Olympus owners, need your help! C8080

[Underthesea81]

Hey all,

Been reading Martin edge's underwater photo guide and trying to grt ready for my dives this weekend with my setup. Had a bad experience two weeks ago using the settings I got the c8080 with and came out super ridiculously overexposed, so I'm going to shoot in my mode this weekend with three preprogrammed modes. I'm using a c8080 with a ds50 strobe and dual tray housing. Shooting in salt water (open ocean) act viz is 50-60 feet, anyone got some settings they have found successful and could share? Would REALLY appreciate it, thanks!

 

[Byte Me]

Well, I shoot with an e-pl1 with Inon D2000 strobe and always shoot full manual mode. ISO 100, WB Coudy, RAW, f6.3, 1/125 shutter. I'll adjust f stop and/or shutter speed to get the background color and DOF I want depending on time of day diving and where / how bright the sun is. On the strobe I set it to Auto and put the power on f5.6. Generally I don't mess with those settings. I adjust WB in lightroom during post processing if necessary. Pay attention to the exposure meter on the camera LCD to give you an idea of where your exposure will end up - I typically adjust f and shutter speed so that I'm a bit underexposed and the strobe brings me right where I want to be.

When I had an Oly SP-350 I had programmed in some my modes settings but only as starting points (e.g wide angle, macro, fish portrait, etc.) and then would tweak settings based on existing environment and conditions.

This is what works for me and I was really happy with the results from my first trip underwater with the e-pl1 rig!

 

[Underthesea81]

Thanks for the info. I'll post my modes I've entered below this for input. How do I set AB at cloudy, as I like the idea of using light room to always add more.
Also on the flash settings in manual/my mode(everything in my mode is set to M) I have flash set yo external only no IN, but what about flash mode?(eye/no eye) and the "slow" flash mode can anyone assist in understanding that if I am using a ttl sync cable to my ds50 strobe, thanks!

Mode1: f8, shutter 1/100, iso 50 manual focus AB auto
Mode2: f5.6, 1/100, iso200, autofocus AB auto
Mode3:f4, 1/200, iso200, autofocus and AB auto
Mode4: f8, 1/125, iso 50, autofocus and AB auto

On all these settings it shows exposure in red at -3.0 no matter what I do is that only because I'm on land and not under water with these specific settings? Can I force it down thru a setting? Also my zoom is set at 28MM for all. Doing mostly close up shots, some macro some portrait style

THANK YOU

 

[Byte Me]

I'm not that familiar with the C8080 and don't recall enough about setting up my modes but would think as part of inputting the settings for f stop, shutter, iso, etc. you'd be able to change the WB setting. Auto WB should be a fine setting though, as long as you shoot RAW you can always edit WB in post processing.

For flash settings I would NOT use redeye reduction, I just set the flash to the lightning bolt (I think) which forces the camera flash to fire every time the shutter is pressed. You could probably get away with a lesser flash setting to save battery but I've always set flash this way and made sure I swap batteries every other dive. I'm assuming your ttl sync cable is optical.

You may be right about the -3.0 exposure due to being inside, can't recall how mine reacts to being inside, take a picture or two with the strobe firing and see how the turn out, adjust from there. May need to bump ISO, slow shutter, etc. I wouldn't fire off more than a couple to keep the strobe from overheating.

One thing that really helped getting my e-pl1 dialed in before my first trip using it was playing with it for a while in a pool. I called my LDS to find out when they were running an OW class and spent 45 minutes or so in a corner of the pool taking pictures, getting used to the buttons / settings and dialing things in. Sure, conditions will be different in the ocean but it'll give you a good starting point!