easy to take out and put back and I don't notice it's there while shooting.

Billy

 

[mikechp]

Hi, I'm a producer in Singapore, we are looking to shoot a TV series on diving and we are looking to find out what are the best camera out there for shooting HD underwater footage. Thanks

 

[H2O Photo Pros]

Mike, you will definitely want to go with the Sony EX1 in a Gates housing, or if budget allows, the Red One in the Gates housing.

 

[sharksdelight]

Of course, you will need an experienced diver and someone who knows how to use the cam and housing. Would be happy to help.-Steve