Under water Videoing??? Help!!!

[Debzyp]

Can anyone help me please....

I am looking for an underwater video camera.
I am looking for something small enough so I can video when I go cave diving.
I have seen on a website that there is a hands free camera called Veecam.

Does anyone have any info or seen one? Is it any good??

Debzy XXX

[Ben Panter]

It's a display rather than a camera, so I suspect it is of no use to you. Lots of housed video cameras on the market, have a look at http://www.camerasunderwater.co.uk/.

Ben

[EDIT] Just looked again and seen that it does have a camera, but there are a multitude of other solutions out there - try the link.

[Hamish]

Hi Debzy,

If it's small you are looking for have you considered just using a good quality digital camera?

I use a Sony Camcorder with a dedicated housing and video light, this is all well and good if you don't mind the size, but if looking for something compact then I would consider one of the modern compact digital camera's.

These give very good quality and with a good sized memory card you can record quite a bit. Just as an example my son has a Panasonic DMC-TZ3 with a 4GB card and can record 2 sessions (max 2GB at a time) of 22 minutes in either 4:3 or 16:9 with 30fps (frames per second). This gives good quality video including sound which can be then transfered to DVD disk or watched on any PC.

regards

Hamish

[Paul Duckworth]

Veecam allegedly has been delayed while they sort out a few software issues.

The depth rating has apparently been reduced to 100m due to the screen imploding at/near (?) the original depth.

There seems to be a few people waiting on hearing how the video looks at depth, so maybe worth waiting for.

[paul holder]

i presume you are tight for room therefor a head on your hand or the side of your helmet .with the recorder seperate would be best it will have to be robust.therefor talk to alex at custom divers 01737773000

[Janos]

My buddy ordered at the last show. He was hoping to get it before Christmas so that he could bring it on our cave course in Mexico in February. However I think he's since been informed that it will be delayed until March 2008

They do look nice though.


Janos

[Debzyp]

Janos,
Thanks for letting me know that they wont be available till March....
a bit like your friend, I thought they were available very soon..!!

Has anyone seen one for real... are there any out there???

DebXX

[NickMcV]

As above for all the hardware advice - I offer a note on usage..

It's a good idea to have a depth guage/computer/bottom timer fixed either to the housing or mounted on you so you can see it whilst filming. I found it only too easy to change depth whilst following a fish/diver and looking through the viewfinder, and not wanting to 'jog' the shot by changing grip.

[ChristianG]

My buddy ordered at the last show. He was hoping to get it before Christmas so that he could bring it on our cave course in Mexico in February. However I think he's since been informed that it will be delayed until March 2008.
Well, I don't "do" video, matter of fact I don't think I've even ever handled one above water leave a lone under water.

What I have done however is handle quite a lot of still cameras, both current issue and experimental (and ancient for that matter) and, given that, I am constantly astonished that people are willing to put down their hard-earned on a concept, something that has yet to see the proper light of day. Indeed if we take computers as an analogy I never, ever, get the latest OS until the bugs have been ironed out. Matter of fact I'm about to buy Apple Mac Leopard OS10.5.1, because the bugs have been ironed out, most of them anyway. Currently I'm still running 10.4.11.

Brand new camera technology, particularly when complicated by water, pretty well inevitably needs a settling down period and the Nikonos RS AF is a classic case in point. I know, I used to have one and the system cost me about $AU17K in '92 - guess what that works out at today?

The system is both magnificent and also seriously flawed and that last is why it was unsuccessful in the long term. So can be anything else which breaks new ground as this thing did. I suggest to you that you tell your buddy to try to wriggle out of any commitment he has for this thing, to wait until the early adopters have done with their complaining.