Not a huge fan of my GoPro

[tursiops]

1. I don't know how to say this politely. The GoPro takes crap still pictures. But you already said that. Go look at some TG-6 albums on Flickr, or some reviews in the magazines, or spend some time in UW Photography or X-Ray magazine.
2. Better, yes, in some situations, but will you even notice? What are you going to do with your images? If you are going to make wall-size blowups, go for the DSLR. If you are going to put things on the web, you'll not see a difference. If you want to do fish eye stuff with a $200 lens, go for the DSLR.
3. Huge. And you'll want two strobes, too.

But if you are going to go DSLR and want top-of-the line capability and image quality, I would not consider using your ancient land camera, and I'd get ready to spend $10k or more.But you said you are a diver who just wants to take some pictures. Well, then, that's your answer.

 

[Barmaglot]

I guess my question is how much better is a TG-6 than my GoPro for still images? And how much better is EOS RP than the TG6? And how bulky is a EOS RP with a housing and a strobe?

In the order of questions asked - night and day, especially for macro, possibly somewhat better for macro and much better for wide-angle provided a very significant investment (think $10-15k) in additional gear plus a lot of practice and dedication to photography, somewhat bulky if set up for macro with a flat port, short arms and small strobes (think Backscatter MF-1) and very bulky if set up with a 230mm dome, twin 8-12" arms on each side and powerful strobes (Seacam, Retra, SUPE, etc) for wide-angle. I'm on my phone now; I'll post a picture of the camera room on my last liveaboard a bit later - you'll see the difference between big ILC setups and macro compacts.

 

[bvbellomo]

I have no doubt a $15k setup is night and day better than a $1000 EOS RP + $1500 housing and $1500 in lenses, strobes and accessories. But that isn't what I am asking. I picked the EOS RP because I am familiar with Canon, it is full frame and I did a 30 second google search. If any other $2500 DSLR camera+housing is better, use that for comparison. But I am not going anywhere near $15k.

There are tons of great DSLR underwater pictures, but only a few relatively low resolution TG6 and GoPro shots to compare. The TG6 shots by professional photographers look night and day better than my GoPro shots, but I have no idea how much of that is the user.

As for what I do with them, I do print the nicer ones 17 inches and hang them on the wall, and do like having them as 4k backgrounds or just images to look at. But ultimately they are memories of a trip, and I'd rather take a lot of trips for $15k than buy a camera.

 

[Barmaglot]

I have no doubt a $15k setup is night and day better than a $1000 EOS RP + $1500 housing and $1500 in lenses, strobes and accessories. But that isn't what I am asking. I picked the EOS RP because I am familiar with Canon, it is full frame and I did a 30 second google search. If any other $2500 DSLR camera+housing is better, use that for comparison. But I am not going anywhere near $15k.

That's the thing - you spend a lot more on the stuff around the camera than on the camera itself. Four years ago, I bought a used Sony A6300 with kit lens for $800, and a SeaFrogs housing for $250. I'm over $10k into the gear by now, and I don't own anything made by Nauticam. Wide-angle lens, macro lens, close-up wet lens, fisheye lens, big dome, small fisheye dome, macro port, tray, arms, clamps, focus light, strobes, fiber optics, LED trigger, whole mess of batteries and chargers, filters... the list goes on and on. It didn't help that at first I tried to cheap out and got LED lights instead of strobes because strobes were too expensive, then I got cheap strobes, and only then did I spring for the nice strobes (Retra Pro pair), and then of course I had to get diffusers, then reflectors, a snoot, extended battery compartments... I'm sure I've spent close to $4k just on lighting by this point, and now I'm looking at getting better lights for blackwater diving.

