Cozumel Gallery

[Dee]

Detonate once bubbled...
Some things that really helped me with my camera focus was to:
(a) Turn on Full time AF
(b) Leave my camera in Macro Mode (flower mode)


I had a real hard time with exposure, so maybe someone could help you with that. I often times had bright almost white water or Turquoise water background, with a dark, almost black foreground. I still haven't figured that one out.

With your internalf flash, leaving the camera in macro mode is right because the light isn't going past 3 ft or so and you'll be shooting within that area anyway.

I had a hard time with setting exposures manually, it was just sort of a crapshoot most of the time. The I picked up on something that cleared it up. The aperature (f/stop) is what controls your depth of field (DOF), how much is going to be in focus from front to back. The exposure time (shutter speed) controls the background. For instance if you have a scorpionfish on a hunk of coral with more coral in the background, you aren't going to be able to see him....he'll blend in with the background. You need a dark background, so use a faster ET, say 1/600. The 'shutter' is moving so fast that ir only has time to capture the light as it reflects off the scorpionfish, but not off the coral in the background. It's not that the light didn't get to the background, the shutter was just to fast to capture it. Make sense? And since the scorpionfish is positioned lengthwise, you're DOF doesn't have to be very much as long as you get his width in. So a F/8 or F9 would work well, you want to get a little bit in front of him in focus.

Aperture = DOF (what's in focus
Exposure Time = how fast the 'shutter' is open to capture the light.

Hope that didn't totally confuse anyone!

 

[ReyeR]

Detonate, sorry to hear that you didn't have a good experience with the DS50 and TTL controller. Apart from camera/strobe setting, if you are too far from the subject or if the strobe hasn't been aimed correctly then you could end up with a blue cast in your picture. Also, you must remember that TTL will not give you correct exposures in all situations.

I actually used the settings and such recommended by Splashdown divers to shoot my photos, as well as tid bits I had picked up by lurking on the Digital Diver board.

I hope you didn't follow the flash settings for the C5050 (slave flash, level 1) on Peter's site - they are for shooting in manual using the DS-125. With the DS-50 and TTL controller you should have your camera's internal flash set to Int+Ext, flash forced on (thunderbolt symbol in P and A or Slow in S and M).

I'm guessing that the little switch inside of the TTL controller was flipped the wrong way. It's the only thing I can think of.

The switch varies the pre-flash duration of the strobe. Switched to the right = longer (brighter) pre-flash, left = shorter pre-flash as documented here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dsenswitch.html and pre-flash notes documented here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dig_definitions.html. Switched either way you should have the strobe light up the picture. I leave mine switched to the right.
You may also have to vary the 'flash compensation' to get consistent results in TTL. Documented here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dig_ttl.html and here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/qdigital.html.

I was really leaning towards the DS-125, but now I may rethink that decision and go with the YS-90DX.

Please remember the YS-90DX is similar to the DS50 with the manual controller, not the TTL controller.

Also, try out the rig on the surface before you take it UW. UW (with strong current) is the worst place to find out that your rig isn't setup correctly or not working.

BTW, I think you have some pretty good shots in the gallery, though you say some of them were your friend's (with the YS25).

HTH

 

[Detonate]

ReyeR once bubbled...
Detonate, sorry to hear that you didn't have a good experience with the DS50 and TTL controller. Apart from camera/strobe setting, if you are too far from the subject or if the strobe hasn't been aimed correctly then you could end up with a blue cast in your picture. Also, you must remember that TTL will not give you correct exposures in all situations.

At first I thought it was me aiming the strobe wrong. So I basically positioned it so that it was directly above the camera pointing forward (Almost like the internal strobe) for the second dive.

Then I started thinking that maybe TTL was giving me the wrong exposure, since I had read a lot of people saying that it wasn't so good, so I switched the dial from TTL to Manual, which SHOULD have given me a full dump of the flash on every shot totally over exposing my macro shots....

I hope you didn't follow the flash settings for the C5050 (slave flash, level 1) on Peter's site - they are for shooting in manual using the DS-125. With the DS-50 and TTL controller you should have your camera's internal flash set to Int+Ext, flash forced on (thunderbolt symbol in P and A or Slow in S and M).

I shot with it in Slow in M mode. I had it set to Slave 10 for Super Macro Mode, which I couldn't really use with all the current...

The switch varies the pre-flash duration of the strobe. Switched to the right = longer (brighter) pre-flash, left = shorter pre-flash as documented here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dsenswitch.html and pre-flash notes documented here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dig_definitions.html. Switched either way you should have the strobe light up the picture. I leave mine switched to the right.
You may also have to vary the 'flash compensation' to get consistent results in TTL. Documented here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/dig_ttl.html and here: http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/qdigital.html.

Hmmmm, then I don't know what I was doing wrong. Again, my DM told me a few times that my strobe wasn't firing.

Please remember the YS-90DX is similar to the DS50 with the manual controller, not the TTL controller.

That's what people kept telling me. And with the DS-50 being so much cheaper, I was hoping that it was going to suit me well on this trip, and the DS-50 with manual controller, or possibly the DS-125 was on my list for purchase. But now I'm not sure again.

