Islandbound

When pushing on the diopter underwater how important is it to ensure that it is perfectly straight against the port? Obviously I think its important but am a bit afraid to push somewhat hard underwater in case water gets past the oring.

As I was slowly moving past all the familiar land marks on my way out to the local wall I swear this fish was waving at me. He was so cute looking out of his little house I had to share. A little while later I was trying to get used to a new lens/diopter combo and saw a romantic opportunity so to speak... Over the past several months I have been taking photos underwater its been a big benefit to look at the photos from everyone to look at lighting, composition etc. So... if you have some fun or cute photos then post them!

I appreciate the compliment Pakman buts its not as hard as it sounds. Whats so hard is the slow cruising deep enough to locate things to take pictures of. One of the things I immediately noticed when I got home that night and looked at the pictures was just how many turned out to be keepers. Ordinarily during the day I keep maybe 1 in 5 or so photos due to lighting, focus etc. On that night I kept 25 out of 60 photos taken. I attribute that success ratio change to the fact that the camera when using the focus light to focus was either locked on or still "hunting". With only one DS51 strobe most of the pictures are on the dark side but again that doesnt bother me too much. The camera was set at F10 and shutter at 1/160 the whole night and all I had to do was point and shoot the SLR, couldnt have been more pleasant!

I took the photo in Okinawa (Japan), the photo in the link is from Maeda which is 20 mins north of where I took the photos I posted. My wife told me that she saw a number of them that night on the red pencil urchins. We should be going back out at night soon and I will try to get some better photos if someone would like them. Thanks Leslie! (and Sammy too)

Cool picture!

My recent experience with purchasing from Tom Harman at Marine Camera Distributor was fantastic! He was super easy to get on the phone, quick and accurate in his responses and he shipped the items exactly how and when he said he would. Two thumbs up! Just wanted to give credit where credit is due. Often not living in the United States and having to go through the contact and ordering process can be somewhat time consuming and Tom at Marine Camera was very easy to deal with.

I have to admit that I did not know there was even a shrimp there when I took the photo. Otherwise I would have taken a seperate photo of just the shrimp! This is the best I could do but the DOF is not very good, sorry...

Does the claw shape make this a pistol shrimp.

This is about 2cm wide and came drifting by in the dark the other night. What is it?

The animal itself is about 1/4" wide, lives in a small coral "bud" and was in a small resident population of several dozen or so crabs just like itself. When I first swam up to the coral I thought that it was a colony of barnacles until I was close enough to see the crabs. Can anyone give me some info?

I go out on the average 4 dives a week or about 16 hours and only once every two weeks or so does someone ever go with me. Even then its usually just a ride along in the car with several people who then leave me once we get to our destination. Taking photographs is a lonely hobby to me but one in which I get absorbed in that keeping up with someone is time consuming. Most of the people I go out with are spearfishing for thier dinner and are usuall at the 70' end of the tether on their Riffe anyway. I went out on a dive boat this past Saturday with 10 other divers who the divemaster buddied up initially but then left it at thier discretion if they would continue the day that way. For me, being tankless, he just shrugged his shoulders about matching me with anyone. None the less the boat anchored in 40' then 60' waters which for everyone else was probably great, for me it meant long long dives to get photos. I do wear a bright red hood and carry a water whistle for signaling though if I get separated. He did a good job watching me though and even signaled me from the boat when he spotted surfacing turtles and even a HUGE school of Bonita. This was my dive buddy from the first anchorage!

I looked up Ctenephore, thanks for the clue! The shrimp was very hard to see but in the time I spent with it the shrimp definately not only moved on the outer edge but also went up under the bell into the interior of the jelly. I took this photo at the same location Wednesday and I think this is the classic Ctenephore from what I was able to read... Contrasted against some reef shelf/waves which "bent" the light enough for the autofocus to get a good lock... Forgot one! This also shows the 8 lines of the Ctenephore from the web info I could find, does this look like a Ctenephore to you?

The pictures were taken with a D80 - 60mm Nikor lens - Ikelite housing - single DS 51 strobe and the Nocturnal SLX focus light. Manual at 1/160 and F10.

This week I went on a boatdive and ran into a jellyfish with what appeared to be a shrimp living inside of it. As I moved around the 6 inch or so jelly the shrimp would move around the jelly and even went to the other side of it to get away from me. After I left the jelly for awhile I found another jelly of the same species and it also had what appears to be a shrimp living on it. The water was 60 feet deep or so in the China Sea off of Tokasheki Island. Do shrimp actually live on jellyfish? Sorry for picture quality but to me at least jellies in bright water are really hard to shoot in focus and I kept trying to get something behind it for contrast...

