Otara

I understand having to declare cropping so as to take into account its use in judging the overall image.

Banning it is where I get a bit befuddled. But photography competitions in general leave me a bit baffled compared to other art competitions. Just seems to get to the point of me wondering when the 'one arm behind your back' category is going to turn up.

Otara

Hello Guys,

I am not too sure whether I am posting in the correct section of the forum so please feel free to correct me or move my post.
I am looking for a used underwater setup and believe it or not I do not have an SLR as of right now at all, so it is a bit easier for me to look at the used classifieds.
A gentleman close to me is selling a setup and I feel like it is well priced for what it is but I wanted to hear some feedback from you guys.
Here it is:

• Ikelite underwater camera housing to fit Canon EOS 7D DSLR
• Port
• Port extension
• Dome
• Two Ikelite DS161 Strobes
• Strobe attachment arms
• Sync cable
• All necessary accessories, spare parts, and user manual.

When I asked him which dome it was he said he had the Tamron 17-50mm lens in there and he would find out which one it is exactly.
Do you feel like this is a good setup for $2000.00?
The seller seems to be genuine and answered all my questions and offered for me to try out the strobes etc.
All feedback is much appreciated.

Many thanks
Sergei

My maths shows that to be over $4k worth, so it may be a bit too good pricewise if anything.

That will be a quite large rig, but the strobes are quite powerful and have some video capability as well. If you're intending to travel with it, you might want to look for some of the smaller options.

I havent had any issues with the rear wheel.

I have had the zoom knob become loose. It was slowly unscrewing, and as a result the main zoom gear wasnt working properly on the lens zoom gear and slipping. Just needed retightening and a bit of mild loctite. Did cause a small leak (no damage thanks to the leak detector!), so Id be careful using it underwater till you figure out whats going on.

Its all guesswork in the end and cameras are ultimately pretty expensive investments that drop in value pretty quickly. Future proofing is going to always be pretty dicey at best.

Committing to a new system would be another story, but again, I doubt anyone can really be too certain how useful anything will be in 5 years unless its full frame and higher end lenses. Micro 4/3's is doing well now but could be in a very different place over the periods discussed.

In my view decisions are better based on what current priorities are rather than trying to do the crystal ball thing too much - eg image quality vs size, overall cost, lens ranges that are desired, things like that.

Otara

The funniest part of this whole discussion to me is the bit about if DX / APS-C SLR's disappear, most of you would prefer to go mirrorless for smaller lenses and perhaps even to smaller high performance sensors.

Yet just a couple years ago the 4/3rds system's 2x crop got reamed by many for being....smaller than even a DX or APS-C sensor. Now m4:3rds seems to be getting most of the mirrorless commentary in this thread.

How times change. Not intending to bash anyone, just find it curious.

Because the early sensors sucked by comparison, the lens range was pretty ordinary, and there wasnt that much of a cost advantage. Speaking as someone who managed to sell his Olympus range not too long before 4/3 got abandoned in favour of M4/3, it kind of deserved a reaming as being too early and not good enough.

Otara