Category Archives: Camera Equipment

Posts about the camera and lighting equipment I use

Camera Equipment, Diving Blogs, The Digital Shootout 2012

Day 2 of The Digital Shootout (first day diving)

Leave a comment
Still taken on my first day diving in Little Cayman

For this trip, I took with me a Sony NEX 5N with the 18-55mm lens, and a Nauticam housing.   I have used this rig once before, but always in an automatic mode (similar to using a Point and Shoot).   Now, for this trip, my goal was to get better at using the full functionality of the camera and increase my skills as an underwater photographer and videographer.   So, I got a quick lesson in how to use the system in completely manual mode.  I manually set/changed ISO, f Stop, and shutter speed depending on if I was shooting video or photo and depending on the conditions where I was.   I did leave the camera in auto white-balance mode and then fixed up most of the shots/video in post production.  For lighting I was using 2 Light & Motion Sola’s (one 1200 and one 800).  These lights did a good job for video, but created quite a challenge for shooting stills.   Ultimately I will need to upgrade my rig to include 4 lights, 2 strobes and 2 video lights to give me that flexibility to switch between the two mediums at will and not burn down my video lights when I am shooting stills.

In the morning we went on two dives, that were nice (although lets face it, for me any dive is a nice dive so I may be biased).   I shot quite a bit of stills and some video, although nothing super inspiring happened in the water, but it was my first real attempt at going completely manual and having all the control.   It was quite fun, and I learned a lot on these dives.

In the afternoon, we got a seminar on underwater photography techniques, there was quite a bit of good information for me in the talk (and handouts) so that I could improve my skills in this area.

Every night during the week, there was a slide show and video presentation of the stuff shot that day if you wanted to get feedback on what you might do better, what looked good, and in general how to improve the work product.   It also provided a good drinking game for the event staff by playing “buzzword bingo” and drinking on phrases like “tack sharp” or “dialed in”.   I found these slide shows great not only for my own feedback, but the feedback and shots given to others.   This first day is where I really got the idea that I liked macro images of animal eyes, and later in the week got some good shots.

I also learned to make sure that of all the elements in a shot I need to ensure that I had clear focus on certain elements over others to ensure a high quality shot/video such as the eyes, mouth, and fins.  This is much harder than it sounds, especially underwater with moving “models” and current that causes you to move as well.

This video is cut together from work shot on the second day of the trip (first diving day).  Hopefully it will give you an idea of what I experienced in the water this first day… and why I fell in love with Little Cayman almost immediately.


And this video is a slideshow of some of my favorite stills from the second day of the trip.

 

Camera Equipment, Dive Equipment, Diving Blogs

My new lights… it makes all the difference in the world!

Leave a comment
Light and Motion Sola 1200 and 800

Have you ever taken underwater photo’s and videos only to have them look very blue?   This was my problem and for the longest time and I thought it was the cameras I was using, so I kept looking for better camera equipment.  What I have recently discovered is that the best investment you can make in underwater photography and videography gear is not the camera or the housing, but the lights that you use.  There are plenty of lights to pick from, strobes and flashes for photography, and other lights for videography, but for me, what I have found works best are Light and Motion Sola lights that can mount to my camera housing via a tray.   When I need the lights, I turn them on, and then when not using them I turn them off to conserve the battery life.   With this method, I found that I can do 3 full dives and have juice left over after shooting a lot of video and photographs.

 

 

Light and Motion Sola 1200 and 800

These lights provide a very rich color that works great even with my Sony TX7 entry level underwater camera.  I can’t wait to try them out with the Sony NEX7 in a Nauticam housing which I will be doing at the 2012 Digital Shootout in Little Cayman this June.    I highly recommend that if you are serious about underwater photography or videography to pick up some of these Light and Motion lights.

These LED lights can illuminate a wide or narrow beam of light with three different intensities to create many lighting modes as well as extend battery life of the lights under water.   Charging the lights is fairly quick and easy to see what the current state of the battery life is both while charging as well as while using the lights.

Camera Equipment

Trial run with the Sony NEX 5N camera and Nauticam marine housing…

Leave a comment
Hairy Hermit Crab
Hairy Hermit Crab taken with the Sony NEX 5N

On a recent trip to Hawaii (11/27 – 12/10) I was given the chance to play with the brand new Sony NEX 5N camera and an even newer Nauticam housing for it.  Obviously this camera is quite a bit more advanced than the Sony Cybershot TX7 I have talked about in my starter camera post.

