im tempted with ewa-marine

[hedonist222 3]

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller...egoryNavigation

 

Should I? Its either this, or the $7,000 from seacam or ikelite or something like that or buy a 20D + housing for about 2,300$. I know the housings are more expensive for a reason. But the one I linked is rated to 150 feet and I dont go beyond 100 feet anyways.

 

Link to product gallery:

http://www.ewa-marine.com/english/cameras/e-slr.htm

 

Link to mentioned Canon 1d compatible w/ 72mm lens:

http://www.ewa-marine.com/english/cameras/e-uaxp.htm

 

Link to mentioned 1d compatible with 77mm and 82mm lens:

http://www.ewa-marine.com/english/cameras/e-uaxp.htm

[acroporas 0]

In a word NO it is not a realistic option.

 

It will probably keep your camera dry but there are other things to consider.

 

Accessing any controls other than shutter release will be impossible.

 

Due to flat port, any lens wider(angle of view) than about 40mm will show extreme chromatic abberation.

 

You will not be able to use an external strobe. While land flashes are good for macro underwater they are not sufficient for wide angle shooting.

 

Probably a lot of other reasons too but that is what I think of right now.

[hedonist222 3]

William,

 

I dont plan on going to deep with it if I cant access the controls. I cant expect much from a $370 housing while the other alternative is more than $4,000 difference.

 

How the flat-pot affect CA? How does the dome fix it?

 

I have seen a review of it on photo.net and,sure its not the ikelite or the expensive one. But will it prevent flooding?

[TuriLed 2]

Let me quote Biko, an underwter photographer (for my local forum) - "Plastic bags are ment for sandwiches" :-)

[acroporas 0]

No matter which housing you go with, you WILL eventually flood it. Insurance is a must if you are considering taking your camera underwater in any housing.

 

The fact that 99.9% of underwater shooting is done with manual exposure, not being able to access the controls is a major problem.

 

See attached picture for explanation of the benefits of Dome over flat for Wide Angle. Which by the way is how you shoot underwater, you must be within 1 meter (and closer is better) of your subject no matter how big it is so the only option is to shoot wide inless the subject is very small...

[hedonist222 3]

William, WHAT?????? no matter which housing I use (even the $5000) I will eventually flood it? O_O Are you sure? How so? Im shocked.

[acroporas 0]

William,  WHAT?????? no matter which housing I use (even the $5000) I will eventually flood it? O_O Are you sure?  How so? Im shocked.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Yep, eventually it happens to everyone. Most floods are caused by user error, though occasionally it is the housing's fault.

 

See "official insurance thread" for information on flood insurance.

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showt...

[james 0]

Hi and welcome to Wetpixel

 

The EWA housings are meant to provide camera protection in harsh environments. They are not underwater housings.

 

you can use one for some snorkelling and pool photo shoots and it will work. I would not take one on a scuba dive in the ocean as the environment is too harsh there and there are a lot of other things that can hurt your camera, like impacts getting on and off the boat, in the rinse tank, on the camera table, etc.

 

Many people on Wetpixel have flooded a camera at one time or another. It's pretty common, and one reason why we are so careful. A lot of floods happen in less than 10 feet of water.

 

Cheers

James

[acroporas 0]

And see this thread for everyone's flood stories...

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=10883

[davichin 18]

Looking at your lens collection I don´t understand you even consider buying the Ewa...

[Paul Kay 65]

Many years ago (~20) I used an F801 Nikon in a Ewa housing at 10m. It was one of the Ewas which had a hand shaped glove welded into it, and at 10m the pressure squeeze locked it onto my hand! Not a comfortable dive (to say nothing about safety issues), but I digress. If you want to shoot immediately below the surface and use a lens of 35mm (film) equivalence or longer, then perhaps a Ewa bag would suffice - they do work in such conditions, although I would not personally put a Canon 1D series camera inside one. Any deeper and you will have problems of some sort (squeeze activating push buttons, difficulty operating the controls, and at worst the nightmare of a flood). For anything more ambitious then, only a full blown underwater housing with decent optical ports will really do. If you have Canon lenses then why not look at the 350D and see what is available for it - at the worst, buying a cheap set up means that you lose least money on upgrading!

[bmyates 5]

I've had and tried to use an Ewa plastic camera bag, and while they MIGHT work OK for shooting in the rain or snorkeling, or even free-diving down a few feet, they're total crap for actual underwater photography.

 

Just because they say it won't leak down to 66' or 100' or ANY depth, does NOT mean it will actually be USABLE at that depth. You can go ahead and buy one to try it, but I would bet money you'll decide on your VERY FIRST DIVE that it is useless at 30 feet. In that case, you'll still end up buying a legitimate underwater housing, and it'll just have cost you $300 MORE than if you hadn't bought the Ewa bag to store away in your "used once" closet.

