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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
UnderWater Flash Sync
Joe Morahan, Photographer
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Denver | Co | USA | Posted: 11:40 AM on 06.27.09 |
->> Wondering if anyone could point me in the right direction to help educate myself on some underwater flashes-
I have an underwater housing with a flash, however I would like be able to sync an above water and an underwater flash for the same image.
I have been trying to point the underwater flash up to trigger the other flashes but it just does not seem to work for me.
Any advice or ideas where to look? |
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Karsten Moran, Photographer, Photo Editor
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New York | NY | United States of America | Posted: 12:06 PM on 06.27.09 |
->> Using radio slaves has been discussed on the site -- and appears not to work.
Slaving the flashes is your best bet (can you shoot at dusk/with the lights off). If it's not working the way you've got the flashes currently set up, you could buy an ike controller and run it into the pool/under water via cable from the land-based unit.
I'm not sure there's really a better solution. I'd call ike and see if they have any ideas : http://ikelite.com/web_pages/1strobe_index.html |
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Shelley Cryan, Photographer
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New England | CT | USA | Posted: 12:51 PM on 06.27.09 |
->> I remember Joe McNally had to rig up some strobe system or other to shoot in an enormous NASA training tank -- so maybe he'll chime in (he's a member here). If memory serves, he had a series of flashes -- they'd optically trigger each other down the line.
That is, you have your on-camera strobe, then position another strobe (or two) physically between you and your above-water strobes (those strobes are underwater, too, successively closer to the surface). Your on-camera strobe can be seen by the closest strobe, which can be seen by the next closest strobe, which can be seen by the strobes above water. Theoretically ought to work.
Joe's the man on figuring out complex lighting scenarios, so I hope this explanation at least somewhat approximates what I remember reading on his blog or book somewhere.
I do agree with Karsten about the radio triggers -- I've tried them underwater and have only been able to get them to work reliably when the Pocket Wizard was at most maybe a foot below the surface. The opening image on my website (www.shelleycryan.com) was shot that way: one pocketwizard on camera triggered two sb800s above water. In that case I had the wizard and camera in an EwaMarine bag that I held just under the water's surface. My hand was in a cast too that day, so my hand was in it's own version of an Ewa bag....grin...As I recall my camera stayed dry but my cast got wet. Better than the other way around....
Good luck with your project and give McNally's books/blog a scan to see if you can skim some details of his NASA watertank shoot. |
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Curtis Clegg, Photographer
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Sycamore | IL | USA | Posted: 4:56 PM on 06.27.09 |
->> What isn't working for you - are the slaves not firing, or are you not getting the right exposure?
If the slaves are firing and you're still getting under-exposed, then you may have a situation where the E-TTL's pre-flash (instead of the main flash) is triggering your slaves.
I have been pondering this question myself... I'd like to use some external lights with my G9 and underwater housing. The best option I have thunk up so far is to have a slave trigger connected to a PC cord inside a long clear tube, sealed watertight on one end. An assistant standing outside the pool could put the sealed end of the tube in the water near the camera to "see" the G9's flash (I'm also considering putting aluminum foil over the clip-on flash diffuser to direct light back toward the slave trigger).
The unsealed end of the PC cord would go out of the clear tube (above water, of course) to a radio transmitter lest the assistant or anyone else has direct wired contact with the strobes near water.
Since the G9's built-in flash doesn't have an option for manual flash, I'd have to outsmart the E-TTL system. For every shot I would need to hit the FEL button (*) before every exposure (probably covering the built-in flash as I do so) so the pre-flash doesn't fire the strobes prematurely.
One of these days I'll get around to building the setup unless someone can come up with a reason that it wouldn't work. |
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Mark Peters, Photographer
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Curtis Clegg, Photographer
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Sycamore | IL | USA | Posted: 10:10 PM on 06.27.09 |
->> Thanks Mark, using fiber optic cable underwater makes perfect sense.
Your suggestion got me looking on eBay, where I found this:
http://tinyurl.com/Underwater-Fiber-Optic
Adhering one end to the underwater housing, and the other to a clear Pelican case like this:
http://www.adorama.com/PL1060CYL.html
could be a safe and effective way to trip a slave trigger. You could put a Pocket Wizard and a Wein in the Pelican and let it float on the surface of the water. I don't know the length of the cable though, I'm going to write the seller to find out. |
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Mark Loundy, Photo Editor
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San Jose | CA | USA | Posted: 1:38 AM on 06.28.09 |
->> Joe,
Would continuous lights be a solution? That would get you past the synch issue entirely.
--Mark |
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John OHara, Photographer
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Petaluma | Ca | United States | Posted: 11:50 PM on 06.28.09 |
->> Have you looked into EO connectors ? On all my underwater housings I used an EO connector to my strobes. Your effective max. distance to light things is 7 feet. Some might argue this point, but it is a fact. With an EO connector and a long cable you could cary it above water to your other strobes. In the early 70's we used airplane landing lights and a generator. It is a wonder we did not kill ourselves.
I couple of very nice OLD STROBES, for U/W that have not been turned on for 10 or 15 years, I would love to sell/ They are variable output and have slaves built into them. A Sub Sea 150 and a Hydro 35 or something like that. |
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Joe Morahan, Photographer
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Denver | Co | USA | Posted: 7:18 PM on 06.30.09 |
| ->> everyone thank you so much for the wonderful advice. i will try using fiber optic cables and see what happens. |
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