Sea and Sea DX-1200 or Canon 980/990 Ixus IS?

[forumsgr]

Hi everyone,
i am about to buy a new camera for underwater photography and video. The usage will be 40/60 photo/video. So the critical questions is: does it worth to sacrifice Canon's better lens for DX-1200's HD feature?
Both sets (canon 980/990 ixus IS+housing and sea and sea DX-1200) costs around 500 Euros with Canon be a bit cheaper.

I don't have any issues with manual handling. So, if anyone can advice be my guest.
thx

 

[marcaumarc]

This thread was similar:

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/un...underwater-camera-vs-land-camera-housing.html

Sea & Sea cameras were mentioned, but not a lot of info was given about them.

 

[forumsgr]

I know, i have done my homework but still i didn't figure out if the HD feature such a WOW!!! in order to give up Canon's better lens.

 

[marcaumarc]

I see. I just noticed you intend to do 60% video and only 40% photo. If that's the case, it seems like you should go for the HD video, since all video is headed that direction, even online video is getting bigger and wider. It could make even more sense to get a video camera that can also take stills. Even if you can shoot HD with the camera, you don't get optical stabilization that you could get in a video camera, so the video can be very jumpy. We call it "shark attack."

 

[ScubaSteve]

My recommendation is go with the better still lens. The HD feature is nice however you are getting some great quality video out of photo/video combo cameras that are not HD. I personally think the lens is far more critical for a still image. There is a tremendous amount of detail can go missing in a photograph when corners are cut. A HD video IS much better than a non HD, but the negative impact is measured as less by me.

This is of course, JMO.