sony hc-3 and light & motion housing

[limeyx]

My wife recently bought the HC-3 with the L&M housing. I have been using a TRV-950 in a USVH housing for the past 4 years. It's great watching our last 2 dive trips in HD off the tape, but we've noticed that the 3 chip TRV-950 produces better color rendition when comparing each video shot on the same dives/conditions. Also under poor conditions, i.e. particulates, low light, the HC-3 loses autofocus more often than the TRV-950. I don't know what your professional end use will be, but there is little consumer market for HD DVD at the moment. If your goal is professional UW video, IMHO get the best camera you can. Topside the HC-3 produces nice video, but has limited external mic input if you need high quality sound.

One way to "fix" the autofocus issue is, assuming you have access to zoom and "momentary autofocus"

as far as I understand it, zoom all the way in. Momentary AF on a subject 3-5 feet away. Zoom all the way back out. Leave camera on manual focus.

Now you have decent focus over the whole range of zoom with no autofocus "seeking" -- seems to work OK for me

 

[JeffG]

One way to "fix" the autofocus issue is, assuming you have access to zoom and "momentary autofocus"

as far as I understand it, zoom all the way in. Momentary AF on a subject 3-5 feet away. Zoom all the way back out. Leave camera on manual focus.

Now you have decent focus over the whole range of zoom with no autofocus "seeking" -- seems to work OK for me

Thats what I do and I haven't had a problem yet.

I've seen video where the autofocus would focus/unfocus on stuff in the water. Almost made me sea sick watching it.

 

[limeyx]

Thats what I do and I haven't had a problem yet.

I've seen video where the autofocus would focus/unfocus on stuff in the water. Almost made me sea sick watching it.

Yeah, I have a bunch of footage of some beautiful 300 pound Giant black sebass that got ruined with autofocus

 

[ScubaBob92651]

You are right. The idea is that you must first tell the camera which color is white, and then it figures out all the other colors. Distance from the lens will effect white balance underwater, as the volume of water between your subject and the lens will change the lighting conditions. I have had the best results when I have my buddy hold a white slate about 5 or 6 feet from the lens, zoom in, iris, and WB. Yes, it takes about 60 seconds this way, but it makes a big difference. And if you are using lights then you've got to white balance, otherwise your color will be all over the place. Turn on your lights, have your buddy position the slate so the lights are shining on it, zoom in, iris, WB.

Right. The way I understand it is when you tell your camera to manually white balance it will determine white based on what it can see at that moment. If you are holding a white slate in front of it, it makes it really easy for the camera to make that determination. From that point forward (until you set WB again manually, or change to another WB setting) the camera remembers what white is (which it is important to remember that that setting is specific to the exact environment when it was set. Any change in ambient or supplied light, depth, etc. would make the setting less accurate.) If you do not put a white source in front of the camera, it is then forced to determine what white is based on anything else the lens can see. This is the approach I'm using. Depending on your approach to doing this (and your options for framing during this process) you should be able to provide a pretty close representation to pure white to the camera. This approach can also be obtained for those who aren't able to manually set WB through the camera/housing. By leaving the camera in auto white balance mode and turning the camera off and then on again, the camera is forced to re-determine white balance each time as it starts up.