What camera to buy?

[Stoo]

Perhaps if you posted a couple of the problematic images, people might offer insights.

 

[KeithG]

I think new shooters expect to push the button and get a perfect image and that's rarely the case. All of us that have been lucky enough to get a few "keepers", do "something" with our images before we present them. And this is one of the strengths of the TG-4... it can shoot RAW. While it's easier to just bang off jpegs, the reality is that that jpeg is the result of some software engineer's idea of what that image should look like. Post processing a RAW image will yield a much better final image, but it requires a bit of work.

I agree - and then dis-agree. No RAW for me. Because I am lazy? What you see is what I took!

The only post processing I perform is "delete". During each trip I create a "top 10" folder that ends up with about 50ish possibly interesting pics. These top 10s are handy for public display if other divers / travelers (we actually do non-diving trips) ask to see some pics. Any totally crap pics are deleted, but this still leaves me with way too many images leftover (about 100ish a day).

I archive them to my website and eventually curate the top 10's to be the first images for each trip, generally over a few beer & wing lunches. This minimal level of effort is too much. I can not get excited enough to spend any extra time fiddling with a specific image. It is not that important to me.

I claim RAW is not important to most people.

 

[Stoo]

we chatted a bit and he was willing to admit that he "knew nothing" and hence had no idea why his open water wide angle stuff sucked in comparison to his wonderful macro stuff. He was frustrated that macro was so easy....

Typically, WA is harder simply because lighting is harder. The epitome of "easy" back in the day, was shooting macro on a Nikonos III... Which was basically a Kodak Brownie with an O-ring. You added an extension tube, a wire framer and a small strobe and you were in business. If you fit your subject inside the frame, shot at 1/60th and f22 with the strobe over the camera body, you would generally get the shot.

Same deal with macro today... "close" with any video light eliminates most of the issues around getting a decent shot... minimal backscatter, decent colour, probably framed ok. If the guy behind the camera remembers not to shoot down, he's in business. Wide angle adds challenges with backscatter, balancing natural and artificial light, and it eliminates 99% of video lights as a viable light source.

That's why most people have this result, and why they concentrate on shooting "close ups"... Best bang for the buck.

 

[Stoo]

It is not that important to me.

And this goes back directly to what I said earlier... If you are happy with what you are shooting, and have no desire to improve your "art" then enjoy your results.

I claim RAW is not important to most people.

And as long as they share your attitude, I agree.

Personally, I work hard at getting batter images. I have a decent, middle-of-the-road DSLR system and readily admit the camera is not generally the limiting factor in my images. I love it when a magazine runs one of my images or even when someone "borrows" one to make it their FB cover page. But my images also get me on free dive trips too, and I'm totally fine with that!

All of this underscores the neat thing about photography... anyone can do it and enjoy it at whatever level they are happy with. I suppose that makes it a bit like golf. Although I mostly hate golf. But the beer cart is cool. Diving needs beer cart boats for post-dive libations.

 

[stuartv]

I agree - and then dis-agree. No RAW for me. Because I am lazy? What you see is what I took!

The only post processing I perform is "delete". During each trip I create a "top 10" folder that ends up with about 50ish possibly interesting pics. These top 10s are handy for public display if other divers / travelers (we actually do non-diving trips) ask to see some pics. Any totally crap pics are deleted, but this still leaves me with way too many images leftover (about 100ish a day).

I archive them to my website and eventually curate the top 10's to be the first images for each trip, generally over a few beer & wing lunches. This minimal level of effort is too much. I can not get excited enough to spend any extra time fiddling with a specific image. It is not that important to me.

I claim RAW is not important to most people.

Ha ha! "Self? Is that me talking?" LOL

I agree that most people that are taking photos or video underwater probably don't really care about RAW. But, if someone decides to spend $500 or more for an u/w camera setup, and they want something better for photos than what a GoPro will do, then why NOT buy yourself a little "insurance" by getting something that will produce RAW files as an option?

One note: If you spend a little bit of time and money, you can set yourself up with some software that would let you dump all your RAW photos from a given dive into a folder. Load one representative photo from that dive and work out the best settings to improve the way the picture looks. White balance. Saturation. Other color correction. Whatever. Once you work out some settings (which could be as simple as a couple of clicks and accepting automatic choices that the software makes), you can then tell the software to do a batch process and apply those settings to all the files in the folder. You probably won't get the best possible results - meaning, not as good as what a knowledgeable person could do editing each photo manually. But, you will likely get a whole bunch of stuff that looks way nicer than how it looked when it came out of the camera. All for a little one-time investment in setup and then a couple of extra minutes per each dive's worth of photos.

Just an option to consider.

I notice that some of my photos that would not make my top 10 in unedited form turn out to be a lot higher in the rankings after a very minimal amount of editing.

 

[Stoo]

I notice that some of my photos that would not make my top 10 in unedited form turn out to be a lot higher in the rankings after a very minimal amount of editing.

There is a widely held belief (and I hold this) that you can't fix a bad photo in post-processing, but you can often make a good photo into an awesome photo with a little work. All semi-serious photographers spend time tweaking their images. It's no different than spell checking a text document.

When I look back at my past few years of shooting in the digital world, I would say that my "most improved skill" is actually in post processing. Some of my favorite images were taken several years ago, and they lacked "something" back then. Revisiting them now, I have in a few cases, tweaked an image in Photoshop and ended up with a gem.

One of my friends (who is new to photography) was looking at something I posted on FB following a dive we had just done together. He asked how long I had spent "fixing" my photos and I truthfully told him that it was about 2 - 3 minutes per images. Often I will spend more if I am making a print, especially it's a large one, but as a rule, a little "tweak" is all it takes.

Similarly, another friend came back from a South Pacific trip with a drive full of "crappy" (his word) images. He shot with a little Oly system and it's a decent setup. I asked him to send me his 20 favorites, and I would say that in less than an hour, I was able to return maybe 18 very nice images. (Mostly close ups).

All cameras have limitations, especially underwater. Part of the challenge for the shooter is to work around those limitations when shooting, and then continuing to overcome them in post.

There is no "shame" in tweaking images... It's just a continuation of the image-making process.

 

[stuartv]

There is no "shame" in tweaking images... It's just a continuation of the image-making process.

I'm a total newb at u/w photography, but I definitely feel no shame in tweaking. Any camera that produces a JPEG is doing "post" processing. I don't see any difference in doing my own tweaks to the RAW file versus taking a JPEG that was tweaked by the camera, based on someone else's preferences, from the RAW data that the camera sensor captured.

Some photos are "made" by their subject and/or the composition. But, I think some photos are "made" by the colors. Or the colors and the subject and/or composition. And a JPEG captured with auto white balance may look like it's nothing but varying shades of blue and nothing special, on initial inspection. But, I have been really amazed by a few photos that looked like that (varying shades of blue - nothing special at all) that turned out to have some really nice colors hidden in there that only come out in post-processing.

 

[fish80]

Gopro videos are impressive imho, I have a gopro3 black with a SNP filter and works great also at decent depth with no lights. it is a great set up for videos. If you want stills the tg4 is better, but its videos are not as good as the gopro, at least according to my limited experience with that.