 

[Barmaglot]

Here is the camera room on the liveaboard that I left yesterday. On the very left is my own rig, with a SeaFrogs housing and Retra strobes, after it is a Nauticam Nikon Z7 rig looking comical with a SeaFrogs strobe that I lent its owner because one of his YS-D2s died halfway through the trip, then there is a SeaFrogs A7R III rig set up for video with constant lights, and in the back left corner, a Nauticam RX100 V with Z-330 strobes (one of which had also become an engineering casualty during the trip). The big mess of float arms on the right table is a Subal Nikon D500 rig, and in the rinse tank is another D500 in a Nauticam housing that you can only see a couple arms of. However, in the foreground on the right table you can see a couple of Olympus TG series cameras configured for wide-angle with wet lenses. The one in front is on a SeaLife tray with their flex arm carrying a SeaLife Sea Dragon strobe; the other one is set up with what looks like a single Inon Z-330. You can see how small and handy these are in comparison to the big ILC rigs. Just yesterday morning, there was a bamboo shark, sitting on the bottom deep inside a crevice formed by a rocky overhang - the crevice was maybe 1.5 feet high at the entrance, and the shark was several feet in. I actually flipped my camera upside down to get it closer to the ceiling without the strobe arms bumping into it, but I still couldn't get close enough to the shark for a decent shot. A GoPro on a stick would've gone in right next to it, and a small camera rig would also get reasonably close, but my setup was just too bulky.

 

[Chris Ross]

I have no doubt a $15k setup is night and day better than a $1000 EOS RP + $1500 housing and $1500 in lenses, strobes and accessories. But that isn't what I am asking. I picked the EOS RP because I am familiar with Canon, it is full frame and I did a 30 second google search. If any other $2500 DSLR camera+housing is better, use that for comparison. But I am not going anywhere near $15k.

There are tons of great DSLR underwater pictures, but only a few relatively low resolution TG6 and GoPro shots to compare. The TG6 shots by professional photographers look night and day better than my GoPro shots, but I have no idea how much of that is the user.

As for what I do with them, I do print the nicer ones 17 inches and hang them on the wall, and do like having them as 4k backgrounds or just images to look at. But ultimately they are memories of a trip, and I'd rather take a lot of trips for $15k than buy a camera.

I assume you are talking about the ikelite housing for the RP, yes you can get a full frame underwater fairly cheaply but there are compromises along the way. Dome port size scales with sensor size for wide angle underwater and the you also need to stop down more as sensor size goes up to get sharp corners with rectilinear lenses. Ikelite will get these lenses UW for you but there are compromises. You are also somewhat limited to do either a macro dive or a wide angle dive with sort of equipment and need two full size strobes to make it all worthwhile. Even with Ikelite my guess is your budget for "accessories" will be a bit more than $1500. If you are looking at full frame I'd suggest you need two strobes - that's $1200-$1500 straight away and you need arms and clamps for them and sync cables. The smaller $3-400 strobes don't have the needed power for full frame underwater, but are perfectly adequate for compact and 1"sensor cameras.

There's lots of steps between the TG-6 and a full frame camera each getting progressively more expensive and bulky, next step up would be 1"sensor like G7X, then m43 camera, APS-C a and finally full frame. Water is a great leveller and the advantages of full frame are not as much as you would think based upon land photography. I would also encourage you to go to an UW specialist retailer to see how big these rigs are and think about how you travel with them on dive trips and push them through the water. You could get a very nice setup based around a Canon G7X III, Fantasea housing and a single INON S_2000 strobe which will give you a jack of all trades setup with the option to add macro closeup wet lenses or wide angle lenses later on and also another strobe, later and it would set you back around $2K . Photos will be night and day compared to a go-pro and as long as you are not cropping a 16x20 print is perfectly achievable. With strobes you'll be at base ISO or thereabouts and won't take advantage of full frame low light capability for most applications.

 

[bvbellomo]

The biggest advantage of a full frame DSLR is I only buy 1 camera and pack 1 camera. Although if it gets lost, damaged or stolen, I might be thankful I have a 2nd (especially I brought 2 < $1000 cameras instead of 1 > $10,000 camera).

If I go with a TG-6, do I need anything besides the housing?

