TheDeepDweller

Nice shots, looks like nice clean water! I still remember my first few dives and don't think I'd have been able to cope with handling a camera on top of everything else. Were you using the setup in macro mode? Looks like the subjects were quite close, you do have to wait a little for the camera to focus in macro mode though which I find somewhat frustrating at times. I find getting the subject well lit with the strobe focus light helps speed things up. Dive safe, TDD

Just to confirm, I set the camera running last night and it happily recorded a 20 min continuous clip at 640*480, 30 fps so it looks like the card / battery would be the only limiting factor. When filming it only seems to "zoom" digitally not optically, but it can be zoomed then set filming again happily enough.

Just thought I should add my experiences into the discussion. Mostly I have had no problems with my dx1g / ys110 combination. I am shooting on manual 1 using the port towards the edge of the camera housing for the cable. I had some problems to begin with as the slave select was getting knocked off, switch seems quite sensitive to a small amount of movement? Occasionally strobe will fail to fire towards the end of the day when I have failed to allow enough time to recharge, I am using 2800ma duracell NiMhs and get a good couple of dives off a set using the aiming light most of the time. Haven't tried TTL as I have read it doesn't work, also don't think the strobe syncs at higher shutter speeds (Problems over 1/250th) so just turn the strobe right down for a lot of macro stuff. Hope this is of help, TDD

Greg, As the strobe is slaved to the flash from the camera you have to make sure the camera flash is firing (ie set it to always fire) and you have to make sure it is "popped up" before you put the camera into the housing as the only control you don't have on the housing is the one to pop up the flash. I know that I will forget one day and curse quite excessively, a good argument for firing off a quick shot or 2 after you've put everything together to make sure it works I guess? I think backscatter will always be a primary concern for us temperate water divers? Dive safe, TDD

Greg, Video seems to be limited only by the size of card / storage. I have an 8gb card and it shows about 30mins as available on full quality. Not sure if buffering etc becomes a factor after a while? I have only shot 10-15 sec clips as I was having battery problems (Due to breaking my charger by dropping it down a staircase - try to avoid this) TDD

Cal, I was recently playing with shutter speed to try to get a realistic blue-green background, I'll post links to the results below - Shot 1 Black background with shutter speed at 1/125th sec Shot 2 Nice blue-green background similar to actual conditions during the dive with shutter speed at 1/20th sec, aperture constant at f9.1. As regards motion blur, I think the maximum amount is down to taste, I've seen some incredible shots of deep wrecks etc with blurred fish due to the extreme slow shutter speeds. Hope this is of help, TDD (Just re-read the question and realise this is not quite the same thing as I am altering the total amount of light entering, D'Oh)

Greg, The housing has a couple of sockets/ports which the fibre optic plugs into, and a window which the internal flash can fire through. I was having some problems with backscatter from the internal flash and also with the ys110 getting turned off (ie slave mode to Off instead of On) and failing to fire, but me not noticing as an image was still appearing on the review screen (under exposed + heavily backscattered), causing me confusion. To prevent this I have stuck a small piece of tape over the window so there is no significant amount of light coming from the internal flash. If you are shooting in clearer water and are able to remeber to ensure your strobe is firing you might find the internal flash useful to give a bit of light to the foreground and not want to cover it? I am using the sea arm VII with YS110 strobe and find the setup to be around neutrally bouyant if not slightly positive, the wide angle adaptor seems fairly heavy + dense so may make the setup slightly negative but I don't think it will be too much of a problem. Also the system is quite a bit more compact than the SLR systems I have seen so current drag is more manageable. Hope this is of help, TDD

Water clarity was good when we were there, probably 10-15m overall vis, but with large stringy clumps of diatoms (Especially visible in the shot of the seapen habitat). Water colour / ambient light was fairly green hued. Very little light penetration below about 25m. Strobe is useful to give better colour any deeper than about 5m, and essential below 25m. The files on the site are low quality jpegs (500k or so), the quality of the original dngs is really very good and would probably blow up / crop down quite well, and certainly cope with a little touching up if required. TDD

For macro I was using the camera fully zoomed in to increase the max f stop from 9 to 15 to give more depth of field, using the macro mode of the camera. I have a reasonable shot of a nudi about 6mm long filling most of the frame using this method. I was shooting auto focus, manual apature (set to max) and manual shutter speed (usually 1/124th sec). Had to turn the strobe right down to min to avoid over exposing and I have gaffer taped over the flash on the housing to reduce backscatter (May not be such a problem in Komodo?). I am thinking about getting some sort of dedicated focusing light to improve the focus time for macro shots, possibly a compact torch diffused and mounted on the shoe fitting on top of the housing? The wider angle stuff was max f stop (ie 9ish?) zoomed right out and shutter around 1/125th again for the black backgrounds and shutter speed slower (1/30th or so) for the blue/green backgrounds, Strobe turned up to about 1/3 - 1/2 power. I now have the wide angle adaptor as well which looks very impressive so will be trying that out fairly soon. Was mainly looking to record overviews of habitats hence a lot of wide angle stuff, the adaptor should let me get closer and reduce all the gunky bits. Hope this is of help, TDD

