Stoo 42 Posted October 8, 2021 On 9/16/2021 at 11:08 PM, mcranga said: I have no issue spending more money and get it right the first time, nothings worse than buying twice I think you're falling into the old "more money = better photos" vortex. The argument has some merit, if you're a capable photographer, but as you said yourself, you have almost no experience with photography and not much more with diving. Most new UW photographers discover it's exceedingly tricky to get good shots out of the bag. Many years ago, my brother, who is a sponsored Canon pro, borrowed an old UW film setup of mine for a trip to Galapagos. He came back and pronounced that "underwater photographer is impossible". My point is only that starting with a complex system is more likely to yield frustration than strong images. So contrary to what you said above, there is nothing wrong with "buying twice" as your skills improve. You may find it comes easily, or you may find you don't have an "eye" for it. It's always better to take crappy images with a cheap camera than a fancy one... if nothing else, you have a good excuse! We all have friends who have to have the latest camera gear but they can't make a memorable issue to save their lives! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ChrisRoss 150 Posted October 9, 2021 17 hours ago, Stoo said: I think you're falling into the old "more money = better photos" vortex. The argument has some merit, if you're a capable photographer, but as you said yourself, you have almost no experience with photography and not much more with diving. Most new UW photographers discover it's exceedingly tricky to get good shots out of the bag. Many years ago, my brother, who is a sponsored Canon pro, borrowed an old UW film setup of mine for a trip to Galapagos. He came back and pronounced that "underwater photographer is impossible". My point is only that starting with a complex system is more likely to yield frustration than strong images. So contrary to what you said above, there is nothing wrong with "buying twice" as your skills improve. You may find it comes easily, or you may find you don't have an "eye" for it. It's always better to take crappy images with a cheap camera than a fancy one... if nothing else, you have a good excuse! We all have friends who have to have the latest camera gear but they can't make a memorable issue to save their lives! I'm not sure I agree with premise that a more complex system will confuse you, generally I find I'm giving people advice on kludges to get around limitations in cheap systems like lack of manual mode or lack of manual flash. If you compare a TG-6 to m43 you have to shoot the TG-6 in aperture priority and accept the bottomed out shutter speed or dive into the the menus to activate the minimum shutter speed option with flash which requires auto ISO and min ISO of 400. _ what you really want to do is fix the shutter speed and use base ISO100. The m43 camera you put it in manual mode and dial in any shutter speed you like and shoot. The TG-6 does great macro but you need to be on top of the subject and even then it's not life size. and lighting is difficult. A 1"sensor (RX100 etc.) for macro you get about 0.5 - 0.7x magnification with a strong diopter that only focuses between 45 and 80mm, some are even more restricted in range. The 60mm macro on m43 focuses from infinity down to life size with about 50% more magnification than the 1"sensors and has at least 80mm working distance at max magnificationand is overall easier to use and to get your strobes the light the subject. Certainly an interchangeable lens camera is very complex but you only have to use a very small subset of that complexity to take you UW images. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
