Hi @ all!

I am a so-called Newbie in here :wink:

Nevertheless I am searching for “the right” digicam for me and would really appreciate getting some hints, good advice a.s.o.

Currently I am “between two or three cams”:

1. Canon Powershot A95
2. Canon Powershot S70
3. Sony DSC-W7

Unfortunately there are just a few tests and reviews on the internet - and if, then the cams are not tested under water with their housings a.s.o.

Number 1, the A95, is a relatively cheap but as far as I could find out, good digicam. It is not too big in size and too heavy in weight but it is a 5mp cam. The other two cams I listed are 7mp cameras but the questions is: is it really necessary to have 7mp combined with a small lense?

Number 2, the S70, must be an excellent cam. Reviews are crazy about its photo quality etc. I found one page with comments about this cam like: “Photo quality like the one of the Canon G6”...! The housing is Canon-like good but the price of cam and housing is quite high, still…

Number 3, the Sony, is a 7mp camera with a big-sized screen which must be great for underwater-photography. But I heard some comments like, “the DSC-W7 has such a strong supression (you know what i mean) that the pix are not as detailled as if they’d been taken with a 5mp cam”. Price of housing and cam is ok.

It would really be great to receive some comments, perhaps experience values on my email account “daggl318@yahoo.de” or in here!

THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR HELPING ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Cu, Flo :D [/list]

Hi Flo

I am also called a Newby but i think i can give you some advise for the decicion between the 2 Canons.

I have a Canon S30 and a S50 myself and the best improvement for underwater-photos is a manual white-Balance on a raw-Image. The A95 can´t store the RAW-Pictures so you can´t do a white-balance at this camera.

IMHO 5 MP are enough. Others disagree with me in that point but when they see my Pictures at a format of 50x70 cm they agree with me. The point is that you can´t bring these pictures to that size with a simple bubblejet. You need a Lambda.

So my choice would be the Canon S70.
Perhaps if you want to get a good camera for a low price, the Canon S50 in a WP-DC 300 is a option.

PS: The size of the screen is not the problem underwater. Its a problem to see the screen because of the reflections of the polycarbonate-housing. On some Olympus cameras you can use shaders (sometimes combines with Lenses) to solve that problem.

@mac2

Thx very much for your posting. It really helps me!

Just one further question:

Do you have some pics online? Maybe in original size?

Looking forward to receive your posting!

Greetz, Flo :D

Hi Cheat,

if you like to see some sample picture just go the product pages and click
on “sample pictures”. There should be enough pictures to decide which
camera

PowerShot S30:
http://www.digideep.com/english/digital/photo/camera/Canon/PowerShot-S30/7/23

PowerShot S50:
http://www.digideep.com/english/digital/photo/camera/Canon/PowerShot-S50/7/390

Powershot S60
http://www.digideep.com/english/digital/photo/camera/Canon/Powershot-S60/7/941

Powershot S70:
http://www.digideep.com/english/digital/photo/camera/Canon/PowerShot-S70/7/1019

/lars

@lars

Thank you very much! I already had a look at these pix. Nice ones!!!

I am interested in UW pictures in original size e.g. ~ 2200x1700 pixels to see the quality…

Greetz, Flo :D

Hello Flo,

My Homepage isn´t ready yet, but the pictures are online in Full Size.

http://www.biggi-und-marcus.de/Bilder

Just click on a Picture and the full-Size is loaded.

These Pictures are barely modified. Just the Raw-convertion and convertion to jpg with 75% quality.

The Parott-fish ist modified because i cut of his tail.

They aren´t my best Pictures just some to see the difference.

Hello Lars,

I just saw that 6 of the 15 Pictures at the sample Page of the S30 are made by me.

Thank god i have now a S50.  :D

Bye

Definately go for the S70!!!!
You will not regret it…. that camera will smoke the others

Definately go the cannon, the software that comes with it is by far better than the sony software

Well, I was in your position a few weeks ago as I was in the market for a new digicam for u/w pics.  I have just gotten back into scuba diving now that I have relocated out to Asia with a new job and I am now just a short flight from some world class diving in Southeast Asia/ Micronesia…

I had an old Sony DSC-p9 but unfortunately the sony housing for it has been discontinued and its hard to find even on ebay…  Also, I’ve never been happy with the white balance on the Sony and manual settings were limited (doesn’t apply to the newer Sony’s…).  I thought about some of the newer Sony’s that are out which seem to get good reviews on shutter lag, etc, but their new 7mp camera (P200) doesn’t have a housing yet out.  Anyways after weeks of latenite browsing and reading reviews I chose the Canon S70 for the quality of the pic.  I was concern however about the complaints about poor autofocus in low light.  To confirm, it does struggle with this in dark settings.

