debersole 3 Posted October 5, 2012 I am heading to Kona in a couple of weeks and planning on doing a few "Pelagic Magic" night dives with Jack's Diving Locker. I will be shooing a Canon 7D in an Aquatica housing with dual Sea & Sea YS-250 strobes. I would be interested in any Tips and Tricks from anyone who has done this dive. Manual or auto-focus? White or red focus lights? Lenses (60mm or 100mm)? Thanks in advance! Doug Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
diver dave1 23 Posted October 5, 2012 Lots of threads on this very topic. Do some searching and you should find a lot of info already posted. 'Black Water' would like be a good search selection, among others. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
debersole 3 Posted October 6, 2012 Thanks, but I did a search in the forums for "black water", "black water night dive", and "pelagic magic". None gave me any results. If you have any other ideas or if you find something I did not, I would really appreciate it. Doug Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
debersole 3 Posted October 6, 2012 I left the "forums" page and went to the "home page" to search and lots of threads came up. Thanks! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
bvanant 179 Posted October 6, 2012 We have done that dive quite a bit. My best pics came with the 60 mm set to manual focus at about 10 inches away from the port. Have a big strong focus light (and a second one if you can swing it). Whenever something floats into the light then move the camera to get it in focus and fire away. I have tried autofocus with mostly miserable luck. Check out our website for a cool video of some of what you might see. Bill Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rramaley 5 Posted October 14, 2012 Hi Doug, Can you let us know how your experience went? Still umming and awwing about which operator to go with when we go in Feb... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
rramaley 5 Posted March 8, 2013 So we ended up going with Jack's Diving Locker. Was a pretty amazing experience - we went on their scheduled night and it was just the 2 of us on the boat, and chartered the boat for a second night (again just us 2) - if you can wing it that you are the only ones on the boat, it is a very special experience. The dive guides were in the water but for them it was a pleasure dive since they didn't have to worry about us. Each dive was ~75 minutes and some fantastic things floated by. Matt D'Avella (JDL's resident expert) takes a bit of warming up to (and likewise him to us) but we had a good time diving with him. He'll also give you good tips if you listen.... Here's a video I pulled together of my footage - pretty happy with the results though I wish I had a week of consecutive diving to work the kinks out. One big recommendation: bring a sh*% load of light - Matt the dive guide had 5 lights on his rig!!! My 2 Sola 1200s were woefully inadequate. https://vimeo.com/61169972 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SwiftFF5 134 Posted March 8, 2013 Very, very nice. You had me smiling all the way through. Thanks for sharing. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
debersole 3 Posted March 12, 2013 Very nice video. Thanks for sharing. Somehow I missed your original post. We went out two nights with Matt from Jack's Diving Locker as well. Glad you also had a great trip! Doug Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