Greg, I have a very small play with the video mode on the DX1G using basically ambient light only. Seems to work pretty well but the resolution isn't massive (640x480 I think?), plenty good enough to record general habitat overviews and show friends + family but It'll not be featuring on any David Attemborough documentaries. I think (though haven't tried) that the manual white balance function should work for video ie take a slate and adjust to the ambient light before shooting. Hope this is of help, TDD

Hi all, Finally got my new setup wet so thought I'd let you see the pick of my shots, not really edited just converted over from DNG. A few problems with camera taking time to focus esp in macro mode, much reduced by taking time / care to get the focus light in better position. Also I found the YS 110 would tend to switch out of slave mode quite easily, may need a bit of gaffer tape there. See Here Dive safe, TDD

Hi all, Joined a few weeks back looking for advice on the system I had already chosen to buy. Looks like I'll be happy with it as soon as I get enough time to try it out actually under the water. Might be somewhat shy about posting any pics I do get as all my diving is in UK waters so no bright coloured corals & gin clear water, maybe shore crabs and ballan wrasse look exotic to tropical divers? I mainly want a system for recording marine life for later identification without having to take specimens so I imagine the shots won't look that great anyhow. Diving wise I've been diving for 14 years now (I started fairly young), mostly in UK waters though some in the Med, Florida Keys and South Africa (Cage diving before it really took off). My wife started u/w photography about 4 years ago (Ike housed D70) but I've never fancied a bulky SLR system and didn't feel compacts were flexible enough for our often murky waters. Dive Safe TDD

Damo, Not sure where in Ireland you do your diving. I dive in Northern Ireland, mostly with Seasearch. We usually have about half the boat filled with u/w photographers; and plenty of buddies willing to dive with them as the whole point is to carry out marine life surveys which means moving fairly slowly. Might be something worth checking out? Many thanks, TDD

Travy, Haven't been able to get the camera wet yet, have been messing about topside. Can't really comment on quality as I have been shooting to internal memory and therefore limited to the lowest setting (VGA quality!). Have now sorted a card and hope to get in the water one evening next week. In terms of grab time (As mentioned in the other thread) it seems pretty much instantaneous, not sure how much effect focusing u/w will have. Write time seems quite long (about 7 sec) on full quality, but the card I currently have is an old school SD 1gb, I imagine a new sdhc should be quicker? We'll see. I guess it depends what you want the images for, I think to publish at full quality nothing less than a housed SLR will do, but if you are achieving the sort of quality you need with a video setup in still mode (And you mostly want video) then my gut instinct would be to go for a video setup and put all your budget towards that. If you're talking about a Sony stills camera the ability to take RAW shots allows for a lot more correction afterwards. I think the DX-1G is probably the setup that suits my needs (A bit more controllable than most other compacts and not as bulky as a DSLR), and I'll post up any results I get that I'm not totally mortified by. (I also have Photoshop so should be able to get something I hope!). Hope this is of help, TDD

Thanks, It would make more sense that it would be compatible with any sdhc card, I think they are up to 16 or 32 gb by now, but a couple of 8's should be more than enough for a 2 dive day. Didn't realise that the place I ordered mine bundles a battery and charger with it (Cameras Underwater in Devon). I will likely pick up a second battery though I am very impressed so far - only had time to charge it for about an hour and so far have had a couple of hundred shots just messing around, now I just need to get away from work long enough to get it wet! Housed unit is impressively small as well, it's only a touch bigger than my wife's d70, and thats without her Ike housing. Looks to be just what I was looking for, though I think I'll have to get the wide lens as well, those shots of yours look cracking. Many thanks, TDD

Hi, Have just been informed that my new DX-1G w. YS-110 has been dispatched so will be looking for a bigger memory card, could you tell me which make / model of 8gb card you have as the S&S specs sheet says only up to 4gb is compatible? Also are you finding the battery life OK? The S&S specs are for 30 pics per set of AAAs which doesn't seem much, or do you have the DB-60 rechargeable battery? PS some great pics on here. Many thanks, TDD

Hal Thanks for the reassurance, I have decided to take the plunge and ordered one with the ys110 strobe, I think I'll need the extra power even if I don't get a wide adaptor at some point. Hopefully it'll be here in the next couple of weeks, I'll post up some results when I get it, though I doubt they'll be as colourful as all the lovely tropical pics I've seen browsing around. TDD

Hi, I am looking to buy my first U/W camera system, and having looked around at the various compact digital systems available it looks like the dx-1g is the best bet for me, and the ys-110 looks to be a common companion. This system would be within my price bracket, but would a cheaper strobe (Eg ys27dx) suffice? I dive in Northern Ireland, so a strobe will be essential, and a system which can take a wide angle adaptor lens may be helpful in the future. I am looking for a system which I can take diving with me to photograph subjects of opportunity, and to record marine life and habitats for later ID rather than for artistic purposes. (Much of my diving is Seasearch surveys + similar). I would also like the possibilty for future growth eg manual control, RAW image editing etc to prevent me from rapidly growing out of the system. I do not want a housed SLR as I find them far too bulky and they have a tendency to take over the dive. Any comments would be gratefully recieved, Many thanks, TDD