Hawaii diving with the RX100 II

[Skeptic14]

Sure, just hopefully the OP doesn't regret posting dive pics if people pile on with more scrutiny or critiques, like a diver in the group fin hitting the bottom

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

, like a diver in the group fin hitting the bottom

Yeah! I hate people who ... wait a minute!

 

[scubadada]

I would think most of us are upset with the dive op, not @ggibson. First time I saw something like that, I didn't say anything to the dive op. Now I am vocal and I stop dive pro's from doing that. I actually intervened underwater in Oahu with an instructor (not associated with the dive boat) in front of his students. I was wondering if he was going to confront me deck side, but he didn't. I figured I embarrassed him enough in front of his students, so I let it be. No need to create a scene for people completely unaware of what happened.

@ggibson posting a picture like that is implicit consent, sorry, this is just wrong. In addition, take a look at the other divers, standing on the reef, swimming vertical, this is an embarrassment.

 

[ggibson]

Regarding the octopus handling, I agree it is not proper. This was with Hawaii Nautical in Oahu--one of the dive masters pulled him out of his hole for us on the second dive (maybe the same guy?). I just went on the one boat dive with them, however I didn't express my distaste vocally. I debated about posting the pictures as I worry it promotes this kind of thing more.

Heh, and yes there were a mix of skill/experience levels on that boat and many a fin striking the bottom. Anyways...

The acquapazza housing is really well built and controls well for the most part. My RX100 II lens ring is pretty stiff unfortunately, so that control doesn't work so well. Hard to say if that is common or not. I can usually get by with just the rear wheel control. The lens port is a screw-on which makes me nervous sometimes. You can swap it out for a port with an LD mount if you don't want m67 screws. I've actually felt mine turn a bit on a dive when I was adjusting the lens, but it did not leak. No leaks so far, but <10 dives since I've had it.

The UWL-04 lens petals often show up in photos, but a slight crop removes it. They don't appear in video though, due to a slight automatic crop I suppose.

I shoot mostly in A mode to make sure my aperture is not wide open with the UWL-04 (corners start to suffer below f8). Although like I said, I'm still learning, so I was playing in S and M mode and lowering the shutter speed to affect background brightness. My flash is usually set to TTL, although I set my internal RX100 flash to -2 comp to help save on battery.

 

[scubadada]

Regarding the octopus handling, I agree it is not proper. This was with Hawaii Nautical in Oahu--one of the dive masters pulled him out of his hole for us on the second dive (maybe the same guy?). I just went on the one boat dive with them, however I didn't express my distaste vocally. I debated about posting the pictures as I worry it promotes this kind of thing more.

Heh, and yes there were a mix of skill/experience levels on that boat and many a fin striking the bottom. Anyways...

So, I guess you had the opportunity to make several constructive comments and chose not to, sorry you did not make the effort. We all need to contribute or accept reef degradation. So glad you got some shots you are proud of

 

[ggibson]

Look, scubadada, I'm not posting here to get in a fight with you about all this, and it's all off topic. Just because I took a picture of something doesn't mean I approve, and I don't have a responsibility to fix the world's problems. I provided the dive operation name--why don't you vent your frustration with them? If you want to post further on the topic, please do it someplace else or PM me.

 

[Skeptic14]

Thanks for the info on your setup ggibson and thanks for posting, and now you are aware that you are responsible for the buoyancy/trim and behavior of divers that might end up in your pictures... meh, sometimes people are more interested in feeling superior than actually teaching.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

I think the OP understands that it is preferable to speak up for such incidents in the future. Whether he feels comfortable doing so, is up to him. The whole idea that "you're either with us or against us" is a bit extreme. I think he also understands that posting pictures of sea life being harassed can give others the ideas of "cool! I want to do that too!"

As far as my comment regarding the person standing on the bottom, that is no way was meant as a criticism of the OP, only the dive op, as it is their responsibility to at least try to prevent customers from destroying the environment.

 

[fish80]

I just upgrated to a rx100 m2 after using a tg4, but it is so much more complex!

Which settings do you recommend for wide angle shooting with ambient light (not WA lenses at the moment). In the tg4 I simply used aperture priority set to f2.0 and let the camera choose ISO (normally 100 or 200) and shutter speed. I would like something simple as I do not have time nor the ability to fiddle around with many controls at the moment.

By the way, great shot of the green turtle!! And... I also live on Oahu... Let's get some dive!

 

[ggibson]

Hey fish80, I'm jealous you get to live in Oahu and have access to dive so easily. I'm here in California, where the waters are a bit cooler (although I do enjoy diving Monterey every now and then)

For settings, I'd first recommend playing with your camera a lot above water to get to know it, even inside the case too. I would always do that leading up to dive trips to make sure I'm familiar with all controls and to test out how different settings work. Practice makes perfect. Learn what aperture and shutter speed do so that you can learn when and how to control these settings.

Here are some tips for shooting without a strobe:

• Auto ISO will probably be fine.
• Set your camera to RAW (or RAW+JPG if you want) so that you don't have to worry about white balance and can adjust it in post. It can really make a big difference in being able to recover colors and highlights.
• If you have anything that could be fast-moving in your shot (fish), you could use S mode so that your shutter is 1/200+ or so to reduce motion blur.
• If you allow your camera to pick aperture (like in Auto or S mode), it will most likely just set it wide open aperture to get as much light as possible--this is probably fine. My Fix UWL-04 wet lens makes corners blurrier if you shoot below f8, which is why it becomes necessary to stop the aperture down. For most casual shooting, letting the RX100 be wide open is fine because the sensor is still small enough that most things will stay in focus. Aperture on this camera is more about controlling light.
• Dive mid-day so that the sun is overhead and light penetrates deeper.
• Shallow dives (<45ft) will give better colors.

I started out shooting without a strobe mostly (just using onboard flash a bit) and you can still get some great shots. I've had some images published that were taken without a strobe. The further you get in this hobby though, the more you'll want a strobe