EWA-Marine DSLR Bags Vs Compact U/W Camera

[Spimon]

Hey Scubaboarders!

I've been an avid land photographer for a while now (longer than I've been diving) and would love to combine the two 'expenses' (famous last words!).

I have a Pentax K200D (no production underwater housing available). So I'm considering my options to get into underwater photography. Budget is limited to ~$400 for now.

1. Buy a dedicated underwater compact camera. Considering the Intova IC800, Nikon Coolpix L22, JVC Picsio, Sealife DC800, etc.

2. EWA-Marine makes an underwater bag for DSLR's for a smiliar price as option 1. They say they're safe to 50m (I don't plan on taking it deeper than about 20m). They claim after that depth they don't leak, but the bag becomes sqashed and starts pressing buttons on the camera. I can't imagine the squeeze would be good for the camera anyway.

Sadly I haven't been able to find any reviews when used at significant depth.
Ewa-Marine U-AXP 100 SLR Camera Housing - photo.net

3. Get over the whole idea for a while and save for a DSLR and hard underwater housing (Nikon or Canon I guess)? A DSLR + hard case is probably the prefered choice, but really not on the cards at the moment.

So I'd love to hear first hand experiences regarding:

- Will a compact 'cut it' after using a DSLR for so long, or will it 'cramp my style'? I've found it very hard to find examples of underwater photography using compact digital cameras (well that specifies which camera was used). Above the water there's certainly some great compacts, but I love the control of a DSLR.

- How do these underwater bags affect the useability of the camera and long term life of both bag and camera?

Thanks for any reviews, comments, thoughts.

 

[Damselfish]

My husband has a regular housing for his DSLR but got one the bags for snorkeling and kayaking, thinking it would be a handy more convenient thing. In reality he didn't even find it useful for that and we got rid of it (gave it away, as no one seemed to want to buy it.) Just too awkward to use.

 

[MarkH]

I used one of those EWA-Marine housings years ago down to a max of 80 feet deep up here in Canada. Problems are bouyancy in the shallows, but I didn't find it too annoying. In cold water, the major drawback is that I had to have a bare hand to use the built-in glove. The most I could wear was a dish glove. In 4-8 degree water, this can get painful. Eventually, it started to leak around the seams. The Pentax series I think are pretty small so it would probably fit in many old Ikelite housings. I have a Canon Digital Rebel series and used it in an old Ikelite housing ($35) on Ebay. After a few years it was pretty beat-up so I've recently upgraded to another old 1970's Ikelite housing ($100) bought locally. Obviously I don't have access to all the controls, but I never use all those useless gimick features anyway. It usually takes some adjusting of control rods, but I have control of shutter speed, ISO, aperature and the timer. That's all I ever use anyway.