New RED FILTER for GoPro Dive Housing by SRP - Official Thread

[Bratface]

That's quite a set up Marty.

 

[AquaProHd]

Love the bottom left filter of your rig! LOL

 

[Marty Cerven]

Love the bottom left filter of your rig! LOL

The Blurfix still does a pretty good job I think, and for those that need a wet filter for it this will be a good choice.

That's quite a set up Marty.

Quite a handful for sure, not all mine though luckily my friend Nigel from Sports camera hire in Australia helped me out with some extra stuff for this trip. He is based between the airport and South West Rocks where we dived so it was pretty handy to stop by his place on the way and check out all the cool gear he had there.

I will post the first couple of videos here shortly, just uploading the second one atm. One pretty deep one (mostly 25-30m then gradually getting shallower) with plenty of sharks and the other a bit shallower (10-30m but mostly around the 15-20m depths) going through the cave.

Conditions weren't perfect on the trip unfortunately with the first day being pretty rough and messy, the second day we couldn't dive the cave due to big swells at the entrance but it was pretty calm on the other side where we saw plenty of sharks. It was great all days before I got there and the next day was great as we went for a surf at the gold coast. Still even a bad dive here is better then all other dives Ive done but Id have loved to see how the filters would have done in much cleaner waters as the vis was 10-15m this time and last time I was there it was 30m+ which makes a pretty big difference.

But the filters still did a much better job over no filter if you have enough natural light as did the HD2 compared to the HD1 last time around, at 25m+ in lower light a clear lens may be a better option but that's the beauty of a wet filter if using the LCD bacpac also. You should be able to see if you have enough light or not and then take the filter off if needed. In very good light and close to your subject 30m is doable and was just doable in my tests but best results were above 25m.

 

[Fab Plongeur]

Hmmm.... that's not a tray... but a... tree !

 

[Marty Cerven]

Hmmm.... that's not a tray... but a... tree !

The guys running the dive shop did suggest bringing some decorations for it

Here are the first couple of videos, this is all with the GoPro dive with clear lens inside the cave and the SRP clipon for the GPD housing from the cave entrance and exits. Entering the cave and exiting the last 5-10m I found the footage was better when combining lights and filters so I used those shots rather then just the clear lens, the lights were on until the second last cut with the turtle and after that I had them off. First turtle shots are with lights and filter and the last one was filter only and that would be around 15m depth here at the shallow exit.

Then it will drop down to about 25m but maybe we didnt get that deep as the current was pretty strong and ended up going over the wall early and into the turtle cave where the 2 sharks were. I assume this is around 20m but I will have actual dive depth data synced for when I post the filter comparison that will give true depths throughout. This video has no colour correction and its all just as was recorded with the camera even the shots where both lights and filters were used turned out ok without needing correcting.



This next video was overall the deepest as we spent most of the video at 25m and deeper, max depth I think was 32m at our descent point. Then it would have been close to 30m all the way to the sharks with it getting just below 25m at the top of the hill there. This is the part extending ahead of the shallow exit that we couldn't get to on the other dive due to the currents. Then we would have dropped down a little off the hill and then gradually climbed back up for the rest of the dive ending at around 10m at the line back to the boat. This video has some colour correction throughout the deep parts as the GoPro's did struggle a bit at these depths and lights weren't used at all this dive. This video was mostly all GoPro dive and clipon but a couple of shots are from the Blurfix and clipon as all cameras and filters did have some issues with white balance early on here at 30m in this level of light.

 

[doonkin]

I cannot wait.

Q: can it be 'slipped' or clipped on in the water? I.E. could you leave it off till you got to 15 ft, then grab it from your BC pocket and clip it on, giving you the best of both worlds-colorwise.
Im diving in the tropics where I wont be wearing gloves.

-looks fantastic - I hope the late-October release holds.

 

[Fab Plongeur]

Of course you can mount or unmount in the water, it's made for and you can do it with or without gloves. It's firmly mounted, no chance to loose it, but you can even secure.
My filter was tested in French Polynesia, and is perfect here from 8 to 30 meters, w/sunny day.

To keep it in your pocket, SRP will certainly include a perfect pouch to keep in you BC or attach where you want.

That said, I'm sorry but.... yes you'll have to wait a bit more

 

[Marty Cerven]

I cannot wait.

Q: can it be 'slipped' or clipped on in the water? I.E. could you leave it off till you got to 15 ft, then grab it from your BC pocket and clip it on, giving you the best of both worlds-colorwise.
Im diving in the tropics where I wont be wearing gloves.

-looks fantastic - I hope the late-October release holds.

They are very easy to take on and off, I even managed to do this easily one handed whilst holding the tray with 5 cameras on it. The currents were pretty brutal at times on our dives and though they banged my lights around a bit the filters had no issues and they are so secure I cant see them ever coming off unless you want them to.

As with all wet filters though they do have a tendancy to gather bubbles in between the lens and filter so its best to take them off and on again just after you start your descent. It only takes a few seconds and I did it just between equalizing on the descent pretty easily, the strong currents also helped clear bubbles on their own and I didnt have many bubble issues with the dive housing filter, the blurfix one has less room for the air to escape so this needed to be cleared and I forgot until mid dive on one of the dives with it. Not sure if mine is the final design and there may be a few more vent holes added to the final version of it as there were between the first and second version of the gopro dive version.

If your going to headmount I think you would still get best results with a Blurfix and screw in filter as bubbles cant get trapped under the filter, it wouldn't be that easy to attach the filter above your head and bubbles from your regulator could get in between the filter and lens. This would be the same with all wet filters so best to use them where you have easy access to them and no bubbles may get trapped in them. Its likely bubbles from another diver could end up coming between lenses too but I didnt have this issue as I never swam through too many bubbles.

I still have 2 more dives to edit up and will do a little highlights package wit a bit more editing along with some comparison videos. I will show some short cuts comparing at depths but as some may think I am cherry picking the best URPpr shots I may even put up a couple of full dives side by side so other can see how they all work and how the gopro deals with wb.

Im surprised how well the filter do with lights even in the cave there was little difference between the clear lens and all the filter options, theres times where there is a little more noise with the filters but other times you would struggle to tell them apart. Outside when using lights combined with filters there isnt a great deal between the brands but the URPro does do better once you get much beyond about 10m relative to the magic filter. They do level out a bit if too deep and light isnt great, but in light like Fabrice has had in tahiti at 30m the urpro is still holding up well, mine started struggling at around 25m due to the low light and vis as can be seen in the shark video above but the others werent any better there.

 

[inka]

Marty,
You have the SRP wet red filter fitted on the blurfix filter, right ?
How do you put it on ? with the UV filter screwed and anti fog balls or without ?
Thanks

 

[AquaProHd]

@inka - Marty is using the new SRP slip on Red filter for the BlurFix. The new SRP Red filter, slips over with UV filter that is screwed on to the BlurFix adapter. The new Color Correction filter system allows the the diver the option to add or remove the filter underwater at any depth. The UV filter is used to create the airspace in front of the OEM lens allowing the GoPro to focus. Hope this helps?