Canon WP-V1 Housing!

[gunsrunner]

Yes I am very happy with the camera and housing, for it's price and size. The clear case makes it very easy to check the o ring before and after closing to make sure there is a good seal.
P mode with the colour filter would work, but you do lose some light by using the filter, so it is best if you can video without it. Most video editing programs will have a white balance ajustment, you should check if corel has it.

 

[guamrider]

HI All,
Just came back from a trip to Truk Lagoon and a friend of mine took the housing to 172' on the San Francisco Maru. He was pretty nervous about the housing leaking before the dive but was all smiles after the dvie. Worked beautifully.

His rational: "Hell, I'm a doctor and can afford it. I'll just keep the sd card if it floods."

 

[Tom2020]

Thankyou for posting your correspondence with canon, It's pretty stupid that they chose 30cm to be the focal distance when 10cm would have been plenty. I have been using our camera in priority mode instead and doing colour adjustments later in editing which i have found works good.
I did have a problem with this the other day when using a wide angle lens, as we swam though a bit of weed some got attracted to the lens and the camera focused on the weed on the lens, as soon as i tried to video something with good contrast it refocused on what i wanted. So I can understand why they would think it could be a problem, but i think they got a bit carried away with their distance.

I hope we can get them to release a firmware upgrade to re-adjust the focal distance in underwater mode!!!

=======================

Let's get a lot of users to write to Canon! I hope they listen to their customers.

 

[jeja26]

Hi
This thread has some great comments and video footage. Anybody with any experience of how this camera performs in green / cold water with or without the green filter?

Thanks

 

[subcmdr]

Hi
This thread has some great comments and video footage. Anybody with any experience of how this camera performs in green / cold water with or without the green filter?

Thanks

Is this green enough for you?

Institute of Maritime History underwater survey of U-1105 on Vimeo

subcmdr

 

[jeja26]

looks very much like the Scandinavian waters too me - backscatter and all. I can see you did not use the green filter - how would the filter affect the footage do you think if it had been used?

 

[subcmdr]

I have the green water filter, and have used it, but now prefer to do my color correction in software. like any filter, the green water filter cuts down on the amount of light entering the camera, and in the very low light conditions under which I usually dive, that can be a problem. But it does a good job when there is enough light.

 

[ggeorgie2007]

"I used a hand held hobby drill chuck. It is about 1/2" dia with a knurled grip. You drill into the area behind the threads just before the face of the ring. The hole has a slight angle as you can't get completely perpendicular to the surface since the threaded area protrudes and interferes with the drill chuck but there is enough metal there to keep from compromising the sealing/mating surfaces. It is slow going even with a sharp bit. I may have used a hand crank drill on one side after starting the hole about half the way through. The small bits are flexible and you can bend the drill slightly to follow the hole you started. It would be difficult to drill from the outside without a good jig and precise measuring tools. I did this priming trick on an adapter ring for an Ikelite housing a few years ago where there was more room to work. It worked so well that it was a must do on the WP-V1. I don't see why it doesn't come that way from the factory."


Hello Aqua Spider and thank you for your reply. I'm sorry it took so long to get back to you. I went on a diving trip to the Philippines. I was going to implement your modification... when I discover the canon wp-v1 housing already has "holes" to allow water in between the lens port and wide angle lens. I discovered this by playing with it in the tub. I screwed my WAL on underwater but then when I pulled it out of the tub, I could see the water drain out on my video screen. I couldn't figure out how it was leaking out, until I looked very very closely at the lens port. If you look very closely you will see that the wp-v1 has a slit at the top and bottom of the lens port that allows water in and out. The slits are located on the lens port and are on the top and bottom towards the very back where the lens port meets the housing. Take a look you will see that they are there. But thank you for your reply and video. So to anyone considering this modification for your wet-mount WAL it is unnecessary. The slits are very thin, so they can easily be missed. You need to look for them.

 

[ggeorgie2007]

Hello. I recently purchased a canon HF20 and the WP-V1 housing. This is my very first underwater video system. I am using an Epoque WAL along with an ultra light arm system. I had an ikelite Pro-V8 video light, but it flooded my very first dive. I don't think it was bright enough anyways. That thing is a real piece of junk and has turned me off Ikelite. Next trip I am going to invest in a real good light. So over Christmas I took a trip to the Philippines. I really loved how this camera operated. I think it worked great. I hear people complaining about its macro abilities.. but I got a great close up shot of a nudibranch with my wide angle lens on and it turned out just fine. Now I didn't have any lights and the visibility in the Philippines is poor this time of the year. I guess it doesn't clear up until April. Anyways, considering the conditions, I thought I got some good vacation videos. By using Pinnacle Studio 14 video editing software I was able to fix the color a bit. I am going to upload 2 videos of a turtle I shot. The first will be the unedited version and the second is the edited version. In my opinion this is a great camera and housing for the money. Its not pro level, but great for vacation videos. When I get the rest of the videos sorted I'll try to upload some more. Like I said they are not the greatest, and the conditions were bad... low visibility and low light. But I am still happy with the camera and would recommend it to anyone. I would also definitely get an ultralight arm system as the extra handle makes it so much easier to hold. I guess, in order to watch these videos in HD you need to click the watch in HD button on the bottom of the youtube video viewing window.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb0vT64PLJs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mH-QzBVFfyE

 

[jeja26]

To Sub Cmdr
Thanks for info. I will be staying above the 40 m mark for the time being so the filter should do all right. As far as I can see in theory about 20 m should do ok with the filter, otherwise compensation by light and no filter if deeper or macro. Is this correct?

To ggeorgie2007
Nice video showing the difference. Good to see. I will be using iMovie when time comes .
Anybody with experience of iMovie or other possibilities on Mac?

Nothing too fancy :blinking: just getting started with UW video. Done stills topside.