Sealife DC 500

[Alan Mayfield]

I am interested in getting the DC 500 with digital strobe. I have read a lot of good things about it, but they have been mainly in magazines. Does anyone that owns one have any complaints or recommended techniques to getting quality shots?

 

[CheddarChick]

Ah living breathing people with the camera I would like to buy. Feedback please.. are you happy with your Sealife DC500 Propack? Would you buy something different?

 

[ffestpirate]

We are extremely happy with ours. We don't have the digital strobe, just the regual strobe. We've only had it to about 68ft so far, but it's done great. We also got a 512 memory card for it and we can shoot almost a 1/2 hour of video with sound(so I'm told,we haven't tried yet,but we do have over 320 pictures on that card) . The shark mode(fast shutter) works well. No complaints and lots of fun. We're going to start posting some pics after this weekend.
chris

 

[nucem]

I looked at th Sealife DC500. Nice camera but I decided on the Olympus Stylus 500 with the Olympus PT-026 housing. It has 2 underwater modes that work great. I had it down to 78 fow in Costa Rica last week with no problems. I paid less than $500 online at B and H Photo with a 512 card. I am planning on getting the Sea life Digital Strobe next month. I bet you can find the Olympus with housing and digital strobe for less than the DC500 pro pack.

Just my 2 cents

 

[Tanked]

I'm pretty happy with mine, its my first camera, so I don't have anything to compare it to. The pics in my gallery were taken with it.

 

[mike_s]

If you do a search on scubaboard for DC500 or DC-500 you'll find all kinds of discussions about this camera.

 

[micahjt]

I received one for my birthday and didn't even take it out of the box. It was sent back. Do some snooping around on the boards and you'll find there are more than a few problems with this camera.
In fact I saw a post which had a link to a document at the SeaLife website that listed two pages of problems customers have had with the 'new' DC500 camera. They rushed the camera to market before many of the bugs were worked out.

- the external lenses that are reported to work on all Sealife cameras, according to their web site, do not work with the DC500.
- battery life isn't that good
- problems with the external flash firing inconsistently
- customer service is bad in my experience

 

[diveman7683]

I've had no problems with the DC500. The macros and wide angle lens from my old Reefmaster 35 mil. camera work fine the the DC500.

And to micahjt, where on Sealifes website are the pages of problems customers have had?? I'd like to read them.

 

[micahjt]

Here is the link I was talking about.

It comes from this thread: http://www.scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=119045

DC500 Problems

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Joe Iocona the export manager of Sealife has just emailed folk with the following page of issues with the DC500, rather hidden on their site :

http://www.sealife-cameras.com/downl...ting_Feb06.pdf

He also added:

Although in theory it's possible to use the DC500 with the macro lens, in practice it isn't. Without the macro lens you can get into 2" with the camera anyway. You can't zoom though the lenses so you can't get any closer without the additional macro lens. However, the depth of field is so small on the macro lens with the Dc500 attached, that unless you were (and I quote) "a professional diver" you wouldn't be able to
stay still long enough for the picture to work, because the field of focus is so narrow.

Also see:

Firmware info:

http://www.sealife-cameras.com/service/firmware.html

CJB.

It is necessary to use the macro measuring stick provided with the lenses for the DC310 because the depth of field is so small. I've tried to use them without and didn't have much luck, although if your VERY experienced with determining your shooting distance (within a several inches) you may have better luck.

I believe I heard the attached lenses create a purplish halo effect around your shot when attached to the DC500. I would guess that Sealife had intended that the lenses be compatible, hence the housing design for the lens mount but they did not do enough R&D before the product was released.

 

[micahjt]

I just tried the link and it failed this time around but I assure you I read through a rather lengthy list of items. One can only imagine where and why the information went away.

The list of issues included a statment that the additional lenses are NOT intended for use with the DC500.

When I recently purchased my camera I spent a lot of time looking at peoples photos where you knew what camera they were using. There are many posts concerning the Sealife cameras where people have suggested looking at their photos to get an idea of the cameras capability. Of course, the quality of the photos are greatly determined by the person using the camera, not the camera itself.
I went with the E900 from Fuji, it's still being delivered so I have no experience with it yet and can't personnaly comment on it. Here are some photos though, that were taken by an experienced underwater photographer using the E900. http://www.flickr.com/photos/bob_whorton/