Looking for a d80 underwater housing.

[williamd717]

Hi all names Will I just got certified and I want to specialize in underwater photography and am looking for a decent priced underwater housing for my nikon d80.

 

[jcclink]

Congratulations on your certification. Before getting too serious about u/w photo you need to be very comfortable diving & have excellent buoyancy control skills. Some develop quickly, some take a bit longer to master the skills. U/w photo turns into serious multi-tasking. Most of your time is spent on looking for & photographing subjects (adjusting camera & strobe settings, positioning, etc). Diving skills must become second nature. One hand for camera, one hand for diving. And you will become a solo diver at some point (if not most of the time). So - with all this in mind, what's your budget? Will you need a complete setup - housing, ports, lenses, strobes, arms, etc. Is your computer big enough & fast enough to handle files, Photoshop, backup, etc? Laptop for travel? As you can see $$$ can mount up fast. Not to discourage you at all - just making sure that you understand all that u/w photo requires. You DO have a Platinum Card, right? You will see a lot more critters in the sea as a photographer than just a basic scuba diver. Good luck!

 

[John Gulliver]

Good advice from jcclink! The D80 is of course fairly old by digital standards but it works fine under water. I'm perfectly happy with mine and, as I can't reasonably expect to be diving for many more years, do not plan to upgrade. However, because of ithe camera's age, you don'r want to spend too much om a housing. Unlike me, you will probably want to upgrade within a year or two and will need to buy a new housing. I theredore suggest you look for a used Ikelite housing and used ports and strobes. Ikelite housings and ports are a lot cheaper than aluminium housings and still work just as well under normal circumstances. An important advantage IMHO is that Ikelite digital strobes give you TTL with Ikelite housings and sync cords.