Upgrading to A6xxx. Which one is best for me?

[jf3193]

Here's a chart from Seafrog of lens compatibility in different ports for the a6xxx Salted. Some lenses have zoom/focus rings available that go inside but each different port can typically handle a lot of different lenses.

Lots of discussion and usage notes in this thread about the salted line which covers it's initial announcement through long term use and maintenance.

New a6xxx housing from Meikon

Thanks!

 

[Lewis88]

I also shoot an A6100 in a Seafrogs Salted Line housing. I use the 16-50 in the short macro port with a +7 diopter on a flip mount, and a Tokina 10-17 Fisheye on a Sigma MC-11 in the 6in dome. I also have the TRT electronics ttl LED trigger, and a leak sentinel v5 vacuum system.

While It's no nauticam, it's untouchable for the price and the quality is actually really impressive.

 

[jf3193]

I also shoot an A6100 in a Seafrogs Salted Line housing. I use the 16-50 in the short macro port with a +7 diopter on a flip mount, and a Tokina 10-17 Fisheye on a Sigma MC-11 in the 6in dome. I also have the TRT electronics ttl LED trigger, and a leak sentinel v5 vacuum system.

While It's no nauticam, it's untouchable for the price and the quality is actually really impressive.

I’m still learning , so I’m not afraid to ask. What does the TRT trigger do?

 

[Lewis88]

I’m still learning , so I’m not afraid to ask. What does the TRT trigger do?

It allows you to not use the internal flash to fire external strobes. This is for battery life, as well as the internal flash has a slow recharge time. The trigger plugs into the hot shoe, and appears as an external flash to the camera, and uses LED's in the fiber optic windows, which allows you to take pictures at a much faster rate (limited by your strobe recharge time).

 

[jf3193]

I have dozens of dives on my Seafrog a6xxx with my a6000. The only problem I've ever had has because I ignored general maintenance and had a a small leak that thankfully pooled in the dome.

As to "too good to be true" keep in mind these are not metal housings and glass domes. They are all acrylic systems so much cheaper in cost. The upside is that savings, the downside is buoyancy. It's very positive and on it's own needs weight to make neutral. It becomes a balance of weight and floats when adding tray, arms, strobes and lights to make it both neutral and trimmed.

I can vouch for the customer service. They've sent out a redesigned back early on because of a design flaw with the original without being asked. When I ordered a vacuum tester last month they sent me the newest upgraded latches at no cost.

Canadadan do you find the housing bulky or is it easy to fit your hand around? My wife will shoot some and has smaller hands

 

[CanadaDan]

Canadadan do you find the housing bulky or is it easy to fit your hand around? My wife will shoot some and has smaller hands

To handle this housing on it's own would be a task. I would recommend a tray and handle set to, quite literally, get a grip on it.

With no other lights or arms you will need to attach some weight to the tray to make the rig near neutral. The housing, especially with the larger dry dome, is quite positive.

 

[jf3193]

To handle this housing on it's own would be a task. I would recommend a tray and handle set to, quite literally, get a grip on it.

With no other lights or arms you will need to attach some weight to the tray to make the rig near neutral. The housing, especially with the larger dry dome, is quite positive.

Thanks! Do you know comparatively if the Ike light or other ( affordable) housings are more neutral buoyant? I don’t live near any underwater photography stores, so seeing these housings first hand is difficult.

 

[CanadaDan]

Thanks! Do you know comparatively if the Ike light or other ( affordable) housings are more neutral buoyant? I don’t live near any underwater photography stores, so seeing these housings first hand is difficult.

Any inexpensive housing (especially with dry dome lenses) are going to be rather buoyant. They all tend to be made of plastics while the expensive housings are metal and glass. I have found that by the time I added strobes, lights, arms and the tray I only need about 1lb on the tray to achieve neutrality for my particular setup,

 

[ReadyDiverOne]

So checking in on this thread, where did the OP end up? I bought the a6400 with the Fantasea housing and flat port for the 16-59 kit lens; I attach the AOI uwl-90f wide angle to it. My impressions: having shot an RX100 mark 1 in a tiny Recsea housing for a long time I find this new kit really heavy topside (though only slightly negative below), maybe too heavy (more in that later), but the picture and video quality are very very good. I was particularly impressed with the quality of the video using the camera’s Underwater auto white balance setting. In fact I was shocked at how good and how realistic the video was right out of the camera. Stills were also excellent and I was able to fire multiple shots quickly with my two YS-D2s without having to wait at all (flash comp set as low is possible to -3.0). So I would recommend the a6400 and Fantasea housing a lot although unfortunately the latter has been out of stock everywhere for a while.

 

[jf3193]

So checking in on this thread, where did the OP end up? I bought the a6400 with the Fantasea housing and flat port for the 16-59 kit lens; I attach the AOI uwl-90f wide angle to it. My impressions: having shot an RX100 mark 1 in a tiny Recsea housing for a long time I find this new kit really heavy topside (though only slightly negative below), maybe too heavy (more in that later), but the picture and video quality are very very good. I was particularly impressed with the quality of the video using the camera’s Underwater auto white balance setting. In fact I was shocked at how good and how realistic the video was right out of the camera. Stills were also excellent and I was able to fire multiple shots quickly with my two YS-D2s without having to wait at all (flash comp set as low is possible to -3.0). So I would recommend the a6400 and Fantasea housing a lot although unfortunately the latter has been out of stock everywhere for a while.

Thanks for the update. I’m still in the market, and no rush to pull the trigger since traveling has been so limited. At this moment, I maybe leaning back towards a Rx100 series, simply for the smaller impact. Nothing set in stone, I’m just worried about a larger setup lugging around on a dive boat.