Entry Level

I apologize if this subject has already been brought up elsewhere on this site, but . . . I was seeking advice on an entry level camera and housing, or uw camera. Not ready to go whole hogfish with a digital SLR. I went on a trip last year and my buddy had a Canon A70 . . . ? I believe it was, point and shoot digital. It had a manual white balance, and I was amazed at the quality of the pics he was getting, and it was the first time he had used it. At this point I would probably like something that is not too cumbersome to drag along so I can take a few snaps when I see something pretty and then forget about it otherwise . . . But in trying to research it there are so many choices it's overwhelming! And of course I am looking for inexpensive yet amazing quality ... :D Any comments would be appreciated!

Entry level is always something you'll outgrow right away, like after the first trip. I've looked at the 600 dollar range cameras and I'd say you won't be happy with them. Maybe something like the Sea and Sea 800 or 8000 or whatever that is with an external strobe and wide angle adapter. I wouldn't go lower than that.

Seasnake,

I have a Canon SD630 6 mp camera with Canons inexpensive compact housing. It uses the camera's flash, and has a white light diffuser for macro stuff so it won't blow out the shot.

I am quite happy with it as a compact, easy to use camera that produces great photos and has a very large 3" LCD screen on the back, BUT, it doesn't compare with pro cameras, but it sounds like you and I are after the same thing.

I am sure the camera pros here though will have some better opinions. :)

I'm new to the forum but your all welcome to visit my site and check out my photos. www.underthesound.smugmug.com

Having introduced myself I'd like to give my 2 cents worth.

DON'T Buy an expensive SLR with a bunch of lenses and an expensive housing! Please don't! You have enough to do underwater without a camera that requires a degree to operate. Leave the SLRs to the pros! You can't change lenses underwater so you limit yourself to one type shot. and lenses ain't cheap! And forget the dedicated underwater cams. They just don't have the versatility you need.

I shoot a Canon Powershot S80 and I find it ideal for shooting underwater stuff, it has an awesome macro and it has a decent zoom also if you can figure what you need a zoom for underwater? The flash does a pretty good job for the close up stuff and doesn't wash out macro shots.

Several of the newer powershots are perfect for the job and less expensive. The A630/A640 are great and the new G7 and S3 iS are awesome. you can go with the inexpensive canon housings if you don't dive deep but if your into the deep stuff go with an ikelite housing.

Which brings up the big thing. Make sure that the case and all the accessories are readily available before you choose your camera and buy them right away. I know lots of guys that bought thair "ideal" camera only to find out the case was no longer available.

Things change really fast in the digital camera game. Whats new today will be discontinued 6 or 8 months from now.

I dive with a Canon A70. I bought it new years ago and have not had the need to upgrade. Sure there are much better cameras around - I dont dive solely to take pics - so the A70 is "right up my alley".

Thanks very much everyone this is exactly the info I'm looking for. I've been doing topside photography for quite a number of years and have a lot of moolah invested in a film set up, but my efforts at uw film photography have been disappointing. I'm pretty hooked on the instant feedback of digital photography. Just don't think I'm ready for a pro uw set up yet for two reasons: the $$, and also I don't intend to make uw photography the main focus of my diving at this time.
Seems the Canon's are very popular. Thanks for naming models folks, 'cuz Canon has about 8 kazillion models to choose from (give or take ;)). What about the Canon housing? I think they are rated for 130'? Has anyone taken them past that?

After doing my research, I think I have finally settled on the Canon A700. Very similar to the SD630 but a few little extras for the same price. Now where to buy from?? Does anyone have any experience dealing with www.bhphotovideo.com out of New York? Or can you suggest any other online retailers? (Any in Canada would be nice) B&H carries the particular Ikelite housing I need for this camera.

Ron

Ron, B&H Photo has a huge following and reputation in the photographic community.

They are probably the hightest rated mail order house. They don't have grey market stuff, they don't ship things with Japanese markings and words on the camera controls, their cameras come with all the factory accessories, etc. But that is why they don' thave those remarkable prices, because the prices are real, not fake bait and switch.

B&H can do grey stuff if you want. Check out any dive or photo board and their name will be there more than once and hardly ever a bad comment.

Matt

Oh goody, there's already a thread on the info I need (on a decent point-and-shoot with compact u/w housing). And so...were you or anyone here able to acquire a Canon A700? (I noted you said that it's priced the same as iDiveChick's camera of choice but offers a bit more?) Was it everything you thought it would be?

Okaaay, just to say that I called up the Canon office here and learned that the Canon A700 is no more -- what with the new, improved A710 IS (of course). I surfed for the appropriate underwater housing and came up with Canon WPDC6 (up to 130 feet or 40m). My brother lives/works in Beijing and travels to Singapore so I think maybe he'll get it at a better price for me than if I buy it in Manila, we'll see...

