What type of camera

[islandguy]

I want to purchase a camera, but Iam not sure what I need to get. I have been looking at the Sea & Sea 35mm camera with a strobe and a Sea Life digital. How important is the strobe? Does a digital give you better pictures? Is a strobe necessary on a digital? Between the two, which one would you recommend?

Thanks
Islandguy

 

[Scuba65]

I personally like the digital and I own a canon a95. alot of people on the board have either oly's or canon's. mine is an a95 with housing, inon D180's strobe and i also use a inon wide angle lens. so, it's to what you would prefer and probably someone else here can tell you better than me which to pick and why etc. again I like the Canon digital. my hubby had a sea & sea 35mm and he just switched to digital. so, if you want to buy 35mm i can sell you a cheap one with strobe, wide angle lens and fiber cable.

 

[herman]

I would suggest you go digital. I use to spend $80-100 on a trip doing UW photographs until I switched to digital. Last trip I took over digital 450 pictures at basically $0, that would have been well over $250 if I had shot it on film. A good strobe is very important, no matter film or digital.
Another feature of digital is the ability to review your photo real time and learn from you mistakes. Unless you want large blowups a 3mp or better camera will do nicely.
I would also suggest you go ahead and get a set of macro/closeup lens for what ever camera you buy, you will end up wanting them.

 

[Gilligan]

Digital is the way to go hands down.
Be sure and get a camera that allows you to calibrate the White Balance manually.
You can live without an external strobe for awhile by using the internal strobe for macro shots within about two feet and manual white balance for the non-strobe shots over two feet as explained in my article.
A decent software program is also a must.