Seeking Tips for Shooting Video of Hawaii Manta Night Dive

[Oz Chris]

I've also read that, for stills, strobes are just a no-go as there is too much backscatter/plankton. Were you snorkeling or diving? If diving, did you have or even need your own video light? Thanks.

The water is thick with plankton so yeah, I’d imagine strobes would not be much of a help.

I was diving, although it’s not diving as you might expect. You’re sitting on the bottom at about 10 metres in a big circle with all the other divers.

I had a hand held light - the boat gave them to everyone. As someone else said - the more light, the more plankton; the more plankton, the more Mantas. However, mostly my stills and video are just shot available light. As you can see it’s pretty bright anyway.

My number one piece of advice though would be to take some shots/videos and then put the camera down. Spend time just soaking in how awesome it it.

 

[ReadyDiverOne]

Very good advice indeed.

 

[JamesBon92007]

I used no filter and two cheap LED lights and sure, I got some backscatter but the water is full of plankton anyway.

 

[chess_is_me]

All of that advice sounds good, I run an old film nikonos with a 25mm lens and twin strobes rotated down to keep them in a safe position. I then rigged up a mount for my LED dive light to keep it pointed up attached to one of my strobes to attract plankton and hopefully mantas. I wish I had a photo of my rig but I have it all set up so my head is the highest point so I have zero risk of hitting the manta with my camera.

I will shoot either iso 400 color or 1600 b&w. I also alternate using flash and not because sometimes the backscatter can have an artistic look with the b&w film. You are sitting on the bottom mostly stationary, but sometimes there is surge which will all effect what shutter speed you want. I would shoot shutter priority personally, if you shoot full manual you are going to spend too much time fussing with your camera and not enough enjoying the show. And I never go lower than f5.6, subject is too large for any less dof.

 

[JamesBon92007]

The water is thick with plankton so yeah, I’d imagine strobes would not be much of a help.

I used two small, not-too-powerful LED video lights in order to try to compensate for the overexposure that I get from all the intense lights down there. I would love to learn how to avoid that but it's probably not going to happen with my cheap camera. My stills are screen captures of my videos. Also, without the video lights I could not get a well-lit shot down the manta's throat.

I've read that a yellow filter is supposed to be good for LED lighting and from looking at my videos a pink filter may or may not be a slight improvement in color correction but I'd shot the mantas before with no filter and they looked OK and I didn't want to risk messing up all my video.

 

[danam404]

Very good advice indeed.

Hey hey, check your PM’s. Thanks!