Sea Life DC 500 Questions

[IwakuniDiver]

Hey everyone,
I just got done diving the wreck of the Japanese Battleship, Mutsu and well, my pictures SUCK! The camera has been nothing but problems since I got it. When I'm a foot away, it can take great pictures but anything over 6 feet and the pictures are black. Also, the camera has had some issues locking up on me which on a dive where ever second counts.... you get the idea.

To deal with the locking up problem, I read that it was most likely due to the fact that the DC500 does not like 1GB and larger memory cards. OK, no problem, so I bought a 512 Panasonic card and albiet, it doesn't lock up as much, but it still does it on occasion and so far, at the worst possible time. Like on this dive of all dives.

Also, I had noticed a dark area on the lower left of every single picture taken with the flash. Figuring this was due to the stock flash, I bought the External Flash for it and went to test it in the pool. Well the camera takes pictures just fine in the pool, although a little dark in Underwater Mode, as soon as I put it in External Flash Mode, all of my pictures in the pool were black! How is that possible with all of the light? The video it takes is perfect and comes out better than the pictures!

Please someone help! I sincerely hope that this is a case of operator error and I don't have to send this camera back. Living in Japan makes things difficult to say the least.

Here are the best of the pictures that were taken. They are untouched except edited for size since the originals were taken at max detail and are too big to post here.

Scott

 

[Bbarnes]

Are you using the digital strobe? Here are a couple of things to try... First, have you upgraded the firmware to the PIE.5 version? The issues that I had with the strobe firing intermittently were solved when I did this. I never had lock up problems but I think this was supposed to help with that too. Here are a couple of suggestions I got from the DC500 trouble shooting section on the www.sealife-cameras.com website.
1)Take the camera into a dark room. Aim your camera at your strobe and take a picture. If your strobe is firing correctly you should see the flash in your picture. 2) Check your sync cord to make sure that the light can go through it. 3) Make sure the sync cord sensor is correctly centered over the sensor in the strobe. I am not sure how much ambient light there was at the time of your pictures. Remember, strobes are really only able to reach about 6-8 underwater. If these don't help I would suggest emailing the customer service department directly to see if they have something else to try. Don't give up on the camera.

 

[mike_s]

I had the same "green" phots problem with my DC310, only to find I didn't have the strobe setting correct. The DC500 has had it's share of problems though.

 

[Darnold9999]

Play with the SCN mode. I found that this has a huge impact on the light that the camera uses. If you are using external flash mode the camera expects to get back a fair amount of light so I believe it increases the shutter speed (it may just do everything in software - hard to tell). For closeup work this is exactly what is needed, but for the kind of shots you are taking the external flash mode does not work well at all. The strobe light just gets absorbed too quickly for the speed of the camera. Try Night mode - which won't work for close up, but will probably work for these kinds of shots as the camera is then set for very low light conditions - which is where you are and if the flash goes off the external strobe will fire as well.

I would play with these settings, they seem to have the most impact on the camera. Remember you can take as many pictures as you want - shoot, adjust, shoot again.

I think this is operator error, I got some really nice pictures with this camera, however it just did not have enough settings for what I wanted to do so I got a DSLR. I do plan to keep it though it is a nice small system for basic pictures.

I do have a 1G card and have never locked up the camera so you may have a defective camera. Have taken about 800 pictures with the system. Lots and lots and lots did not turn out. The auto focus in the camera is not so great - you do know that you have to push the button down half way until the box turns blue before pushing down all the way. I say this becuse it took me about 100 shots to figure this out - duh - couldn't figure out why the first picture of something was always out of focus!

 

[alcina]

That sounds like too much hassle to continue using. ebay it and buy a compact digital with housing.

Add a strobe later when money allows.

In the meantime learn manual settings and white balance on your new system - almost all of the main players have solid offerings for underwater work.

 

[IwakuniDiver]

Thanks for the tips! Especially using trying out night mode and the tip with checking the flash sync. I'll get right on it.

As for the locking up problem, I'm starting to suspect that I have a defective camera and I am going to get in contact with Sea Life today.

Thanks everyone again. We're already planning another trip down to the wreck again and next time I should have more luck.

Scott

BTW, the pictures are really green because the waters on this side of Japan are really green. This day was really clear, but still green. Much like Puget Sound.

 

[reeldive]

Remove the sd card. Format. insert the SD card, format again. Sometimes that will work

If I can attach this photo This is what I'm getting with ext flash and the standard (non digital) strobe

Tried to upload from my desktop. don't look like it worked.

whish I had as much luck with this board as I do with my DC500

 

[Bbarnes]

One other thing to try.... check the switch on the inside of the strobe head. Make sure that the switch is on the 'O' otherwise it will be looking for a preflash and won't fire correctly.

 

[divingHeidi]

That sounds like too much hassle to continue using. ebay it and buy a compact digital with housing.

Add a strobe later when money allows.

In the meantime learn manual settings and white balance on your new system - almost all of the main players have solid offerings for underwater work.

Don't sell it, be patient and try things out and maybe listen to some people who give you advice.
I am just back form a diving trip in Turkey and I had time to try out our new Sealife DC 500 with the external optical strobe and Flash difuser.
I had to try several modes, do some experments, but I am happy and I think I made some good shots (hey, this is the first time I take underwater pictures) Attached pics downsized to small format, original bigger.
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j104/DivingDesertrose/Kas-%20
Turkey/underwater_009.jpg

More pics also in my Turkey report in the Europe / Central & Eastern Europe Section.

 

[Bbarnes]

One other adjustment that I would try would be to set your white balance to cloudy. I have read somewhere to set it to flourescent for water that has a green hue. I haven't done it, but it might be something to try.