Underwater surveillance

[OkByMe]

You may have to do the same thing for the ambient lighting. If you use LED floodlights the batteries would last a long time. There are marine lights made to install through the bottom of the hull, but they are pricy and you would still have to build a battery box. The best bet would be to get LED floodlights using a socket 26 or 27, that you could install close the the acrylic lens. Put your batteries in series to get the 70 or so volts for the higher powered lights. You could use rechargeable batteries ether way. You are not dealing with a lot of pressure, so 1/4 acrylic and schedule 40 PVC pipe is good to at least 200psi.

 

[Ardeus]

I took some time to get some more information about your suggestions and I had to make some decisions. The first is that I won't be filming deeper than 3 meters and in fact most of the time I will be filming just at 1 or 2 meters deep. That eliminates the lighting problem. I'm also at ease with post-production.

Although I started an Indiegogo campaign to try to raise some extra funds for the project, I'm on a tight budget and I already have 4 cameras:

- 2 Panasonic TM700;
- 2 Panasonic HS200;

The first two I plan to use underwater and the other 2 above water.

I need at least 2 more cameras and I was so tempted by the gopro's because they are so convenient and excellent value for money. I can even cope with having to change their batteries every couple of hours. But I find it hard to cope with their quality underwater. I love what they do above water, but I have seen countless videos of them underwater and none of them convinced me. There's very little detail.

If I was shooting large animals, I would go with them, but I am shooting animals that range from 3 to 20 cms in length.

So the idea now is to continue with panasonic cameras and I will try to get 2 more. But the question is: will a cheap housing make the images come out with the same quality of the gopro's? Do you guys have suggestions of housings that will keep the quality as high as in this video shot with a TM700 with a RecSea housing.

https://vimeo.com/21111618

I really don't need to fuss around with camera underwater. I just need it to not damage the image quality and be alright at least at 3 meters deep. I don't even mind turning the camera on before putting it inside. I really just need a transparent waterproof container that doesn't damage the image (and the camera).

Any suggestions?

 

[flareside]

For as shallow as you are going to be, DIY housings made from PVC pipe & fittings and clear acrylic sheet should be more than adequate. Check the DIY section of the forum for more information as well as How to make the Nemo 200 underwater video camera housing part 1 of 12 - YouTube, How to Make Low Cost Underwater Camera Housings Bags | eBay, https://sites.google.com/site/robbmoffett/ (all 3 are same guy.)

You may also have sufficient space in such housings to add in an external battery (12V DC USB 5V Rechargeable Li Po Battery 4 CCTV Camera | eBay) to keep the cameras running longer.

 

[Ardeus]

Thanks a lot! Lots of useful information there.

I'm going to find out how to connect those batteries to the cameras and the custom housings.

 

[Ardeus]

I ended up ordering 6600 Mah batteries. The problem is that they don't fit the cameras, they need adaptors. Panasonic sells these at an outrageous price, for such a simple device.

I also went with one of diversteve's suggestions, Reef Rider in what concerns the 4 housings. I will use 3 of them to film from morning till dusk and the last I will use for some random shoots.

 

[3D diver]

Bit too late, but a friend just sent me this link to a Chinese company selling a tethered underwater camera system:

CAMERAY ELECTRONIC CO.,LTD

 

[Ardeus]

Thanks, looks like a very interesting equipment.

I ended up making some cuts to the project not only to reduce costs, but also to make my own life easier. Too many cameras would mean that my life would be very stressful and the project would be much more difficult to control.

I ended up deciding on using:

- 2 Panasonic HS200 for above water;
- 2 Panasonic SDT750 (without 3D lenses) + 1 Panasonic SD600 for main filming underwater;
- 1 Sony XR550 for sporadic underwater use.

I'm going for 7 weeks in about a month to Lake Tanganyika and my goal is to be able to edit all the footage from each day on the next day.

I'm guessing around 30 hours of footage per day.

I also got a Spare Air hoping that it will enable me to place the cameras in place in 3-4 minutes at a depth between 2 and 4 meters. If not, then I will use 12 litres cilinders.

I'm still waiting for the housings to see how will I use them. I need to make sure they stay still the whole day. I thought about using tripods with sand bags, but I don't know how will I attach the housings to the tripods yet.

I also thought about attaching the housings to rocks.

 

[3D diver]

You'd be surprised how buoyant rocks are...metal/lead works better.

 

[OkByMe]

I use the Intova hd camera. works great, less expensive and takes 1080p video. Battery last about 4 hours.

 

[Ardeus]

I just wanted to let you know that maybe it's a good idea to avoid Reef Rider, the german vendor or underwater housings.

I ordered and paid for the 4 housings more than a month ago and now they don't reply to emails or answer the phone.