ssra30

So when you mentioned on a dive that you had the problem and shutter release was locked up. Did you change your strobes back to manual during that dive? I just want to make sure that if TTL misbehaved, at least going back to manual would be a good back up. However, if the board decided to act up and there was no way to get around it while on a dive, may be it is not worth bothering with it, I guess.

Hmm.. a bit of a bummer as I also just ordered the ttl board. If you have the ttl board installed, can you reverted back to manual only without having to switch the board?

I have D850 since its launch to replace my D810 and just came back from a trip to Indonesia with my Nauticam D850 housing. This is the first FF setup underwater for me though as my last rig was D7100. Worked pretty well but I still need to get a bit more familiarized with changing from aps-c to FF. Macro is a bit of a pain as my working distance is completely changed and I will need to change my domeport from 200mm (worked well with my 10-17, 16-35 with apsc camera) to 230mm. AF is better which is not surprising. The new natural light wb works really well with Inon strobes and wb calibration against my white fin at depth up to 10m is very convenient and more accurate than with my d7100. May be because of bigger dof issue, I never had to adjust my AF fine tune on D7100 with my 105/2.8 VR but with d850, AF fine tune is a must. Luckily auto fine tune feature is very handy. A bit annoying that at usual macro distance, it was +7 but at further distance 3-5m, it was like -13. But for underwater stuff, it does not matter since I would be using it at near minimum focusing distance anyhow.

A friend tried Nauticam housing and it fits fine. Subdial in front is a little off but can be modified easily to work. Live View button needs a little work. The only control that does not work is the video recording control. You can reassign that control on the camera though.

hey, 1.5 kg would be a saving of a tad over 24000 rupiah one way. For round trip Manado-Sorong, that's equavalent to 2 cans of diet cokes and a few candies. The saving is piling up very quickly with D7000 Actually, I am just tired of lugging around Pro body/bigger housing but did not think that D300s/D700 was worth hazzle to upgrade over D2X but D7000 is promising.

I am very impressed (even if Drew is not ). I think this is going to be a good camera to replace my D2X after having to pay 500,000 rupiahs on Lion Air each way from Manado to Sorong recently I am looking forward to a lighter traveling day!

I plan another quick dive trip in a week, I think my friend may come along. I can't remember if he mounted his strobe arm on the housing or the handles. I will see if I can get some feel for his housing underwater as if Nikon vaporware becomes a reality, Nauticam would be a housing that I am very interested in.

A friend of mine also recently got his 7D housing recently and on his first dive trip with it, said he likes it very much but complain that the handles are not stiff enough. He said that the housing tends to oscillate a bit in his hands due to the handles. Is that your experience? Finish on it is top notch and with my next housing for whatever camera, I am seriously switching to it from my current Subal setup.

Its the dream of Nikon vaporware that made my D2X lasted me all these 5 years Canon just does not have enough vaporware to make me wait and I surely will be broke from keeping up with buying Canon's newest toy! Gotta love a company that make you wait and wait some more before taking your money away Unfortunately the red shirt has been kept off Silom and Nik Thailand pretty effectively so far so I can't use that threat!

Hmmm... my usual source claims absolutely no firm knowledge yet of any new Nikon camera even when I threatened them that I am going to get a 7D

I suppose that sounds about right. If Nikon plans to make official announcement in 2 months time which would be around June, I won't expect the camera until sometimes closer to the end of the year anyhow. I am curious to see how good the D400 will be with high ISO. I assume that D750 will be better but if D400 has a very good usable ISO 1600-3200 or higher, would there be any reason to really go full frame with D750 (assuming AF and other features being relatively the same). Battery grip for both models will be new with different dimensions from current grips so presumably they will not fit in existing housing so probably it won't be until next year sometimes before somebody will get to use it underwater.

Has anyone heard anything more concrete about this? I was away on a trip and I heard from a friend on the trip who is very reliable usually, about D750. However, he did not say anything about D400. When I got back and checked internet, looks like there is a lot of talk about both D400 and D750. Another person also confirmed that Nikon should be making official announcement in the next 2 months and supposedly local distributor is now preparing local language brochure for it. Unfortunately it is a long holiday in Thailand right now so I can't verify with my usual source probably until next week Speculate away

Paul, 6m viz does not neccessarily exclude 105VR, I think. The main question will be how big a macro subject you are going to take the picture of. On tiny object, 60mm lens, you may need to be right on top of it where as 105VR may give you a few more inches to work with. We are not talking about differences of 1-2M in working distance here. I dove in some very nasty water in Gulf of Thailand here and 105 definitely has its use in not so great water condition as well. Using 105 with wet diopter also will let you get right on top of the subject with a bit more magnification as well so it can be handy. However, if you dive in 6M viz where most objects are 6 inches or bigger, 105VR probably is pretty useless there. I only wish that 105 can AF as fast as 60mm.

depending on how big a macro stuff you are taking picture of and how skittish they are. Personally I use 105VR 90+% of the time for macro shots. I like 60mm for fish type picture, even occasional skittish smaller reef sharks that won't get close to me (say within a meter or two). For macro stuffs, say less than 3-4cm, I prefer 105VR because it gives me better working distance and easier to position the strobes. Lots of wrasse, juvenile fish, gobies you will be really hard pressed to get close enough to them with 60mm in my opinion. I don't think you will be wasting your money on 105VR. Once you are familiar with it, you will know when you need 60mm and when to use 105VR. Both are great lenses.

Thanks for the comment. I heard about coral bleach and all that before. I just was not prepare to see how bad it was. Except for a few sites, Lembeh Strait also really had nothing there to offer scenic wise but it was full of macro life to see that nobody notice or care much about the surrounding otherwise. There were plenty of fish in Maldives but rather uninteresting variety to me. Our dive guides were actually quite tame. Beside accusing us at Dhon Kahlo for missing the site, they were not strict at all. We ended up doing more like 50-60 minutes dive instead of the imposed 45 minutes. We tend to split up into smaller groups, some stayed with dive guides, other went their own ways. The second dive guide was rather useless. He ran out of air once and came to one of us for air. At Dhon Kahlo, he went into decom or closed to it and left us immediately without telling anybody. At this point, I may consider to go back to the Maldives if I want to have a nice holiday in a resort and may do a little bit of diving on the side but I am not sure if I want to return there primarily as a dive trip. There are plenty of whale sharks and mantas to see and in my opinion better divings to be had elsewhere.