Since I only had the camera for 1 day prior to my trip, I didn’t really have time to learn all the bells and whistles on this system.   The first step I had to do was figure out how to put the housing together and then the camera in the housing.  When first looking at the housing it looks rather complex (it was made even more complex for me because I had no documentation).   After about 10-15 minutes of reviewing the various parts, I was able to fairly easily figure out how to put the unit together, attach the camera to the unit and try it out.

The camera has many advanced features, of which I only had enough time to scratch the surface but I tested the ability by snapping a few shots in my hotel room, with the lights off, the shades pulled (very low light) and I was shocked at how much I was able to pick up in a photograph.  This is not true for the video mode as that definitely needs good light in order to shoot a good video.

After playing above the water with the camera in my hotel room, it came time to get wet with the camera.   One of the

Titan Scorpion Fish
A close up of a Titan Scorpion Fish shot with the Sony NEX 5N

cool things I wanted to try with the camera was shooting video in 1080P 60p (60 frames per second).  The quality is simply amazing.   I am finding however, that in this super high-end mode, Windows Live Movie Maker does not seem to be able to properly import the video.

Both Sony Vegas and Adobe Premier are capable of importing the videos, but both of those programs are far more complex, so one disadvantage of the higher video mode is that the simple, and easy to use video editor (Windows Live Movie Maker in my case) hasn’t been able to process the codec correctly.

As I get the photo’s and videos from this camera edited, I will post them here, but things I noticed right off the bat compared to the TX7 was how quickly and correctly the camera focused for still shots, especially smaller items.  With the TX7 trying to focus on small items requires many tries, zooming out and back in, and other tricks to get a shot, while the NEX 5N almost always was able to correctly focus on what I wanted in a very quick succession (10 shots per second quick if I wanted).

One problem I found when shooting video (and a few times for stills) was that autofocus on the camera would sometimes focus in and out of the particulate in the water vs the image I wanted to shoot.  The video that shows this clearly happening was when I was swimming with Hammerheads (a VERY cool experience).  See how the camera comes in and out of focus of the sharks vs the near floating particulate?

I would have loved to spend more time with this camera learning the in’s and out’s, as well as mastering the best settings for both the camera and the external flash in order to get the most optimal photographs.   What I did discover was that for video shooting, the best light was a Light & Motion Sola Video 1200.

In all, this was an amazing camera and housing to use, and I found the quality of my photos and videos increased dramatically while still having the compact size I love about the TX7.  No big bulky DSLR and heavy housings to carry around.

One last note that was one of the GREATEST features of this system was that shooting video and shooting a photograph  are accomplished with two different buttons on the housing (and camera) such that I was able to switch between video and photography without having to use any menus.   If I wanted a picture, I simply pushed the photo button, and if I wanted video, I simply pushed the video button.  It was amazing to easily switch back and forth to get both types of images.

Camera Equipment

My starter underwater camera…

1 Comment

The first underwater camera I used (and still the only one I own so far) for scuba diving is the Sony Cybershot DCS-TX7 with the Sony Marine housing.

For basic underwater photography and videography the camera is ok, but sadly the camera was fairly limiting for underwater photography (in terms of getting good color, and configuring it for underwater shots).

This camera, however, shines when it comes to shooting 1080i underwater videos.  Most of the video’s on my website so far were shot with this camera.

If you need a relatively inexpensive underwater setup that can double as a great above water point and shoot and video camera then this one is for you.

It is very light weight, easy to travel with, and the underwater housing works great.

In the end however, this is a starter camera setup, so if you are really going to get into underwater photography or videography then this system will only take you so far.

Problems with the camera for underwater use:

  • In housing mode (to use it in the underwater housing) you can not configure many options, including ISO.  This makes it hard to use external flash correctly, causing either too blue or too washed out of photo’s.
  • The auto-focus had problems with particulate in the water, as many cameras do, but also could not properly focus on a subject in crevices and the like.
  • Battery life was limiting underwater.  The battery could make it through a 1 hour dive no problem, however, it would not endure a second 1 hour dive.  You will need at least 1 hot spare battery and a dry place to switch it on your surface interval for each additional dive.
  • Taking pictures of very small creatures was not effective with this camera.   It does a far better job with larger items.

Next up… my use of the Sony NEX 5N camera and Nauticam housing for it…