SharpDiver

Long before that we piggy-backed on Steve's Digicams. It was linked from David's site and David had Admin priveleges on Steve's. That's where I first met Herbko, Rstark and some of the other "old-timers".

I think UWPhotoNewbie might be experiencing some confusion here between the old Ikelite system and the new Ikelite system. The new Ikelite 5050 and 5060 housings do not need the control units anymore. Nor does the camera's internal flash fire at all. The new Ike's are hardwired from the camera to the strobe, with some interpretation hardware in between. This is, in my opinion a quantum leap forward. I have long been an advocate of fiber optic sync systems -- and I still am -- as long as strobe output is controlled manually or with an auto sensor that is part of the strobe head. I have not been completely successful with any system that tried to mimic the camera's quench system, though. I have not personally used the Tetra system, which is quite a bit different, in that the sensor is inside the housing, where logically it would seem like it has a better chance of keeping on track. The new Ikelite system and the Olympus PT-020 (and 23) are as close to film TTL as we have ever seen this class of camera. I don't have any experience with the Nikon or Canon viewfinder digitals, but I can tell you from experience with the Olympus X0X0 cameras, both above and below the water line that the camera does a superb job of controlling flash output -- whatever you want to call it and whether it works from a pre-flash or not. I personally am looking forward to trying the housed FL-20, the Ikelite housing with hard-wired flash control, and Matthias Heinric's hard-wired interpreter for TTL strobes.

Yes, it would. Not necessarily. I don't have one.

Ken, you may think that the corrections I am going to point out are semantic, however your position in this community as an "expert" makes it very important that you have a handle on the semantics. You need to recognize that when you throw out comments without verifying terms and methodologies, people listen to you and then carry around misinformation. Let's start with the paragraph above. The D-180 does not "give accurate D-TTL". In the first place D-TTL is a Nikon term which I believe is trademarked. Even if it is not trademarked, Olympus does not use that term. Beyond that, what the D-180 does is not TTL of any kind. "Through the Lens" means just that -- the control is through the lens. The D-180 auto function requires you to set the aperture of the camera on a dial on the strobe. A light sensor in the strobe head quenches the strobe when it calculates enough light has been delivered. The auto system is completely independent of the pre-flash system. In fact, with a 5050 or later, the best approach is to put the camera in "Slave" mode and eliminate the pre-flash altogether. If you have a camera where the pre-flash cannot be disabled, the D-180's Advanced Cancel Circuit will fire a pre-flash that will "trick" the camera into firing a very weak, brief main flash, thus conserving battery life. The pre-flash system has absolutely nothing to do with the D-180's auto quenching system. Moving on: While this is not completely inaccurate, it is not complete. When a 5050/5060 Tetra is assembled with a strobe, the strobe is connected to the housing, but it is not connected to the camera. The housing is reading the camera's flash optically and interpreting the fire and quench signals into electronic signals. This is quite different from what Ikelite is doing with its new Oly housings and what Olympus is doing with the new 5060 and 8080 housings, and what Matthias Heinric is doing with his modification kits. These three are truly letting the camera control the external strobes. Steering back toward the original subject, L&M has always followed the beat of their own drummer. My personal feeling is that their brilliant designs are often held back by less than satisfactory manufacturing. I've experienced it. So has board moderator Craig. Is a Tetra 5050 or Tetra 5060 really worth 7 or 8 times the price of a PT? Like Rand has said, it depends on how much you use it and how much you want auto strobe control. I wouldn't pay it. Others would.

Still using iPhoto, though I am looking for RAW support in something that also allows cataloging. Thanks, Dave, I will look at iView Media Pro. I bought Portfolio, but I am struggling with it a bit. Very versatile, but a bit complicated, too. (And we do carry a larger minority here than elsewhere!)

Sorry guys. I know how frustrating problems like this can be. But, it apparently has something to do with your ISP, your security settings or some other variable. I upgraded to Safari 1.2v125 so that I could say with confidence that it is neither a OS-X nor a Safari issue. Since you're both so close, maybe Evil Bill is putting out his voodoo.

Clear your cache, delete all wetpixel cookies, delete all bookmarks and type the address in the address bar. Navigate to the forum, log in with remember me checked and create a new bookmark. I had the same problem, but I believe it was related to the interim server. Everything seems to work fine now. OS-X 10.3.2 and Safari 1.1.1

Not only is the housing serviceable, it is serviceable by just about anyone. Take a look at the second article down in this library list. The steps you need to take are there, and a source for the o-rings has occupied a couple of different extended threads on DDNet's forum. http://www.digitaldiver.info/library.php

OM-1? What lenses?

The iS line of "ZLR" cameras dominated the line in that period. A nice middle ground for those that wanted manual control, but did not want to lug a bag full of lenses around. I had an iS-20 that I admired. It was sort of like the E-20, only film. An unfortunate financial incident after I got out of college forced me to sell my OM-1 or I would still have it today.

I guess my dogged defense of this system stems from a 30 year association with Olympus cameras and having never known the company to release anything with less than acceptable optics. I have usually felt their equipment exceptional, and under-appreciated. It appears that faith is unfounded, but I will continue to reserve final judgement until I shoot it myself.

I stand corrected. Like the pictures.

Do we know for sure that the folks at Cameras Underwater weren't just trying to sell software? Could that shot not have been done at the wrong end of the zoom? It certainly looks distressing, and a dome would no doubt do better, but I am still interested to see what someone familiar with the Olympus system, and not driven by sales goals will do with that set up.

Swings & Round-abouts = Apples & Oranges. Swings & Merry-Go-Rounds for us Colonials

Yes, I do. I've done it. I had the Titan for the Oly E-20, which is still smaller than most d-SLR housings, and I found several circumstances when diving with both, where I could not position the camera where it needed to be with the Titan and I could with the C-5050. Careful with the term "shove", though. This has remained fairly civil to this point, and I would hope it will continue to be so. I have never "shoved" a camera anywhere around a reef. As for less flexible, and handle worse, I disagree. Flexibility implies an ability to take a wide variety of images. I think the zoom lens fits that definition nicely. As for handling, it is smaller, lighter, and can be viewed from a distance instead of up against your mask. I will concede that manual focus is next to worthless on the C-5050, but I can also count on my two hands the number of shots that I have lost because the camera focused incorrectly. I'm sure glad the manufacturers still make both styles.