I am now the proud owner of a Canon A700, probably one of the last ones available! Here in Canada at least, the A700 was switched with the A710 on the market as of March 1. So I got a great deal as they cleared this model out. I also have an ikelite housing for it, but it is still en route and not in my possession yet. My first impression of the camera was "wow, this thing is small!", a little more rinky dink look and feel than my film set up! Have not used it much more than to shoot a few experiment snaps as I read through the manual trying to figure out how the heck to work it, but so far it seems easy to use and all the controls are well at hand and easy to manipulate. The large LCD is great.
As soon as I can get it underwater I will post some pics! :)
One issue that came up on a local board is the problem of fogging, and now I'm worried about that. The water here is typically quite cool (still around 30F right now) and a lot of people complain about their cameras fogging. Will I run into that problem in the Caribbean, where the water is warmer?
Ron

Nothing like a user’s rating to go by so it’s helpful to know you committed (plonked your dough and all that) to your Canon A700. Presumably an A710 can only be better -- if there’s no hold-out piece here with your same must-go deal.
I think I’ll just stick with the available Canon casing for the best fit (for full access, lens extension, etc.) I'm told it doesn’t come with protective storage though and, if my cell phone is any indicator, I do have to guard against scratches.
Anyone, do I really need the Canon weights to supposedly neutralize the case's bouyancy? I mean, is it that bouyant? (And that's why I'm in the beginners' thread :D )

That's an excellent question. I don't know what the bouyancy characteristics of the ikelite housing are going to be and assume I'm going to have to weight it somehow. I have used cameras that were bouyant and oh man! What a pain in the patootie! I can tell you the camera is very light, so my guess is that with the airspace in the housing it is going to be very bouyant.
In my research I could not find a camera that compared to the A700 for features at that price. All reviews I read about it were very positive. I would presume with you, the 710 can only be better.

Pain in the patootie, I hear you, buying the weights then.
I’m also beginning to see Rzade’s earlier point here on making sure of product availability. I was just at a Canon showroom this afternoon and it seems selling me both the camera and the housing right there and then just isn’t done. (I was hoping to save my brother the trouble of still having to scour Singapore, and so I could already test the gear during next week's trip.)
Personnel from the store and from the sales office were consistent in saying that the housing has to be ordered—as if to give me time to reconsider the idea of submerging newly bought equipment.
Amused me how the word “leakage” (the possibility of it) was bandied several times, making me imagine how enough customers complaining about waterlogged cameras (user’s fault or not) have conditioned them to be less than enthusiastic about pushing marine cases. Oh well, the waiting can't be helped.

Uh-oh, I think I just made an impulse purchase. I was in one of the shops that carry Canon cameras, and it turns out they also have underwater casings AND weights to go with them. That got me excited. I asked for the most compact and they gave me IXUS 850 IS, and I went "sold!" I'm diving in Anilao tomorrow to try it out. Wooh boy, I better work this out :)

Can't wait to see some pics ...

I finally got my housing but have only had a chance to "leak test" it here in the pool at work. I hopefully will get to try it with the camera Sunday during a class session in the pool. The water is colder right now than the acceptable operating temp for the camera.

If anyone is interested . . . the ikelite housing was positve without the camera in it ... (it is billed as slightly negative in their advertising) *shrug*

Sweet!

You have a pool at work?

Yeh ... Canadian Coast Guard College . . .

first random batch:

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second random batch:

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so now that the camera survived me on our "familiarization" dive (and it had to be a drift dive, sheesh), i hope to take pics of marine life that actually move :) on next month's dive at verde, puerto galera. hopefully then, i'd have something worth starting a photo gallery :)

Very nice ... :) I didn't take my camera to the ocean this weekend, I was worried it would be too cold ... kicking myself now, because conditions were perfect ... But I did take into the pool last night during a class and shot some video ... I'll try and post later ...

P.S. the housing turned out to be slightly negative once the camera was in it . . .

I tried out the weights on my camera housing but, pleading ignorance -- because this was a different model from what I initially researched on (learn from this, people! :) ) -- I definitely put on too much (a sealed box comes with four pieces so I underwent trial-and-error). Although that didn’t bother me too much then because, the truth is, when I wasn’t shooting, I was cradling the camera in my palms almost during the entire dive. I kept thinking the strap might loosen, slip off my wrist, and my mistakenly overweighted housing would go hurling down to depths I can’t reach.

Could happen too. On our third dive of the day, as we descended in strong current, instead of seeing a white sandy bottom open up, it just kept getting bluer and darker, like being cocooned. The visibility was poor enough as it was. Finally, at 75 feet, we looked at each other, threw up our arms in a “huh?” gesture, and, a minute after, signaled “abort dive.” It turned out the boat’s anchor came loose and we drifted off. We were in the wrong spot. Our DM described it as being in a moving aquarium, we didn’t know we moved because we were moving with the water. Lost 500 psi but, once we were finally anchored right, had enough to go back down and continue taking test shots. It was interesting to say the least.

Today, I did the online research I should have done the night before the dive and saw that Canon recommends 0 weight for my housing -- grrrr -- although I don’t entirely trust that. I’ll just have to fine tune on the next dive if I perhaps need at least 1. I also noticed that the weight screw has a tendency to loosen during the dive if I don’t use a coin to really turn it tight. Finally, another diver in the group advised me to cushion the sides of the Canon housing with tissue, showing me the scarring on the face of her own camera.

Okay, finally, here are a couple of pics from the Canon A700 I took last weekend. Not the most spectacular site, quite silty, and of course I was just experimenting with the new equipment ... and other such disclaimers ... lol
water temp=38F viz=15'-20'

The crab pic (with its autumn-hued backdrop) makes me think of a watercolor painting.

Placid waters over there.

What exactly was that "slime ball"?

"autumn-hued backdrop". What a nice way of saying "mudhole". Actually I think they call that stuff rockweed, but as you can see, everything including the poor little crab is covered in silt. The bottom in this area is extremely soft. It is a huge brackish inland "sea" that is open to the ocean in three spots (one opening very near this dive site, actually. The slime ball? I have no idea what that is, but we see it fairly frequently. I assume it's some type of algae ... but if you put that in a bucket and drained the water out I doubt if what was left would fit in your hand, although underwater that mass was probably 3' (1 m) across at least.