New digital user - Olympus Stylus advice or other?

[sheilamo 0]

Hi - am new to underwater photography and am considering buying the Olympus Stylus 400 with the PT 016 housing. Any advice on this model? Also, I get mixed answers as to whether it can adapt to an external strobe and lenses (in the future when I'm ready for them).

 

Any other user friendly digital camera recommendations are also welcome. I consider myself a decent above ground photographer and would like to take my skills below for scuba. I welcome any advice - thanks!

[MikeO 5]

I would think that you could use the camera with just about any of the digital slave strobes. The only thing I would caution against with this camera is that is appears to not have a manual exposure mode. I believ that most here would agree that if you're an experienced photographer at all, you'll want a manual mode very shortly after you see your first shots from using "P" mode. Look into something from the C-xxxx series, though be forewarned that the new 5060 seems to be moving off in another direction as far as accessories and capabilities go . . .

[Genesis 0]

I'd buy a 5050 (and did, in fact) before the Stylus.

 

I thought long and hard about the Stylus - I have one of their compact 35s (same camera, but for film) and like it a LOT for a point-and-shoot, but underwater, you need some manual control - and this camera has - basically - none.

 

The 5050 turns out to have lots of other advantages too, like a movie mode that is actually worth using underwater.

[davet 0]

I've got the Stylus (known as the Mju here in GB), I was able to get the camera, PT-016 housing, extra battery and card for just over £300. It'll get used 47 weeks of the year on dry land, where it excels, and underwater it provides pretty good bang for buck in my opinion, in a pretty small package.

 

I added a UR-Pro colour filter and I have been very impressed with the cameras capabilites so far.

[scubag 0]

Sheila,

 

If all you want to do is point and shoot, the sylus is an good camera with the UR-pro filter. I have 3 of them in a rental program. The problems include: No exposure control outside of program auto, macro is 8" minimum, no way to turn off the camera between dives w/o opening the housing (the camera powers down after 3 minutes but the battery is dead in 3 hours even in power down mode, flash is severely underpowered. The plus is: its small (fits in a big bcd pocket), it shoots good photos (just hold it steady as slow shutter speeds w/o flash can be a problem), it's simple.

 

My recommendation: if you want to play with exposure buy either the Olympus 750UZ (4 mp), 5050 or 5060 (5 mp). The 5050 uses 4-AA batteries but has the 35mm wide angle lens, the 5060 has a 28 mm wide agle lense but uses a proprietory battery. All 3 of these are larger (no bcd pocket) and require more reading to master all the controlls, but worth it in the long run.

 

Doug