Leslie, during the time we were out we probably saw a dozen of these worms and all of them were as fat as this one was.

Went out for a night swim and these worms (?) were here and there in the water.

After reading online here at Wetpixel that Nocturnal was selling their demos I went ahead and ordered the SLX focus light. Well today it arrived at 530pm and by 730pm I attached it to the Ikelite/D80 with a single DS51 and am very happy with the results! I did order the ULC arms to use the light with the 2nd strobe attached but it hasnt arrived yet. Four of us went out tonight to do a little freedive photography in the pitch black waters and the light worked very well. It throws a very bright but not harsh white light that didnt show up in a single photo out of 60 or so that I took. The light is brighter than the C8 ELed UK light as well and is about half the size. We were out just over 3 hours so I cant report on battery life other than the light hasnt faded at all in the time we were out. On a side note, I was after blue rings and although I saw two both slipped away mere feet from my face but I am not brave enough to poke in crevices and under corals for them. Anyway, here are some pictures, the Nocturnal light allowed the D80 to focus quickly, showed great color through the viewfinder and didnt screw up one photo with either color or intensity. I will admit that I thought there would have been some interference because the light is so bright. Sorry for so many pictures, I am just trying to show a number of colors that would ordinarily reflect or might show washout from the focus light.

Yes, I have had the same issue although I have never tried to "clear" the flash like you did. I end up usually just switching to Manual, turn the strobes up and then dial in a high fstop while keeping the shutter at 1/125. If its too dark, I dial down the fstop, too light then I turn the fstop to a higher number. I know its not scientific but I dont have the experience to do anything else. Does your Ikelite housing have the knob on the back to turn the TTL up or down? (and the manual too). Do you know how to use it?

Hmm, that leads to another question then. Do you prefer the 150mm Sigma lens over the Nikon 105vr lens for macro photography? (or am I reading too much into this?)

Saw this guy in about 10 feet of water and have never seen his coloration prior to this...

Thanks Don, It was kind of fun to watch while it worked its way around the wall. It could clearly be heard either munching or moving as it worked its way through the rocks. Sorry for the odd color but it was a dusk dive and the flash was running out of juice and put out a yellow tinted light. I thought I would post a pic of a predatory snail now that you mentioned it...!

I bought the Nocturnal SLX light after reading this post, sure hope its a good light! I have a UK Q40 LED which I use to poke around crevices with and will do a "scientific" comparison and post the results once the Nocturnal light gets here.

I have thought about this for a couple of days and decided, not shallow but smart! If you can buy one camera for two purposes then thats probably the best decision. I do have to say that I have used the G7 for many above water pictures as well and it is a very accomplished camera in this as well.

After asking many crazy and I am sure outright dumb questions starting back in April of this year I had an opportunity to enter a photo contest sponsored by JVC. I entered pics for Macro, Critter (undefined) and abstract. Over 200 submissions were made and I was graced with a 2nd in Macro, 1st in Critter and then was selected as Grand Prize winner! JVC really stepped up with the prizes too, I won a brand new JVC Everio GZ-MG555 HDD camcorder with 5.4 megapixel still capability and their new model of Underwater housing to go along with it! I also won Program Director Choice from a Scuba shop with a weekend stay at a Suite in a very nice beachfront hotel and dinner, woohoo, now my wife is happy too! Wetpixel is definately the best source for info for beginning and up photographers to listen and learn. The picture I took which won the camera was taken while I was out practicing the black background technique after spending time reading all the posts here on Wetpixel on how to do it. I am sure that these are probably simple pics by most standards but this is the first photo contest I have entered.

I was using a strobe and the lighting per se is fine in the photograph. I think that the camera itself does not capture the color as well as others do for the same amount of money. As for photoshop, I do own PS Elements 5.0 and have tried to work with the photos but do not have the experience to make much difference. I have a Sony cybershot N2 which produces such rich colors compared to the DC500 it makes me shake my head. Of course the Sony in a housing was less than $600 and the autofocus is as easily as fast as my Nikon D80 and works better in low light than my D80 too. Compared to the Sealife camera it makes it look like a childs toy and at half the price. SonyCybershot pics not cropped... I am not proposing you go get a Sony just that there are better choices for the money in my opinion. I still think the G7, Ikelite, single Ikelite DS51 strobe is an awesome combination. Not cheap but at under $1400 U.S. it can do just about everything and has HighDef video as well at 15fps.