The other problem I had with the rig was that the PT-015 housing doesn't stay on the tray well at ALL.

Also, try out the rig on the surface before you take it UW. UW (with strong current) is the worst place to find out that your rig isn't setup correctly or not working.

BTW, I think you have some pretty good shots in the gallery, though you say some of them were your friend's (with the YS25).

 

[ReyeR]

Ok, I'm trying to see if I can work out what went wrong....

At first I thought it was me aiming the strobe wrong. So I basically positioned it so that it was directly above the camera pointing forward (Almost like the internal strobe) for the second dive.

That's good, at least we know now it wasn't your strobe positioning.

I shot with it in Slow in M mode. I had it set to Slave 10 for Super Macro Mode, which I couldn't really use with all the current...

'Slow' is the 'flash mode'. When you select this it just tells the camera that you want the flash to fire everytime.

The 'flash setting' (Menu >> Camera tab >> Flash ) is what I'm interested in: Did you shoot in normal macro (flower sign) or normal mode (AF) at all? If so, in the menu, did you have the flash setting set to 'Int+ext' or 'Slave'? So that we don't confuse the issue we'll tackle 'Super Macro' (S+flower sign) and 'Slave' flash later...

The other problem I had with the rig was that the PT-015 housing doesn't stay on the tray well at ALL.

I presume you mean the housing spinning in the Ikelite tray. Ike has fixed this problem...

 

[Detonate]

When shooting in Macro Mode AutoFocus Mode, I had the flash set to INT + Flash per your recommendation in this thread:
http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=366308#post366308

I presume you mean the housing spinning in the Ikelite tray. Ike has fixed this problem... [/B]

Well that is incouraging!

 

[ReyeR]

When shooting in Macro Mode AutoFocus Mode, I had the flash set to INT + Flash per your recommendation in this thread: http://www.scubaboard.com/showthrea...6308#post366308

Ok, so that's correct too. If the TTL slave sensor was aimed correctly and you thought the strobe was firing then the only possibility I can think of was you needed to bump the flash compensation up to get the correct exposure. Other than that it might have been a dud controller.

Then I started thinking that maybe TTL was giving me the wrong exposure, since I had read a lot of people saying that it wasn't so good, so I switched the dial from TTL to Manual, which SHOULD have given me a full dump of the flash on every shot totally over exposing my macro shots....

In this case (when you tried a full dump), did you switch the camera's flash to 'Slave' (any level, usually 1 works)? Or was it still in 'Int+Ext'? If it was still in 'Int+Ext' then the camera would have fired a pre-flash and a main flash and the DS50 would have tried to do a full dump twice - once for the pre-flash, leaving it no juice left for the main flash and hence no strobe in your picture.

 

[kdietz]

Hey ReyeR, nice job trying to help out Detonate. With your suggestions, he should be able to figure out what happened.

Detonate, you've got good equipment and we've all gone through growing pains trying to figure it out. Underwater photography is never as "point and shoot" simple as we would hope for. It's possible that your sensor isn't working correctly, but more than likely its the indian and not the arrow. If in doubt, send it back to Ikelite and they can test it out before your next trip. Try that with a Sea & Sea product and see how long it takes.

I've had better results since I switched to the manual controller. The DS-50 should be capable of producing enough light for most shots except for extreme wide angle. If you consider changing strobes, I think you'll find that the YS-90DX is comparable in power to your strobe, regardless of what you read. It's just got variable power control, so you might as well buy a manual controller for $125 and be set.

If you end up with dual strobes down the road, you can use the digital sensor to fire the second strobe.

Good luck and keep reading these forums. You will learn a lot. Also, check out wetpixel.com and digitaldiver.net for more great advise.

Karl

 

[wiley]

Detonate
I have one more tip that I have found to be one of the most useful. WRITE EVERYTHING DOWN! Every one of these tips were great, but if you don't keep tract of what you did, then next time time you go down you may make the situation worse. The absolutely worst situation is that you may find exactly the right settings and not remember what they were! That's experience talking there! I keep a diary in which I write down the day's experience. I then can go back later and circle stuff, cross stuff out, write more stuff in the margins, etc. The number one rule of a good experiment is to ONLY change one setting at a time, record the results, and then design the next step and do the same thing all over again. This really is the best way to fight through all the different combinations. This may seem a little compulsive and at times and you may not think something is important, but write it anyway. No one else cares what you write, it's your diary!

 

[Detonate]

Thanks for all the help.

The one thing I was worried about is the other photographer with me.

I was afraid his strobe would cause mine to fire.

So I had the sensitivity turn all the way to Minimum. The strobe was still firing.

Then I had Jeff take a picture of me to see if my strobe would fire off of his...

So maybe mine was not re-charged while I was taking pictures. Maybe I forgot to turn it on during the dive. Maybe the batteries ran out. Or maybe I just have piss poor luck.



I don't actually own this strobe, so no harm no foul. It's just complicated my decision now. Had these pictures all turned out, I would have plopped down the money for the DS-125 w/ Manual Controller in a hear beat. Now I have to just think about it some more.

Thanks again for all the useful posts.