OP
I really can't say enough about how great it was to dive with you on that Sunday. Just one of the highlights of our trip.
Details on the rig are here, and here, and here.
Backscatter info is here.
All of the wides in MoCal on this trip were shot with my 12-24mm lens. That means I need to back off a bit, but I can still get pretty close. I use very long arms on my W/A rig - 14" I think. Two on each side. Add in the clamps, strobe body and camera housing and my strobes, when fully extended, are close to 7 feet apart. I try to land the light on the subject and light through the subject - never illuminating the subject directly.
The key is to not light up the water between the front of the dome and the subject - that's where backscatter lives. I'll get strobe bleed sometimes at the widest settings on the lens, but I don't get much backscatter. The most egregious stuff I'll pick out, but the water was so clear up there I didn't need to do much to these shots.
White balance is important. You don't want the skin of the divers in the picture to look all Casperesque. Find something in the shot that is gray and go from there.
Avoiding macro backscatter is easy - you just approach by stealth, work fast and get out of there before the stuff gets in the shot.
So good to see you. Hope you liked the Yook. I have lots of shots of Claudette on there that we love.
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Ken
Chica Yooking it up! A view from the inside
At the funnel
Double Dolphin
On our descent to the Yook, a salp chain drifted by!
White Tower
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