OP
Zeeman
Contributor
Good choice with the Ike housing. I would have preferred it, but did not have time to order one as it would not have turned up in time for my PI trip, so the canon housing had to do the job.
Setting - most shots were taking at 1/125 and about f5.0, ISO 100 - I always used full manual, and I used my gray shorts for white balance (they are pretty close to 18% gray and it saved me having to take some sort of white balance card with me. Seeing as the water was 28 degrees C minimum, I didn't need a wetsuit - but my wetsuit has a grey section under the arm I use for white balance (I actually choose my dive gear now to make sure it has something for this).
The shutter speed usually stayed at 1/125, and I adjusted the aperture up or down depending on the image I saw on the screen after a shot. I usually took about 10 - 20 test shots against white and red and green corals to get a"general setting" for the strobe - usually, at full manual, usually at one of the bottom 3 power settings for macro. I was initially a little confused with the Inon dials, as I had not read the manual yet before using it (strobe purchase to first dive was very tight on time). for my first dive I had the strobe running in the middle settings, and was over exposing a lot of shots, even with f8.0.
I love this strobe though, I have to say, it has a fair amount of punch for wide angle (one click from Manual to Full and fold the arm out) and was brilliant for macro. It's also very compact and light, and easy to pack.
My only qualm is I wish they had used a diffused LED instead of an incandescent bulb for the spotting light, as it can make it hard to focus at times - BUT having said that, I did not attach the red filter that is supplied to help with shy night time creatures and also to address my qualm. Overall, I'm very happy, and could only be happier if I had had the extra $200 (ish) for the Z240.
I actually really like this setup, in terms of bang for buck, I am finding the quality of my pics has skyrocketed for a fairly small outlay (it's all relative), and the A640 and Inon will do me very well (assuming I can get my flooded A640 fixed/replaced for a refurbished one by Canon) prior to taking down a DSLR.
The only problem I had was that it loved to focus on the background rather than what I was trying to shoot - as clgsamson said, disabling AIAF and setting spot focus will probably help with this.
I think you will really like the setup - it is capable of great shots, and a friend of mine showed me a teaser of what photoshop can do, and it really transforms very good photos into amazing looking images!
The only other suggestion I have is to get the A640 softmod ( http://scratchpad.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK/FAQ#Q._How_do_I_use_scripts.3F ) it will allow you to do a few extra things - save photos in RAW, RGB histogram and a few other neat little tricks that the original Canon firmware does not offer. This "softmod" software sits on the memory card, is quite small, and does not affect your warranty as it leaves the camera itself untouched.
Let me know if there is anything in particular you want me to tell you about that I may have missed.
Z..