 

I'm yet to hear from even ONE diver who actually uses an Ewa bag and finds it anywhere close to satisfactory below about 5 feet. Actually, I've never heard/read of anyone who finds it useful at ANY depth! The only people who say it IS are the people who sell them!

[Alex_Mustard 0]

Should I? Its either this, or the $7,000 from seacam or ikelite or something like that or buy a 20D + housing for about 2,300$. I know the housings are more expensive for a reason. But the one I linked is rated to 150 feet and I dont go beyond 100 feet anyways.

 

Without reading every post here... my feeling is that the bag is too compromised to produce decent image quality (due to lack of wide angle optics, macro port options and strobe lighting).

 

As a result even a great camera like your Canon would probably produce inferior results to a much cheaper setup that is well tuned to underwater shooting.

 

I would suggest looking for either a secondhand 300D setup or a good digital compact. Good underwater setups will easily out perform a 1DMk2 underwater, when contrained by a bag.

 

Alex

 

p.s lots of people haven't had floods too.

[anthp 0]

Umm, I don't know which review you read at photo.net, but this quote from http://photo.net/learn/underwater/primer pretty much sums up what most people are saying above:

I have some ewa-marine bags. To my amazement, they do not leak. However, I've never been able to use them successfully. The last time I tried the ewa bag was on a liveaboard trip to the Great Barrier Reef. I stuffed a Nikon 8008, SB-24 flash, and 60 macro lens into the bag. As soon as I got to about 30 feet underwater, the bag was pressing up against the camera to the point that the controls were inoperable. The AF drive wasn't strong enough to rack the lens out against the pressure of the bag. I got a few snapshots but they were mostly pathetic in quality. Oh yes, with my 20mm lens there was pronounced vignetting from the housing (example at right).

I endorse Alex and others' suggestions of buying a cheaper 300D setup. It would be nothing like $7K and would certainly produce better results that your 1D in a sandwich bag.

And the warning of flooding is real. You may not ever get a flood, but you should definitely get insurance with the kind of kit you are diving with. You'd be mad not to.

[hedonist222 3]

Ya I dont know what I was thinking. Logically speaking, it should not flood (other than user-error or long term wear) because its classified to go as deep as 150 or so. But then again and more importantly, I don think hard to use buttons at deep depths is the only reason for the $4,000 difference between it and the alternative.

 

davichin, because I do not want to spend twice the price of the camera for a housing. lol

[MikeVeitch 0]

Too funny!!!

 

major expensive camera.. and a ziploc...

 

hahaha

 

Sorry corrupted.. have you been scuba diving yet?

[bmyates 5]

I would suggest looking for either a secondhand 300D setup or a good digital compact.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I just realized that my entire earlier post was just "Ewa bashing" and that I didn't actually offer any constructive advice regarding alternatives (sorry -- I still remember the frustration of my Ewa housing's plastic being crushed against my hand and camera, rendering both totally unusable -- and when I get going on a rant, it's hard to stop! ).

 

I agree with Alex and several others. The most logical thing to do if you want to save money (but still be able to use some of your excellent lenses) is to buy a 300D or 350D (that's the Digital Rebel and DR XT), a decent housing (Ikelite or Aquatica), and a good strobe (such as a Sea & Sea YS-90 or YS-120). The 300D and 350D are affordable enough that I don't think you need to buy used. If you price all that out and decide you can afford to spend a little more, consider doing the same thing, but with either a used 20D or (for a little more) a new 30D (same housing brand choices).

 

The point is that you can get some stunning underwater images with any of the four cameras I mentioned and your existing lenses (David Haas has proven that with the 300D and 350D, and many others with the 20D, and I'm sure many will with the newer 30D as it becomes more widely used).

 

A side benefit is that you will find any of those four cameras FAR lighter and easier to use in some situations on land than your MkII, so the investment won't be wasted in that regard, either! I'm sure you'll still choose to use the MkII whenever feasible, e.g., when you can use a tripod, but you must admit that sometimes you wish you had something for handheld photography that weighed a couple of pounds less! Those are also good cameras for your spouse or significant other (mine refuses to even TRY to use the heavy MkII!), so can be valuable for that purpose, too!

 

For the above reasons, I have a 20D, and I find that I use it surprisingly frequently above water, not that my other bodies wouldn't be better, but I'm not a body builder and sometimes I just don't want to have to carry a tripod; I want to be able to hand-hold a camera and big lens, and that difference in size/weight makes it possible! HTH, and good luck!

[rodriguezfelix 0]

The Ewa-Marine U-AXP housing is manufactured from double laminated PVC and has an optical glass port. It is rated for dives of up to 150 feet (50m) depth.

