Are you buying the camera and the housing ? or just the housing ?

I would ignore Scubadude’s advice .. he has brought up Photo cameras. Although with the wealth of knowledge he normally presents you may want to see if he knows anything about video cameras :shock:

Sony has always been a popular and easier brand to get housings for .. some people prefer canons but i wouldnt know the difference.

I would recommend from what I have heard a Sony DCR-SR90 in the Sony Housing SPK-HCB

Here are some links for purchasing in the UK
http://www.camerasunderwater.co.uk/video/sony/spk.html
thats for the Sony
That same company happens to do Gates housings too which I know a LOT of people recommend
http://www.camerasunderwater.co.uk/video/gates/index.html

contacting them may be a good pice of advice also.

Giles

That Gates are incredible housings, I love them but they cost $$$ Plus some more $$$

Have shot with 4 or 5 (only have an older non-fancy one though).  Each very well balanced, sturdy the whole kit and kabooodle.

Actually may spring for a new one now, moved onto some HDV cameras. 

As an aside used the Sonys also, but the hosuings are a bit more when looking at the Ikelite housings, an the Canon’s were a little less expensive on sale.

The SPK-HCB is nice, but only good to 5 or 6 meters, not 35, which the OP was looking for.  (Have not played with this housing, but the specs arethat depth)

Is he asking for a digital camera or video ill be the 1st to admit i dont know anything on video thats what my father does still unsure of what this guy wants ?

Drew -

The SPK-HCB is nice, but only good to 5 or 6 meters, not 35, which the OP was looking for.  (Have not played with this housing, but the specs arethat depth)

Ok Other ideas Sony DCR PC350 in a Gates Housing again pricey housing but very good mechanical controls. Looking at the housing page you can also put about 10 camcorders in the housing .. so if an accident does happen you will be able to replace camera easily. That will come out quite a bit opver budget.

Going on a more budget friendly route is tough for me to find for you as I don’t know enough to tell you what a bargain is ... but try to contact the company I mentioned above (I am assuming you are in the UK as your profile says)

Also as well as the previous company I mentioned .. give FEP (Fisheye Productions)a phone call. They sell some great light in motion products which are also a bit pricier but are electronic controls which some people prefer. They may also have a great second hand deal for you.

Alan James also deals in other manufacturer of housing .. Sea and Sea .. they can often be a good bargain, although I dont often hear of them as being choice for Video. But again .. he’s a helpfull guy and worth a call.

To be honest .. the Ikelites dons’t come out much cheaper than everything else from what i can see .. And even though they may work I would choose another housing manufacturer just for the appearance and that I don’t know any UK Ike dealers. But take your pick.

Looking at the housing page you can also put about 10 camcorders in the housing .. so if an accident does happen you will be able to replace camera easily. That will come out quite a bit opver budget.

There are changes between each camera, so the camera needs to be specified prior to ordering the housing.  My guess is they can be retrofitted if you do need to get a different camera.  A couple I mention below can be retrofitted and/or used with more cameras. (I have an old Gates housing that takes any TRV camera just about, man I wish all the other equipment worked like this :D )

the Ikelites dons’t come out much cheaper than everything else from what i can see ..

A bit cheaper, the housings can be had for around $500-$650 (at least in the U.S.)and some of the Canons have been on sale for about $300 or so US (same for the Sonys)

Gates, L&M, Amphico, Sea & Sea, Top Dawg (Top Dawg II is another housing for $900 which handles many cameras http://www.topdawgvideo.com/compatibility.htm , so maybe still gets under 1,000 pounds with camera) and some others make nice things, but usually more expensive, and often you need extras such as monitors (more so for the electronic ones, many mechanicals ones have areas to see the screen, such as the Gates very often, or reversing mirrors like on the Iklelites)

BUT I just remembered something for the original poster. (trouble is most of the stuff I know is U.S. side)

http://www.dive-equinox.com/freecamera.html

Housing and Canon Camera for under $1000 US, with Sony a bit over $1000, but I think it comes in under 1,000 pounds These housings can be retrofitted for many other models.  Equinox is good to speak with also, very helpful. 

