Best underwater camera

[DutchAquarium]

It's that time, i'm looking for a new camera to take with me on dives. The camera i had before wasn't very high tech and this time, i'm willing to put some money into it. Can anyone recommend a camera, casing, and lens for me. I also go on quite a few night dives and was wondering what works best for these. Thanks

 

[cristata.reef]

Olympus TG series (4 and 5) are my personal favorites. Depth resistant to a certain degree and they take some pretty decent pictures. Inexpensive and highly portable (no housing needed for depths up to 50 or so feet)

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Bump! :D

 

[User1]

Currently I run a GoPro Hero 5. Orange and red filters depending on depth. I bring two cards, spare batteries fully charge, in dry bag. Everything is captured on video. Depending on the type of dive I'll set 4k and FPS. From video I can take a still. At the time of my purchase GoPro had the market and it was theirs to lose...which it seems like maybe they did. I was looking at the GoPro 7 last night. The Hero 5 works great and the 4k video is really outstanding quality. The 7 series looks promising although I am researching a bit more on the overall company status before I drop another 400 bucks.

Underwater photography isn't really my thing so I just keep things simple. The biggest challenge with the GoPro or any similar video capture device is how you mount or carry it.

 

[saltyhog]

This is my set up for night dives for my GoPro. Very adjustable and not terribly expensive

https://www.makospearguns.com/AR15-Go-Pro-Handle-p/mar15h.htm

This is my daytime set up. I keep in on a retractor clipped to a D ring on my BC. It will actually fit in the pocket of my BC (Aqua Lung Axiom). I love filming but also want to be free to put my camera up and enjoy the dive or be ready to deal with all the things that can come up on a dive.

The filter system is by Backscatter and holds two filters at a time even though there is only one on it when the picture was taken. I usually use a "Dive" 20-50' and a "Deep" 50' +

There are lots of more traditional camera set ups with housings and you can spend literally thousands of dollars on them. This works for me and produces pretty darned good footage.

 

[saltyhog]

Daytime video.

 

[User1]

@saltyhog similar setup here although nice trick with that grip. GoPro's are just tough to beat. The 7 series has a form of stabilization although I've personally not picked one up or seen one used by a diver yet. Supposed to work though.

 

[MichaelP121579]

My Note 9 does great

 

[DutchAquarium]

Im not sure if the gopro really is for me, i really enjoy a picture and im not a big fan of video taking. Thanks everyone for the great responses so far.

 

[DutchAquarium]

Daytime video.

by the way great video and cozumel is awesome diving. I've gone on multiple dive trips to jamaica and dominican Republic. Just made it to cozumel this year and it clearly tops all the other diving i've done.

 

[Instigate]

I've never been diving but I think Sony a7R series cameras are really great, excellent image and packed with features the other companies are slow to release. But you can't go wrong with Canon either. I remember looking into underwater housings for dslr/mirrorless cameras and it seemed like there was only one or two choices for different lenses. So I think that will dictate what lens you can use.

 

[saltyhog]

by the way great video and cozumel is awesome diving. I've gone on multiple dive trips to jamaica and dominican Republic. Just made it to cozumel this year and it clearly tops all the other diving i've done.

I understand. There are some great conventional rigs, I just don't know enough about them to recommend one. I will say stills are just as good on GoPro and you can capture exactly the still you want from your video with no trouble at all.