review Sealife Mini II

[Scuba_Dad]

I've been using my Mini II for several months, and I've learned to work around a lot of its quirks. Would I buy another one? Absolutely NOT! It does have its issues...

When it comes to battery life, I found the silver lithium batteries to work real well. I put two in during the ScubaBoard Invasion of Coz, and I just pulled them out last week. That was two months ago. They were finally starting to die... I took a ton of pictures with it... and the batteries really lasted. Now, the batteries are expensive... but... well worth it.

Macro? Read the manual... it's only good between 2-4 feet. That's not macro to me, but... that's what I use to get portraits... or.. good facial shots... To me... macro is inches away... not feet away...

Underwater mode... SeaLife blew it on that one. Too much red. I use the land mode and adjust the colors using Photoshop and/or Lightroom.

The size of the camera is great! I throw it in my BCD pocket and take it where ever I go... I even have it with me when I'm taking pictures with my DC1200. It's a handy little camera...

I've been throwing the camera in the pool during Open Water classes, and the students have a blast taking pictures of each other during the free swim portion of the class. They have a blast.

I abuse mine, and it's as good as a Timex....

 

[ohonu]

I get much better shots with my Canon Powershot SD750 in a Canon u/w housing from Leisurepro.

For those of us looking for assistance picking our camera, can you please post some of the pix you have taken with setup? My Sealife was recently lost and i am trying to find a replacement.

Thanks!

 

[guggie]

For those of us looking for assistance picking our camera, can you please post some of the pix you have taken with setup? My Sealife was recently lost and i am trying to find a replacement.

Thanks!

Here you go. This was from a recent trip using a now outdated Canon SD750 point and shoot and a Canon underwater housing from Leisurepro. No external flash at all.

https://picasaweb.google.com/109392...ncessDiveTripsToGrandCaymanNorthWallAndRoatan

 

[ohonu]

Here you go. This was from a recent trip using a now outdated Canon SD750 point and shoot and a Canon underwater housing from Leisurepro. No external flash at all.

https://picasaweb.google.com/109392...ncessDiveTripsToGrandCaymanNorthWallAndRoatan

Thank you!

 

[diverdavrecon]

I second the motion that the Mini II is junk....and I'm being easy on it because I'm only
comparing it to it's older brother; the original Reefmaster Mini.

I sent it back to give SeaLife a second chance, and they sent me a re-tuned and recalibrated
replacement, which turned out to be not much of an improvement. Both picture and video
quality are poor, and one of the best features of the original Mini are not available on the
Mini II - the great menu and control features of exposure compensation, color balance, and
picture pixel dimensions. I also hate that I have to pull the flash card out and insert it into
this special little card reader you always have to carry around with it now.

I've been using the camera only a few months now and already the rubber tops for the
magnification and flash buttons have both fallen off and I had to re-glue them.

Finally, buy and use only very good batteries, it sucks through those like crazy. I've done
3 dives so far on Energizer Ultimate Lithiums as well as quite a bit of surface land photography,
shooting quite a bit of video and stills. It still appears to be going strong on those.

One note of caution - pay attention to that red rubber gasket on the bottom water tight
door, it's very loose and will frequently fall out of the camera, also you may have to coax
it back into proper position before closing the door on it.

Bottom line - I wouldn't get the Mini II. Search online and get a good used version of the original
Reefmaster Mini if you can find it. I was so dissappointed, I bought another camera entirely and
ended up using the GoPro HD for most of my photography work....similar price, amazing results.

 

[Darol]

Bought it, returned it the next day and upgraded to the 1400.
The pictures with the Mini were very poor quality no matter what the setting, blurry.
I've been using the DC 500 for years and still will. Looking forward to learning, and using the DC 1400.