I’ve only had a chance to use it once last week on a dive trip to Subic Bay (Philippines).  Visibility wasn’t great so I didn’t really get a chance to get some good wide angle pics of some of the wrecks.  Some samples pics are on http://photos.yahoo.com/mikehpak   Unfortunately yahoo photos limits the viewing size of the photos.  (Anyone recommend a free online photo hosting site that allows larger pics?)  Most of these have been slightly adjusted in PS using the canon RAW addon.  Mind you that these are very amateurish photos and this was also the 1st time diving in 2 years!  Thank goodness my buoyancy control wasn’t too horrible…   Also, I was limited in the poor visibility and lack of external strobe…  For closeups (withing 2ft, the internal strobe was surprisingly OK).

Overall I’m happy with this camera as I was looking for a compact size, excellent image quality, and with good manual controls.  Size was a major considerating as I also like taking photos when doing backcountry snowboarding and other outdoor activities.  Downside of the S70 is that it does struggle with autofocusing in low lighting.  But so far the pic quality is impressive and the compact size of the Canon housing is a big plus (compared to my dive buddy’s Oly 5050 housing).  The Menu layout is a breeze and easy to manipulate underwater (even with gloves).  I can’t wait to use it in better u/w visibility.  And it appears that Inon has some goodies for this camera (addon close up lenses, strobe optical cable kit for their strobes)  http://inonamerica.com/news.php?news_id=35&newscat=0

One slight disappointment I found was the battery life seem to be a bit short.  It provided enough juice to last for about 3 dives a day (approx 60-70 shots w/ flash).  But one day the battery gave up mid dive on the last dive.  I forget but it may have been due to my spending a lot of the surface time viewing the photos…  I’ll have to test this out again as I’m concern as I do like getting in 3-5 dives a day.

i have played with most of these and the most fun and best quality one is definately the s70 .. i am with Andi on that

I did a bunch of test shots with S70 and found that the low light focusing is a problem. My initial tests lead me to believe that it was not too bad. But then I compared it to my other digital camera that is three years old (Contax TVS Digital). The Contax won hands down everytime. I then compared the Canon G6 with the Contax. The G6 was much better than the S70 and performed almost as good as the Contax.  The manual focusing on the S70 usable but rough the G6 was better.

Hope this helps.

Allen

Hi there… am also a newcomer to this forum. I just restarted diving after 2 years away and also am in the market for a quality prosumer digicam that takes good piccies on land and uw.
I’ve also been looking at the canon S-70 and the sony DSC W7. Your comments have definitely been helpful, thanks. I am also considering the olympus C-70 and the Nikon Coolpix 7900. Could anyone give me their opinion on these 2 cameras in terms of their use uw?

Much appreciated,

Christos

Hi,

I thought I’d piggyback along with this thread since I am in a similar spot. I’m thinking about the S70 + the WP-DC40, but I do also have a MMII EX with the lenses (macro and the 20mm wide angle). I see there is an adapter to connect those sea and sea lenses out there for the S50+WP-DC300, but I haven’t seen anything about an adapter for the 40 yet.  I talked to someone who sold their adapter for the 40 on ebay and he (coincidentally) had just upgraded to an S70 + 40 as well. He said the lens adapter for the 300 wouldn’t fit on the 40, so that was a bust.

I’ve got two questions:

anyone know of any generic/homegrown options for connecting those sea and sea lenses? (it seems like it should a rather simple matter to rig up something to line up and hold the lens in front of the camera)

And, second (I’ll repost this elsewhere as well) Anyone have any experience with the cool slave TTL for digicams offered by this guy:
http://www.heinrichsweikamp.net/blitz/indexe.htm
I’ve got a pair of YS-60 strobes that I might like to use for the s70+housing.

Thanks (I’ve learned a lot reading this forum!)
Matt.

Hi mjwestla

The Digital adaptor is VERY good. No doubt. My buddy just came back from a Safari with just the S50 and a Case. There are huge differences between this config and the same with the adaptor and a flash. And this is not a SLAVE. It is a TTL adaptor.That means that you don´t have to set the intensitivity of the flash. That makes the difference.

I dont think that the S&S lens will work on the WP-DC40.
I searched very long to buy a S&S adaptor for my WP-DC 300 here in Germany and then bought one from inon.

I also had to make my homegrown mounting to the S&S Multistay.

Inon has just the M67-Adaptor for their lenses to the WP-DC 40. For this adaptor you can buy a macro , a dome Port and a wide angle.

Perhaps you can sell the lenses at ebay and buy new ones from inon.

Thanks for the quick feedback. I am rather seriously leaning toward getting the digital adaptor now, given your positive feedback. I’ve actually got two YS-60 strobes at my disposal, so I wonder if there’s an easy means of getting them both running at the same time (they are both the standard YS-60/TTL 4 pin models; one is not a slave fired duo). Perhaps two adaptors? or maybe I can see if there is a adapter for two.

I have seen a place selling the lens adapter for the DC300, so I’m tempted to buy it and fashion my own mounting system if it won’t fit over the barrel. Would you mind describing or posting a picture of your homemade mounting? I’m envisioning a bent piece of metal, L shaped that has a hole on one side for the lens adapter and a hole in the other side to fit between the screw in strobe arm mount and the housing. Maybe connecting the metal to the adapter by drilling a hole into it and screwing the two together.

Matt.