Canon A620 & Ikelite DS125...

[O'Malley]

I recently purchased the Canon A620 w/ Canon WP-DC90 housing and now, looking at the peripherals. Initially had been leaning towards a Sea & Sea YS15 Auto Sea Arm set-up but have decided to upgrade...didn't want to skimp and restrict myself down the road. I am considering the Ikelite Substrobe DS125 w/ DS Sensor. While it may seem like excess for a Point & Shoot camera, I simply want a system for now and future applications. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated...thanks!

 

[DesertEagle]

The DS125 is a superb strobe. In the event that you move to a DSLR, you will be well-equipped.

Ikelite is coming out with a new strobe, to fit between the DS50 and the DS125.

 

[bobf]

I believe you will want to use the manual controller to fine tune the DS 125 when used with a Canon A or S series camera:

http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dsensors.html

hth,
b

 

[lairdb]

I believe you will want to use the manual controller to fine tune the DS 125 when used with a Canon A or S series camera:

http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dsensors.html

Ikelite keep revising that page wihtout making it much clearer (and their answers over the phone have directly conflicted with teh website several times.)

The slightly older version (Google cache here) is actually clearer... a little:

Some of the smaller digital cameras like Canon "A" and "S" series or Olympus "D" series for example utilize a pre-flash with a duration that is too short for the powerful underwater strobes to duplicate. If the pre-flash of an underwater strobe is too different, the camera may not provide proper exposure. The EV Manual Controller provides consistent results with these cameras.

Similar wording here.

I had this problem with the 4100.5 and a DS-50 with my Olympus D-40. To Ikelite's credit, they traded me straight-out for the manual controller -- though I'd really rather have TTL that worked.

I just got a Canon A620 (haven't got it wet yet -- just ordered the housing today) and it seems to work fine in open-air with the DS-50 and the manual controller.

To substantially complicate matters, the folks on DigiDeep and Wetpixel seem to be getting very good results with Matthias Heinrich's TTL sensor used with Ikelite (and other) strobes, even with fast digital cameras. I haven't tried this yet, but I'm sorely tempted.