Any Oly SP-350 users w/ tips to share?

[Byte Me]

I'm leaving on Thursday for Playa and doing some diving while there with my wife. I picked up an Oly 350 with UW housing recently and have been playing with it. The only problem I see so far is a bit of shutter lag when shooting the highest res JPG. Shooting RAW on the XD card just doesn't work - too darn slow.

Any tips on settings (especially custom settings) or other hints on using this little guy underwater?

Thanks!

 

[Larry C]

Go down to the Sticky titled "What camera, getting started", go to the second page and you'll find links to previous SP350 threads with voluminous info that you will find helpful.

 

[weaponeer]

I don't shoot RAW or the highest res JPG setting u/w. I normally set res to HQ. This still provides great res without the processing delay. Without a flash/strobe, I like the preset u/w settings and use a white dive slate at shooting depth to set my white balance. I've modified the custom menu functions to make access to the most commonly used settings faster and easier. I have an Ikelite housing for my SP-350.

 

[gary-ramey]

Get you a type H xd card. They're about 30% faster than the type M cards.

 

[Byte Me]

Thanks! I have one of each card, I printed out the whole sp-350 thread and read it on the plane! Lots of good stuff in there.

My first efforts on 4 dives over two days -

byteme45/Vacation/PDC 2007/diving - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

 

[diver 85]

Thanks! I have one of each card, I printed out the whole sp-350 thread and read it on the plane! Lots of good stuff in there.

My first efforts on 4 dives over two days -

byteme45/Vacation/PDC 2007/diving - Photobucket - Video and Image Hosting

OK but not much color, you using any kind of filter or evaluating white balance???......

 

[gary-ramey]

You can manually white balance the color or you can choose to shoot RAW and white balance them on the computer. RAW write times exceed 7 seconds.

 

[Larry C]

Good first try. The Featherduster worm, the Eels and the first school of fish are very nice. If you have photoshop you can go to levels and adjust some of the red out of the water on your wide shots.

 

[Byte Me]

Good first try. The Featherduster worm, the Eels and the first school of fish are very nice. If you have photoshop you can go to levels and adjust some of the red out of the water on your wide shots.

Thanks Larry! I did adjust all of the photos a bit in Camera Raw. I may have been too heavy handed with the tint adjustment. It's a fine line playing with color temperature and tint - they both play off each other.

Is it easier to use a red filter all the time or do custom WB each time the conditions change UW? That's going to be the question - it's easy enough to adjust the manual WB - I just never remembered to do it because I was too excited to just be under water again!

You should see the originals of these. YIKES! Very very blue.

 

[Larry C]

Thanks Larry! I did adjust all of the photos a bit in Camera Raw. I may have been too heavy handed with the tint adjustment. It's a fine line playing with color temperature and tint - they both play off each other.

Is it easier to use a red filter all the time or do custom WB each time the conditions change UW? That's going to be the question - it's easy enough to adjust the manual WB - I just never remembered to do it because I was too excited to just be under water again!

You should see the originals of these. YIKES! Very very blue.

If you're not using a strobe, you can white balance each time you change depth by more than a few feet. If you're diving above 40 ft., you can use a filter like the "Magic Filter" to get rid of the blues. There's also a photoshop "underwater action" that you can download and use if you're good with PS and can figure it out. I'm not, and couldn't. With strobes, I start out in Rawshooter essentials and set the white balance and color temperature. The Oly tends to be a little heavy on the reds when used with a strobe, so I tend to tone down the color temp a bit and modify the tint slightly away from red. When I get it where I want it, I'll usually take the better shots on PS7 and I'll try "auto levels" (sometimes hideous, so I'll edit>undo auto levels) then I'll try "auto color". These often give weird colors or too much contrast on UW shots. If they do, I'll go to levels instead and adjust the input and output in levels, one color at a time. Usually with the strobe, I have to move the bottom level red slider to the right, and go from 100 down to about 95 on the center bar. If it's still too vivid, I'll lower the light end of the output slider a bit. You can open the slider for R,B and G separately. If you don't like what it looks like, just go to edit>undo, or cancel and start over.