need help with nikon/olympus decision

[Island Hoppa]

hey everyone
recently i had made plans to go dslr with a nikon d70. i understood that i was going to pay a pretty penny for my setup. d70, ikelite housing, ds 125, ports, lenses, etc. but recently new concerns came up that i did not realize in the past. i kind of got a little discouraged after looking at about 4k to spend, i have the money but is it really worth it? i dive maybe 50-100 times a year and it is all primarily travel. a dslr fully equipped will be a nightmare when it comes to traveling. so i have changed my decision. i am thinking of going with the olympus 8080 w/ ikelite and ds 125. the questions i have is would the ds 125 strobe go well with this olympus setup. i will save so much money with this setup and i have seem some pics and i am very, very pleased. the resolution is great. anyway any concerns about this decision, any added info, maybe better cameras than the 8080 that i am not aware of, anything, please shoot it at me. i would like to start purchasing gear immediately. thanks so much everyone.

 

[ssra30]

The 8080 is a fine camera. My big complain about it is that the size of the housing, be it Ikelite or Oly, it is just as big as dSLR camera in my opinion. Also Olymus made it such that it is no longer compatible with wetmount wide angle lens which is a big loss for Olympus and was what made the C5050 such a great camera. If you decided to go wide, you are stuck with wide angle setup for the dive, just like dSLR.
I would definitely go with Ikelite DS-125 if you go this route as you will get full TTL compatibility (it is not absolutely neccessary but nice to have nevertheless).
Please don't ask if spending $4000 on a camera only to dive 50-100 dives a year is worth it, I am not doing anymore than that per year and I just got myself a D2X setup , now that's even worse.

 

[dbh]

I believe my Nexus D70 is actually smaller than either 8080 housing. The Ike DS-125 will adapt to any system that you put together. However, it is large and heavy. The Inon Z220 is much smaller & lighter (for travel concerns) as is the Sea & Sea YS-90DX. You will only get TTL with Ike housings paired with Ike strobes.

Dave

 

[f3nikon]

hey everyone
recently i had made plans to go dslr with a nikon d70. i understood that i was going to pay a pretty penny for my setup. d70, ikelite housing, ds 125, ports, lenses, etc. but recently new concerns came up that i did not realize in the past. i kind of got a little discouraged after looking at about 4k to spend, i have the money but is it really worth it? i dive maybe 50-100 times a year and it is all primarily travel. a dslr fully equipped will be a nightmare when it comes to traveling. so i have changed my decision. i am thinking of going with the olympus 8080 w/ ikelite and ds 125. the questions i have is would the ds 125 strobe go well with this olympus setup. i will save so much money with this setup and i have seem some pics and i am very, very pleased. the resolution is great. anyway any concerns about this decision, any added info, maybe better cameras than the 8080 that i am not aware of, anything, please shoot it at me. i would like to start purchasing gear immediately. thanks so much everyone.

Hope this helps, the 8080 is on the left the older Ikelite housing that will fit a D70 is on the right.
The 8080 camera body is physically much smaller than a D70 body, the PT-23 Olympus fits the 8080 like a glove. In fact the 8080 housing is about the size of the the D70 camera body only! The 8080 housing could almost fit in an D70 housing.

The 8080 is 8.0mp the D70 is 6.0mp, and the 3rd picture is the reason why I did not go for a D70 even if I have the Nikon lenses for UW shooting (28mm,55mm, 105mm macros, 20mm, wide). The bottom housing is an F3 Nikon in an Aquatica housing, notice the large viewfinder.

The viewfinder on the F3 is larger than the LCD on the 8080. Remember the LCDs on DSLRs are useless before you take the picture, the 8080 or all point and shoots, the LCD can be always on, because they have no mirror to block the CCD sensor. The D70 has some of the smallest viewfinders around, yes you can add a Magnifier, but the image will be darker and pin point manual focusing is out of the question. The new Nikon D2x has a larger viewfinder than a D70, but also at a larger price. I am still waiting for Nikon to make an DSLR with an Actionfinder like their film cameras. Good Luck.

Oh, and the DS-50 or older Ikelites works much better on the Olympus.