 

 

Perfect for snorkeling, shallow diving, sandy, dusty, humidity or foul weather conditions. This housing will give your camera the best possible protection while being fully operable.

 

This is quote from "features" on BH website... and it´s say "shallow diving", so this give you an idea that manufacturer are not recommend it for real scuba diving at 30 or more ft...

 

Just something to consider...

[hedonist222 3]

MikeVeitch, yep and I loved it! Actually,recently ive been snorkeling and freediving (im assuming that when you hold your breath and dive down for as long as you can hold your breath and resurface is called freediving,while snorkeling when you reaach the top) and there are tons of photo ops. My freediving is not deeper than 7 meters, so I think I would not suffer a lot in regards to pressure making the case or ziploc as many are fond of calling it suck the camera and hence render most controls useless My biggest worry was it failing and flooding my cam + lens.

 

Bruce, thats why I regret selling my 20D 2 months ago. Grip (not at all defective) and all sold. Had I known I would be diving I would have held on to it and bought the housing which is much more reasonable than the 1dmkii housing and much safer than the ewa-marine selection. I guess thats my goal now,buy a new 20D or find a good used one and buy a housing for it.

 

rodriguez, I did in fact notice that "shallow diving",but the official website stated down to 150 feet. So I just assumed BH made a mistake.

[Alex_Mustard 0]

It seems that your heart is set on the bag, so you should get it. Since very few of us have actually tried one, you will have to report back and tell us how you got on. I am honestly interested.

 

I doubt you will flood it.

 

You also have to show us your photos. I think it will be a pain to use and the photos will not be as good as YOU could achieve with a compact camera. But the proof (either way) will be in your shots.

 

Best of luck,

 

Alex

[james 0]

Here are some photos taken by a EWA marine user using an S2pro in shallow water in Belize:

 

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp...essage=18178188

 

Not bad at all.

 

Cheers

James

[Kelpfish 15]

I'd liken the EWA versus a housing to using seran wrap versus a Trojan to protect your pole from unwanted blisters.

[bacripe 0]

I doubt you will flood it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I would still get insurance. I have seen 3 of these on Shear Water - all of them had leaks in less than 20ft of water.

[ReefRoamer 1]

Just a suggestion here: You can get a good 5 or 7 megapixel point and shoot, stuff it in a hard plastic housing and be good to go for easily under $500. My own backup setup of this kind is a Sony DSC W-1 ($250 before discontinued) and a Sony UW case for it ($170). For barely over $400 it does a great job for most macro and mid-range shots with the internal strobe. Forget wide-angle. My point is that you will definitely be able to go deeper and probably get better shots with a setup like this and have less flood risk than putting your $4,000 DSLR in a plastic bag. And it won't cost much more than the bag. If you get serious and want better shots, you'll then appreciate and understand the need for a more substantial housing for your high-end DSLR.

[hedonist222 3]

Alex, I guess I will not end up getting it because I am no longer in the US. So online transactions arent as easy as they used to be

I found a member on photograpny-on-the.net who said it was pretty much useless.

Here is his post (mbze)

 

This is a temporary solutiuon. I have someone that is going to make me a custom housing for the Mk2s that I have. sorry, don't even bother asking. It is a favor to me, limited productions

 

As for this EWA-Marine. Make sure you buy a weights for it. Not the internal one, as it doesn't fit with the mk2s. You have to get the external.

 

My first dive to The Sea Tiger (120ft), the camera locked up, because I didn't have enough air in it. I wasn't about to start blowing air in to it. Since I have $8k just in the bag.

 

My 2nd dive to the pipes at night, it was 45ft, and it was a little bit positive.

 

Than the Corsair, which I got enough air @ depth of 105ft so it was neutral. However during the ascent, it was like a balloon. So unless you are totally comfortable with your bouyancy. I would suggest not using the bag. During descent you have to ride it like a horse, or drag it down like a little b#$#h.

 

Also, pretty much all the controls is USELESS at 60ft+ I couldn't turn the dials. Everything is shot in AV mode, at f/5 I tried turning the knob, but it takes so much effort you start to burn air.\

 

Also, because of the compression from the bag, my 580EX was pushed pretty hard so it was in "Bounce flash" mode. I guess it works out okay. I need to try to see if the 14mm panel help spread the light more.

 

I dove with both the 24-105mm IS and the 16-35mm. at 24 it is bad. Vignetting and soft side (need dome port). I won't even both with 16-24.... Also... because of the pressure, zoom is useless. And you need a lens that has internal focusing.

 

Usage note. For whatever reason... nothing through the viewfinder was in focus.... It might be the plastic + air... but I couldn't tell... however if you are able to get the bag right, you should be able to use the AF system. You'll have to learn how to use both eyes to composition your shot, and trust your AF system.