Need advice for point & shoot underwater camera

[pixoft]

Hi everyone

I need advice on buying a new underwater camera. I'm not sure which one to chose since i'm not a scuba diver, i only do freediving (not deeper than 50 feet), so maybe having an external flash is not absolutely necessary.
My old Olympus mju 770sw was just flodded (maybe you really should stay above 33ft ), so this time i'm looking for a decent camera. I don't need too many advanced manual controls (i don't want to fiddle around with controls and loosing shots while my air is running out), a good point & shoot camera will do.
What really bugged me about the mju 770 sw was that it hat a pretty slow autofocus and/or bad shutter lag, so the fish usually were outside the picture when the camera finally fired. So what i'm looking for:
- Fast camera to capture moving objects
- Small
- Relatively low priced
- Good performance in "shallow" water (~20-30ft) if possible without external flash, or even without flash at all

I looked at the Sealife 1000HD and the Sea&Sea DX-1200HD/1G/2G and the best choice to me seems to be the Sealife, but there are of course drawbacks in all of these models (small sensor size, no raw, no wide-angle, ...)
How is the performance without flash of the sealife 1000HD? and how is the battery performance? I'm not a fan of AA battery powered cameras... And how good is the image quality with the wide angle lens? Of course i've seen some sample images, but it seems they all used external flash...

Thanks for your suggestions and i hope the post is not too chaotic...

 

[muddiver]

Try a new Olympus SW series and get the husing that it fits in. If the housing floods the water resistan camera should not. Plus you already know the menu format.

Or like I have, the SeaLife DC800 is a little better than the Olympus 770sw. It has some preset white ballance settings that will help with different conditions and lighting. An external flash works best at close range and the internal flash on any camrea is only good at less than 24".

I have found the auto focus is pretty fast. If you want wide angle you have to go to an external lense. It clips over the housing lense.

I have made up to three SCUBA dives at approx. 40 min. each on one charge of the battery. It is not an AA battery in the DC800. The external strobe is AA battery powered and it is very buoyant. It would be a tough free dive with the strobe attached.

I have some good shallow water photos from free diving in Maui I can show you. Actually I think some might be posted on the board.

 

[pixoft]

thanks muddiver, for clearing that up about the battery. i thought the SL190 batteries were for the DC1000.

I forgot to say, i will not use the camera much on land, it's really only used under water. What i really liked about the mju 770 was the manometer, which stored the depth where the picture was taken somewhere in the EXIF information.

I'm thinking about getting a good low light camera such as the Fuji F200EXR and a housing, which will come together about to the same price as the DC1000, and i'm sure the camera itself will be better than the Minox in the DC1000. Especially the mechanical image stabilization! What i might miss are the underwater modes, though...
Has any1 got experience with the Fuji underwater?

 

[deeper thoughts]

We have the sealife 1000 and are very happy with it. They also have a wide angle lens that you can buy for 99 dollars

 

[Evie G]

Im also looking to get my cam & case. After soooo much searching, asking, etc...
Was thinking of the Lumix LX3, but dnt wanna spend on 10bar housing, plus being a newbie, all those manual settings will get me lost.
I finally decided on a simple compact PNS- Panasonic Lumix ZS3.
Waiting for d camera shop to bring both in for me... Excited!!!

 

[Puffer Fish]

thanks muddiver, for clearing that up about the battery. i thought the SL190 batteries were for the DC1000.

I forgot to say, i will not use the camera much on land, it's really only used under water. What i really liked about the mju 770 was the manometer, which stored the depth where the picture was taken somewhere in the EXIF information.

I'm thinking about getting a good low light camera such as the Fuji F200EXR and a housing, which will come together about to the same price as the DC1000, and i'm sure the camera itself will be better than the Minox in the DC1000. Especially the mechanical image stabilization! What i might miss are the underwater modes, though...
Has any1 got experience with the Fuji underwater?

Nice camera and the case is very small. I have both a Canon G10 and several Fuji's...free diving, Fuji wins for size and ease of handling.

I also notice that some of the new wet wide angle doom lens can be fitted to it's case, if one wanted to ever do that (suspect the lens would be bigger than the camera).

The fuji would be my choice for easy an easy to use UW camera.

Only down side is the lack of HD video...which would be nice. Wonder if one of the Panasonic camera's have an underwater case?

 

[marcaumarc]

The Nikon Powershot 780 is small, shoots HD video and is pretty inexpensive. I think you could get camera and housing under $500. My buddy has one and likes it a lot.

 

[Larry C]

Was thinking of the Lumix LX3, but dnt wanna spend on 10bar housing, plus being a newbie, all those manual settings will get me lost.

Don't be afraid of manual settings, they're your friend. Lack of them will be your biggest limitation in improving your underwater photography. All these cameras will shoot automatic if you want them too. When you get better, you'll want to override the camera's decisions because cameras weren't designed to make decisions underwater where the light and color are different, the focus area is closer and you often use external lighting.

 

[Puffer Fish]

Don't be afraid of manual settings, they're your friend. Lack of them will be your biggest limitation in improving your underwater photography. All these cameras will shoot automatic if you want them too. When you get better, you'll want to override the camera's decisions because cameras weren't designed to make decisions underwater where the light and color are different, the focus area is closer and you often use external lighting.

There is a certain irony in UW photography that using automatic settings takes more knowledge than shooting in manual. For the most part, I only shoot in auto..well in program mode, aperture priority or shutter priority... but I understand why people go to manual...but someone should not be afraid of not having manual.

 

[Evie G]

one more concern is also im new to taking pic UW. Thats why i just want d simplest smallest cam to handle. The LX3 dnt have OEM case. Have to go w/ 10Bar housing & add external strobes, to be able to shoot UW. I dnt think I'll be able to handle that now. Maybe much later after im good w/ small cam, then I'll think of getting external strobes.