Real strong continuous lights or strobes.....

[tursiops]

I had a lot of dives with mailfunction strobes and/or cable.

LOL. You should take better care of your equipment!

 

[KeithG]

I feel bad for the fish in front of the lights.

What fish? They are all swimming away or hiding.

Most people are just considering the "can I get enough light to get a good picture?" aspect.

I claim you need to be more worried about being able to get good subject matter. Video lights scare away most critters underwater.

So that eliminates anything that you need to sneak up on. And most macro shots. The effect is even worse at night when light adverse creatures are out.

On our last dive trip I got a few good shots of things most people on the boat had never seen. Video lights would have scared all of the subjects and prevented any type of shot (think Scaily Tail Mantis, Pike Blenny, Sailfin Blenny....)

 

[barth]

LOL. You should take better care of your equipment!

My equipment is used in more challeging conditions than most divers do.

I almost take my camera with me at every dive.

My last dive was a night dive 2 days ago with doubles, bottom stage, deco stage and dpv with 1-3 meter visibility. I did use my dslr at that dive.

Also deeper dives are creating more problems for equipment.

 

[bvanant]

"Duration – you get hundreds of frames with strobes, versus a limited burn-time/shooting wind lights"

I do not agree with this. My 7dmkII can do 10 shots in raw in 1 second. My videolights have a burntime of 10.000 seconds.My battery will be empty or my card will be full before the battey of my videolight is empty.


What video light are you using?

 

[barth]

What video light are you using?

This chinese videolights:

Nieuwe LED Duiken Torch Onderwater Video 18650 Zaklamp Duiklamp licht lamp Voor Duiken met Batterij in Nieuwe LED Duiken Torch Onderwater Video 18650 Zaklamp Duiklamp licht lamp Voor Duiken met Batterij van LED Zaklampen op AliExpress.com | Alibaba Groep

It worked fine for a few dives at local shallow lakes. But after the first dive to 51 meter one button was flooded. There was glue used for o-ring mounting. I bought them new, seller did not respond. I did fix it by myself, but I think it will flood again. :-(

Now I ordered bigblue VL9000P.
Bigblue Dive Lights

I also got light for me videolights, but 900 lumen is not enough for wideangle with a lot of daylight.
Light For Me GoPro Video Lighting System

 

[bvanant]

I find it hard to believe that the light you show will run for 3 hours at full power at least according to their specs. They claim 20 amp running current and you have 4 x 4 AH batteries which is less than a single hour. The big blue is specced at 2.5 hours but at less than half the output of your chinese lights. In any case, I think that strobes are clearly more suitable for stills (lower ISO, Faster Shutter speed, lots more light) but you can of course ramp up your ISO, shoot slow moving critters and get some good enough pictures with still lights. In the studio, in many cases, continuous LED lighting has been replacing strobes over the last few years, but you can plug them into the wall.
Bill

 

[tursiops]

In the studio, in many cases, continuous LED lighting has been replacing strobes over the last few years, but you can plug them into the wall.

And, in the studio, critters running away from your strong, continuous lights is not (usually) an issue.

 

[bvanant]

You haven't seen me in the studio

 

[KeithG]

You haven't seen me in the studio

Ok - where's my jug of brain bleach?

 

[M DeM]

"Duration – you get hundreds of frames with strobes, versus a limited burn-time/shooting wind lights"

I do not agree with this. My 7dmkII can do 10 shots in raw in 1 second. My videolights have a burntime of 10.000 seconds.My battery will be empty or my card will be full before the battey of my videolight is empty.

"Mounting – strobes can be mounted on a diver’s back, tanks, etc… hands free & only firing when triggered"

You can do the same for a videolight. It is possible to have lightdivers. It is also possible to put a videolight at the bottom of a cave.

"Cost – bang for buck, strobes will give you more light and shooting time"

I do not agree. They will give you less shooting time. Strobe recharging will take a lot of time. Or at least my inon D2000, ikelite DS125 and DS160. The burntime of my videolight is 3 hours at the max output.


After ten years I decided to sell my ikelite strobes and buy new videolights. If strobes are working fine the will gave a better result, I agree. If you want 1 perfect image and you have perfect settings and composition and you make the image at the right moment.

For me it would be better to have a videolight which is working and no waiting time for recharge of strobes are more important to capture the right moment. I had a lot of dives with mailfunction strobes and/or cable. The cable for my ikelite strobes is 180 euro. A dive trip cost me a lot of time and money, for me it is not acceptable if my equipment is not working. I think videolights are more reliable then strobes.

What video lights are you using?