 

[ssra30]

8080 8mp is unfortunately quite a bit noiser than D70 6mp sensor so the megapixel counts is not really meaningful. I never played with 8080 so I don't how good the autofocus is. However my experience with C5050 is that especially for macro mode with the macro lens, the resolution of the LCD is not good enough to always judge if the picture's focus is exactly where I want it to be. So I personally prefer the smaller D70 viewfinder to the bigger LCD. Never used the F3 though so I suppose I'll never know what I would have missed

 

[Island Hoppa]

cool thanks for the great info everyone! i was told that the 8080 is a bit noisy. the reason i wanted to go dslr was because of shutter lag. i loved how the d70 just shot so quickly. can anyone let me know how the shutter lag is on the 8080. thanks.

 

[f3nikon]

8080 8mp is unfortunately quite a bit noiser than D70 6mp sensor so the megapixel counts is not really meaningful. I never played with 8080 so I don't how good the autofocus is. However my experience with C5050 is that especially for macro mode with the macro lens, the resolution of the LCD is not good enough to always judge if the picture's focus is exactly where I want it to be. So I personally prefer the smaller D70 viewfinder to the bigger LCD. Never used the F3 though so I suppose I'll never know what I would have missed

I see your point, but noise the problem is rather meaningless because in UW photography I only shoot at the lowest ISO possible. If the the camera's were stuck on ISO 50, that would be fine with me. Another photographer once said "that dull light equals dull photographs".

And I will put in more strobe lighting, open up the aperture and lower the shutter speeds just to hold that lowest ISO possible so noise or grain is never a factor. If I get to the point were I am forced to increase the ISO speed (very rare), I won't take the picture! Unless it's a low light shot of a killer whale with a 10 foot tiger shark in its mouth and Paris Hilton riding on the whale's dorsal fin!

So the extra 2 mp will make a difference to me. The 8080 autofocus is dead on, fast even at low lighting, maybe due to the wider leans opening.

You are correct, the LCD is still not sharp enough for pin point focusing, must rely on the camera's AF, that is why the F3 will still be around for the real fine stuff like which rhino on the sea slug do I what to be in focus.

Dive Safe

Note on the shutter lag, the 8080 set on the SHQ res. lags about 3 sec. the DS-125 recycles at 1 sec. DS-50 recycles at 3 sec. To me shutter lag is not an issue, it takes me that long to review the shot anyway.

 

[ssra30]

I think as far as 6mp vs 8mp is concerned, the difference in resolution is not huge and the more important factor is the quality of the pixels. Beside, the quality of the lens do matter. I saw prints of D70 at a local Nikon show, not sure what the size was but the dimension was somewhere between 15-20 inches by 22-30 inches (by my guesstimate and rather vague memory) and it was incredible.
I wish dSLR has a huge viewfinder like the F3. At least Subal and Seacam is trying to address the problem, although at a cost. The DS-125 will recycle at 1 second at full dump and quite a bit faster at 1/2 or 1/4 power. When trying to synchronize the flashing of a blue ring octopus or jawfish spitting out sand (wish it was eggs rather than sand), I found the D70 a lot more convenient as I just kept the shutter pressed and the Ikelite did a very good job of keeping up with it.
I am not trying to put down the C8080 as I think that it is a good camera in its class but I don't believe that it is a replacement for dSLR.

 

[friscuba]

Note on the shutter lag, the 8080 set on the SHQ res. lags about 3 sec. the DS-125 recycles at 1 sec. DS-50 recycles at 3 sec. To me shutter lag is not an issue, it takes me that long to review the shot anyway.

Are you describing shutter lag or write time? It seems like 3 seconds to have a pic taken after hitting the shutter button is quite a long time. I could see the write time not being an issue since the strobes need to recycle.

I'm somewhat curious as I haven't had my 8080 underwater yet. I know on sunny days the shutter lag is pretty much non-existant, low lighting it takes a bit longer. I'm curious if the focusing light on the DS 125 is enough light to make for a quick shutter response or if I'm going to have to chase/guestimate where fish are going to be like I do on my D-40.

later,

 

[ssra30]

I'm curious if the focusing light on the DS 125 is enough light to make for a quick shutter response or if I'm going to have to chase/guestimate where fish are going to be like I do on my D-40.

later,

If you have the diffuser on DS-125, during the day, I don't think it add very much as far as focus light goes but without the diffuser, it is very good for macro work. Fish is tricky as it tends to shy away from bright light so the DS125 probably would not help much.