I heard you guys were kinda scary, but...

[Scuba-Jay]

Alright well this is my first post on the photo / video forum cause i heard you guys were kinda scary and neurotic, but.......(=

Ive never been involved in underwater videography, but id love to start. Im looking for a reasonably priced video camera / housing which will allow me to take decent videos. Nothing amazing, but enough so the picture is clear and it doesn't look way too amateurish (although I'm sure that has a lot to do with me and not the camera) If you guys could provide me with any suggestions id appreciate it!!!

Jay

 

[Shasta_man]

Well, you've already eliminated all the choices with that unreasonable requirement for a reasonably priced rig! You're in scuba, you know the drill.

But seriously, here's a summary:

Any camera will take video. It's the quality where you start adding money.

Your problem comes with color. The color of the water will affect your video. The camera needs to be adjusted to capture the color accurately. You can either just use auto settings in the camera to get fair to poor results, you can use lights or you can adjust the white balance. Adjusting the white balance requires a camera which can do so, and, here's where the big money can come, a housing to access that control at depth.

Essentially all cameras without WB will be in similar quality, though the low end will also have some issues with the range of exposure captured so it might over expose some areas to capture other areas correctly.

I strongly suggest spending a few bucks to rent a housing and your needs and ease of use will come clear.

Don't forget you need a decent computer to edit it together and produce your DVD.

 

[Mafiaman]

asking what name camera to get can invoke A Chevy Ford type argument.
And like cars the way you go down the road more depends on the ability of the driver.

What I'm getting at is most cameras of equal value will yield the same type video quality. But getting better videos is more the videographer.

 

[paulpost]

All comes down at how much do you can afford to spend on a decent rig.
You can start with e-bay where you can buy a used housing that may come with the specific camcorder that was built for. Next you can look in the manufacturer's list posted on this web site and choose a housing that fits your wallet and buy a new camcorder for that specific housing. Here you have to choose between mechanical controls housing and electronic control housings. The most affordable housings are Ikelite brand that come with mechanical controls only thus limiting to the camcorder model that was designed for. The electronic controls housings can accommodate more camcorders. To be more specific if you choose to go with Sony brand camcorders and go for a Light&Motion basic housing, according to Dr. Bill a veteran of this website, you can move from older camcorder models to new ones without much trouble. I can tell this from my own experience, I have a Sony MPK-TRV1 housing (discontinued 7 years ago) and I've used 3 camcorders in time , 2 digital8 camcorders , 1miniDV and now I vahe a HC1 they all fit well with minimal adaptations.
If you want to have WB control sugested by shasta man, you'll have to spend big on housing and camcorder. A must, regardless of what you'll go for are this: buy a wide angle lens that attaches to the camcorder if the housing doesn't come with one and make sure the housing big enough to accommodate it and a UR PRO blue water filter .
This will improve allot your videos.
Check out B&h website, they have some camcorder/housing combos.
Good luck
Paul

 

[Scuba-Jay]

Thanks for the input. What should i expect to pay for a decent setup (taking into consideration the above suggestions?)

Cheers

Jay

 

[Shasta_man]

I reiterate my comment about using one first before buying regardless of the cost.

When you try to use it and look at your resulting footage, you'll know more of what you need and will settle for based on cost. I suggest you won't find housing and camera for less than $500. $500 is a lot to me, so I would spend $100 to rent something. Then you'll know if you're satisfied with the quality or whether you MUST spend $3K to get all the bells and whistles to achieve your minimum quality.

See, we all say we want just a decent rig and we'll be happy. No, no. Like diving and computers, it's self enabling hobby where you want to increase quality a little more or ease of use or ...

I'll give you one tip on using video: when shooting something, count to ten while staying on it. You can always cut out footage but you can't create it. Otherwise, there's a lot of "almost focus the viewer eyes" before the camera turns elsewhere.

 

[Fish&beer]

I concure with Shasta man. Start out cheap to gain experience with video techniques. Learning from your mistakes is a sure way to gain that experience. Shoot, shoot, & shoot lots of tape so your learning curve goes up. Tape is cheap. Once you get better then that would be the time to up grade. Also look into some of the homebuilt tube housings to start out with if you are so inclined. Once again shoot a lot of tape.



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