 

[bvbellomo]

I assume you are talking about the ikelite housing for the RP, yes you can get a full frame underwater fairly cheaply but there are compromises along the way. Dome port size scales with sensor size for wide angle underwater and the you also need to stop down more as sensor size goes up to get sharp corners with rectilinear lenses. Ikelite will get these lenses UW for you but there are compromises. You are also somewhat limited to do either a macro dive or a wide angle dive with sort of equipment and need two full size strobes to make it all worthwhile. Even with Ikelite my guess is your budget for "accessories" will be a bit more than $1500. If you are looking at full frame I'd suggest you need two strobes - that's $1200-$1500 straight away and you need arms and clamps for them and sync cables. The smaller $3-400 strobes don't have the needed power for full frame underwater, but are perfectly adequate for compact and 1"sensor cameras.

There's lots of steps between the TG-6 and a full frame camera each getting progressively more expensive and bulky, next step up would be 1"sensor like G7X, then m43 camera, APS-C a and finally full frame. Water is a great leveller and the advantages of full frame are not as much as you would think based upon land photography. I would also encourage you to go to an UW specialist retailer to see how big these rigs are and think about how you travel with them on dive trips and push them through the water. You could get a very nice setup based around a Canon G7X III, Fantasea housing and a single INON S_2000 strobe which will give you a jack of all trades setup with the option to add macro closeup wet lenses or wide angle lenses later on and also another strobe, later and it would set you back around $2K . Photos will be night and day compared to a go-pro and as long as you are not cropping a 16x20 print is perfectly achievable. With strobes you'll be at base ISO or thereabouts and won't take advantage of full frame low light capability for most applications.

Why would I need/want more/bigger strobes with a full frame camera? I understand reasonably balancing spending (e.g. not buying a $10,000 worth of lighting and a TG6). But wouldn't a full frame with a basic single strobe still be as good or better than an APS-C with the same light? That's assuming you are using the same field of view (which I do understand is a probably a different, more expensive lens for the full frame).

 

[Chris Ross]

No because you need to stop down more for your wide angle shots with full frame. If you are macro only you are a lot closer with the strobe and can get away with less light output. Flash exposure is set solely by aperture at any given ISO, but ISO increases are limited by your maximum sync speed. For wide angle you would be f2.8 on the TG-6, f5.6 for a 1"sensor (G7X) and f11-16 for full frame. So you need 4x+ the light output for full frame compared to 1"sensor camera.

Also if you are shooting wide, you don't aim the flash at you subject like you do on land, you skim light on the edges to try to minimise backscatter and a single strobe would struggle to illuminate a really wide scene. I couldn't imagine hauling a full frame rig half way round the world and sticking a single underpowered strobe on it unless it was dedicated macro shooting. The compacts even with most wet wide lenses don't have the angular coverage that interchangable lens cameras do, so lighting is easier and a single strobe is more feasible - though two strobes is still better.

If you are worried about packing you'll have a housing regardless, the G7X housing would be much smaller and won't have separate ports (macro port and dome port) you need to pack, the camera it self will fit in your coat pocket. So extremely minor difference in size to a TG-6 but more capable for wide angle work and significantly better images. I shoot a m43 olympus system with separate domes/macro ports and two strobes it is quite the task to get it all ready and get it into the water and setup the shots UW and swim around with it - based on your description of your diving preferences I wouldn't think you'd want that level of effort for your photos. I really suggest you go to an UW store and see what's involved in housing your a full frame camera and check the size of what you'll be transporting around the place.

 

[bvbellomo]

I saw the suggestion to go to an UW store. I am not going to buy a plane ticket just for that, and I don't think anyone is going to open one within driving distance. But I will try to stop in if I see one on vacation.

I have been diving with serious photographers before. I went alone on a day trip dive and got partnered with a buddy had something that looked more like a small submarine than a large camera - it may have had a regular DSLR under everything, but I don't know. I didn't pay too much attention knowing it probably cost more than I will earn in my lifetime and some of the dives I already did as a beginner were too advanced to carry something like that.

A G7X sounds like a big step up from the TG6. If I go with either a TG6 or G7X, I absolutely need a camera and a housing, and a probably need strobe, but is there anything else I absolutely need?

Do the TG6 or G7X have separate lenses? From reviews, it seems the answer is an obvious "no". But then I read a few threads on them being configured with macro lenses, or something like that.