Underwater Camera Scuba

- How does a strobe work for an underwater camera when scuba diving?
I want to take some photos with a digital camera while scuba diving. I have heard that strobes are better to use. How do they work? Can you just buy a separate strobe and connect it to any underwater digital camera? Thanks.

A A stobe is either slaved directly to a cameras flash port ( if it has one) by a synch cord or it's slaved via the cameras actual flash itself . In the former's case, the actual on board camera flash is disabled. In the latter's case, the onboard flash isn't disabled but an opaque shield is placed over the flash, allowing the flash discharge out sideways, triggering the stobe's own discharge via a small sensor. If what you have is a normal point and shoot camera and a decent housing that has a strobe tray mount or capable of accepting some mouting hardware, you can go this route. IkeLite for example, makes a housing for many makes and model cameras, that allow the use of an aftermarket strobe. No wires, fibre optics and no connectors between the strobe and camera inside the housing. It simply triggers off the actual light flash of the onboard camera flash and an included flash shield stops the onboard illumination from heading to your subject but allows the offset strobe's light to hit the subject instead. Voila...no backscatter in your image. The strobe's light hits the subject at an angle relative to the camera lens, illuminating the subject but the light reflected off particles in the water outbound to the subject doesn't head right back into the camera lens before the subject's light, like would happen using an onboard flash. That's how a strobe eliminates backscatter in a nutshell and why you see strobes attached to the camera housings by flexible arms. It keeps that strobe's flash of light away from the camera lens and at an angle to it. Here's a few examples of strobe units. http://www.ikelite.com/web_pages/1strobe_index.html this one in particular is probably going to do the trick for you http://www.ikelite.com/af35/autoflash.html but check to make sure that your camera housing is supported for the mounts. I use the dual version of this strobe on this housing for my Canon 720 IS http://www.ikelite.com/web_two/can_a710.html .There's no mount compatibility issues because the housing and strobe are Ike Lite. If your camera is what's called an amphibious camera, like a Bonica or Sea&Sea and if it's relatively new, it may be set up to accept an optional strobe from from whatever camera manufacturer ( Bonica or Sea&Sea) you own. Older models ( 8 years ago or more) required you to jump through a lot of hoops and do some modifications to set up strobe funtionality for them. You need to understand that it's difficult to point you totally in the right direction here without knowing what camera you have, what your budget is and if it's worth it to you to go the extra expense if you're only taking a few fun shots or doing wide angle wrecks and macro life. You don't need to own an F1 race car to get to work a block away unless it's imperitive you're the fastest one on the street is what I'm saying. :)

- What kind of scuba/underwater digital camera should I buy for a trip to Key West?
I am going scuba diving next month and want to buy an underwater digital camera. Any suggestions? I have no experience with taking underwater photos so any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

A A couple of things to consider here. 1/ Do you just need it for holiday pics and that's it? If so, there are many cheap digitals on the market. Wal Mart even had a 5 MP that was rated to 60 feet a few months back. A Vivitar if I recall and they had it on sale for 70 bucks. 2/ Do you already own a digital camera? If so, the company that makes the camera may also make a housing for it. These camera company housings generally aren't great, in that not all camera functions are at your disposal, but you get what you pay for. If your budget allows, Ike Lite may make a housing for your camera ( http://www.ikelite.com/ ) but be prepared, they can be twice what you paid for the camera. The flip side is that they're the best housings and you can access just about all your camera functions as well as add strobe(s) to eliminate the camera flash ( the flash will produce some back scatter, a strobe eliminates it). As an example, I own a Canon powershot A720 IS. A relatively cheap digital point and shoot at $230 . The Ike Lite housing cost me another $450. But I now have an 8MP camera that can be taken to 200 feet and the video it produces is awesome too ( I use a 4 gig card). Setting up the camera in the housing takes about 30 seconds and the same to get the camera out, to take on surface tours or shots in the Pub. One good cheap camera + expensive housing= vesatile rig that does a good job for all my purposes. I could have bout Canon's own housing for this camera for half the price of the Ike Lite, but then I would also have gotten a housing that was half as good and didn't have the depth rating I needed. Theirs are only rated to 130 feet. I'm often deeper. This is the route to go if you own a camera you really like, want it safe and are serious about getting good underwater images or video and still want the option of using that camera on the surface with ease. 3/ Underwater camera bags? Forget them. They don't keep your camera at around one atmoshere. Mechanical linkages or buttons may not work as they will deform with the pressure increase on the camera case as you dive. Sucks not to be able to press that jammed shutter button when you want to take that shot of a whale shark cruising past you. Also you're also now trying to take a picture through a piece of plastic that's not optical grade nor is the port glass. Your images suffer because the incoming light gets refracted by the differing densities of the materials ( camera lens- glass, bag port- plastic) and your auto focus also goes out the window somewhat. This type of housing for a camera is really only suited to keep the camera dry, not producing decent images. Great for a day at the beach is all but some people still get suckered into buying them for dive shots because they're dirt cheap. You get what you pay for again. 4/ What's called an amphibious camera. These cameras are like a mixed breed. Generally they come in a housing that you cannot remove the camera from. Some will have options for adding a strobe tray, some won't. You will also have a lot fewer options when it comes to shooting modes than you would with a cheap to mid price point and shoot. This type of camera usually sells for between $250 -$500. Performance wise they're middle of the road. The shoot ok above water and ok below. Not spectacularly good at either nor really bad at either. If you're taking a camera along only a couple times per year or shoot out in the rain a lot, they'll do if you're not picky about fine tuning your shots. Both Sea & Sea as well as Bonica are popular manufacturers of this type of camera. My first camera was a Sea&Sea Mk5 film camera, an amphib.