Yeah the Ikes are not very pretty, but they work.  I am in that great debate right now for a new U/W video housing.  Can get the Ikelite and use my old WA lens on it for about $1300 U.S. or get the Gates with a WA Port for about $2800, but the Gates is smaller and cooler looking.  And I really do like Gates housings (I may have mentioned that I think :D )

EDIT whoops had to change euros to pounds

some great info here ... especially as we don’t get much video action over here !

I guess the d200 is not supported by photoshop cs. you need to update acr
(adobe camera raw) with the current version, which can be found here:

ftp://ftp.adobe.com/pub/adobe/photoshop/cameraraw/win/3.x/

/lars

Yes Lars you are correct ... the D200 was added in to the new ACR ... or at least in CS2 version anyways so and update will definately work well for this solution.

If not the next question is .. can you view the RAW files in any other program such as Nikon View ?

As others have pointed out, each RAW is not the same RAW, it has never been standardized though we all remain hopeful (FWIW and your eyes can glaze over here, RAW formats are exactly what the sensor captures, others are either lossless (no compression but some changes such as tif) or lossy (compression occurs under various schemes with the general idea that certain things are “thrown away” that the eye would not otherwise see, akin to what happeens for audio such as MP3s and so forth)

FWIW you do not convert JPEG to RAW, so do not worry about that, what you should do is work with the RAW file, save it as umcompressed (a copy so you do not mess up the original in any manner, in faact I usually lock my originals to avoid problems) then save a copy of that to Jpeg or other formats needed for web, print etc.

I would also recommend using 16 bits/channel instead of 8 bits/channel during editing/conversion.

If you do a lot of changes to the colors (Curves, Color Balance, Brightness, Contrast and other) then you could loose some information in your image.

For example, if you darken an image and then make a separate color channel brighter, you will loose information.

You could se 16 bits/ channel as having a decimal point after the color number with 256 extra levels between colors.

Happy editing

/Martin

thanks martin for that comment, but I would like that even if you use 16
bit/channel mode you will loose color information if you start editing. you may
end up with a perfect 8 bit/channel image with all colors, but you won’t have a
full 16bit/channel image.

And you should consider that 16 Bit/channel is misleading a bit as most of the
digital SLR cameras only record 12Bit/channel.

/lars

Of course you will not have a full 16bit image when you are done but you will probably not need the 16 bits when displaying/printing your pictures.

Yes, I know that you don’t have 16 bin in RAW but converting to 8bit will loose a lot of information. If you convert to 16 bits you can do a lot more with the image than you can with RAW-import-tool without loosing information

I did the following experiment with an image using 8bits and then with 16bits and there is a huge difference in result. The following is extreme but will show the effect of only having 8 bits.

Open your favorite image. Choose 8bit mode if not already in 8-bit mode.

Choose Image->Adjustments->Levels. Enter 100 and 125 in “Output Levels”.
Watch your ruined picture.
Try to save it by Choosing Image->Adjustments->Levels and entering 100, 1, 125 in “Input Levels”. Ruined beyond repair… Update and look at the histogram and view all the empty space where there could have been colors…

Do the same thing but in 16-bit mode. A perfect image.

I would like to say that 16-bitmode is a must when adjusting color curves in images, especially if you have to do the adjustments in different steps using different filters/tools.

/Martin

thanks for the report on that martin. and your are completely right. btw what
raw converter do you use?

Do you still have the resulting images or could you possibly create new ones and post them here. I think that will help
illustrating, what you mean.

/lars

Here are some examples:

My camera does not have RAW (Sony DSC W7). I use my imagination…

My original picture:

The destroyed image(8bit and 16 looks the same):
16 bit destroyed tiff (Try to repair and see the magic)

Restored 8bit-image: (Notice the arm, floor and shadows)

Restored 16bit-image:

Can I see The image from your phone ?