vkalia

I currently use this. Great power, built like a tank. Burns the battery quite fast though, but you recharge it to full capacity in one hour. Useless at 10mm coralscape if you're only using one. I've used it in night dives and I don't think I'll want for anything more out of it. I'm planning to buy another one soon.

I get a pretty good deal on that at our dive center trade rates, actually.

One question: what kind of beam angle do you get with it, and which lens have you used it with so far?

Thanks,
Vandit

Vkalia, expectations can be a funny thing.  I know I was very disappointed when I started using lights.  I was expecting the colors to pop like you describe in photos shot with strobes.  What I found was, I could only get great colors on night dives and closeups.  I gave up on using lights for wide angle during the day.

Have you seen video shot with lights where you said, I want colors like that on my video ?  I ask because what you are looking for might not be feasible.

Hmm, good point, Ron.  I am not really basing this on "oh, I want my video just to look like that one" but more along the lines of "I want to avoid that look."

One of our dive center instructors has been playing around with his new video rig (a fancy Panasonic pro camera)
http://www.youtube.c...feature=related --> shot at dawn and completely lacking in color (not surprisingly)
--> shot in the daytime and lacking any kind of punch

In both the cases, he's done some editing in order to try to fix the colors.  Now it could be that he's still learning his rig and editing software, so the results are not optimal, but in my head, I guess I see a huge gap between this and the results with strobes - even if video lights bridge that gap by about half, I'm still ahead.

But you are right - I have seen some very good videos shot with available light (incl those being sold the u/w video guys at Layang Layang - Scubadoo or whatever they are called).  

V.

@Ron - not really trying to emulate anything.  It is just that if I take out my housing, I either have a macro lens on it (50 or 100) or the 10-17.  The sites on which I will most likely end up shooting video are also the sites on which I'll be taking the fisheye for still photography.

So given that the video opps will happen when I am out shooting stills, it pretty much selects itself     

I am looking at some gonzo halogens - I think they are a good starting point and if I ever outgrow them, I can donate them to the dive shop to use for rentals.

V.

Ok, if $1000 is a pipedream, then how much do you reckon I should spend?    Can up the budget to ~$1500 if need be.

@Drew - you are right, I wont be traveling with it.  Will leave it at the dive center.  So land weight isnt as much of an issue.  The thing is, I personally dive with no weights with my gear and my Aquatica is festooned with various buoyancy floats from Stix, so I'd prefer something that is more or less neutral in the water.

I'll check out the halogens - how are they re light temperature?  A bit on the warm side, right?    I'd rather up my budget than get used, to be honest (unless the seller is reliable)... trying to get anything repaired takes ages in the Andamans.

@ileiman - yeah, 2 1000lumen HID light starts to sound scarily expensive/complicated.

@ron - well, I have done a fair bit of still shooting with manual w/b and available light and on our reefs, where the best soft coral and variety is > 20m, it doesnt come even close to producing the same kind of pop that strobes put out.    Being a reasonably competent still photographer, I guess I get camera-OCD when the results arent up their max potential.

The crazy thing is, 3 years ago I had picked up a couple of Czech-made HID lights for my wife from a guy who was here with a group - paid 500 euros for the pair and they were awesome.  Wifey didnt like diving with the lights, they lay around and the batteries crapped out.  Snap.

V.