Thinking of getting an Inon S2000 w/ shoe attachment to Panasonic DMW-MCFT2 housing

[divergal65]

I got a Panasonic Lumix DMC TS2 , with a DMW underwater housing and was able to take fairly nice pics w/o a strobe, but only for very closeup shots.
So, I'm thinking of getting a strobe and noticed in the Panasonic manual that they have a shoe for attaching an Inon strobe.
Does anyone have any experience with this setup - most of my shots are fish and some diver portraits.
Also, since $$$ are a bit hard to come by lately, this would save me the extra expense of a base/arm setup for a strobe, since I could just mount the strobe directly to the housing.
Any and all thoughts welcome.
Aloha

 

[DazedAndConfuzed]

The strobe being so close to the lens negates the advantage of an external unit. Its purpose is to provide flexibility in position and aiming of the strobe.

To make your internal flash work for as far distance as possible, you should set the ISO to as high as reasonable so that the imaging sensor becomes as sensitive as positive thus light coming out of the internal flash is more effective. To minimize external light that is bluish, set your shutter speed to as high as the flash allows like 1/500 sec. not sure if your camera does that.

Second option is to use the manual white balance option so that you re-correct the color balance while underwater. You have to aim it at a white/grey subject at approx the same distance as your subject and save that white balance info. From there on, all your pictures at that depth and similar subject distance should not look bluish anymore.

If you still want to mount the strobe onto the camera, it is usable, but you should be able to compose your shot with the strobe removed from the housing and aimed manually with your hand.

 

[surf4life]

Sorry to hijack your thread, but what would the best way to quick release mount the strobe to the hot shoe attachment on such housing? Guess, a ball mount to shoe on housing and ultralight clamp to strobe ball? Anything quicker/easier to get to hand held?

I've seen a similar set up to what you're suggesting on deepshots web site with a sola 600 mounted to the hot shoe of the Panasonic and that looked pretty compact and streamlined. Think a s2000 or ys01, if it could be easily disconnected would work well.

 

[surf4life]

 

[divergal65]

I started this thread a looooooooooong time ago, and have since decided against getting the hot shoe mount. I went with a tray and arm setup from Backscatter , purchased the Inon S2000 strobe and used it on a recent trip to Roatan.
Worked beautifully.
Thanks anyway for advice...

 

[DazedAndConfuzed]

The S2000 might be overkill for the Technics DMC TS2. Is that like a kodak disc camera?