Incredible Photos

[mccabejc]

Holy guacamole !!! The photos some of you guys take are just insane !!! Very impressive. I'm new to diving, and my next step after I have some more dives under my belt is to start doing photography. I have a 5MP digital camera (Minolta Dimage 7i) for land use, but unfortunately I can't find a good housing for it.

So, at risk for incurring the wrath of the board for asking this question because the answer is probably located somewhere in the archives, can anyone recommend a 5MP underwater camera outfit for under $1,000, that has a good lens (or maybe replaceable lenses)?

Alternatively, does anyone know of a good underwater camera review site with ratings?

Thanks.

 

[saf_25]

You're right, this question is asked time and again. Just look at the first couple of pages in the UW photography forum and you'll find your answers.
But, to somewhat answer your question, Canon and Olympus both make good underwater cameras and housings at very reasonable prices. I believe that Sony does as well, but my friends and I all have either Cannon or Oly, so I'm not as familiar with the others out there.
Personally, I went with the Olympus c-5050, as MANY others on the board have as well. Camera and housing together cost just around $700 for a 5 mgapix cam. The final push for this over the Cannons was the large number of people here that recommended the 5050, so I knew that I would get the support for it. Plus, I see that you're in SoCal - we have started a user's group that meets to discuss different features of the camera and underwater photography in general. Most all of us have this camera, so we're learning how to use it together (although some don't even do photography, and there are users of other cams as well). There's a subforum of the UW photography one that has info of our next meetings - we're hoping to get one together in the next few weeks.
The best advice I can give you is to spend some time searching through the Underwater Photography forum - the answers to a lot of your questions are recent there. Then, if you have specific questions, come back and ask them. People will be much more likely to give you a helpful anser if it isn't the same question they've already seen asked 10 times this week.

 

[mccabejc]

Excellent. Thanks. I've started looking around at nice digital cameras ($800-$1,000) plus housings (another $1,000-$2,000) and got sticker shock. The Olympus C5050 sounds like it's right up my alley.

 

[justinbaker]

http://www.digideep.com/product.php?pType=camera&mID=23&pID=441