When making this important purchase, you must ask yourself a few basic questions...

1) What is you level of expetise in photography ?

If all you know about photography is pushing the shutter button , I would suggest getting the simplest camera you can find BUT. make sure it has a manual shooting mode. This mode is very important underwater and sooner or later you will know how to use it and wish your camera had it.

If you have any knowledge or experience in photography and are familiar with terms like aperture , shutter speed , exposure and so on.. I would suggest that , depending on your budget, you should consider getting a prosumer camera. A good article about these can be see here : Best Prosumer Cameras 2011.

2) Where would you be diving ?

If your diving is in clear waters like the Red Sea or the carribbean then you would be able - and most surely -  want to shoot wide photos or coral rocks, wrecks and reef walls. For this, you should make sure the camera you purchase has a widest angle possible. Some point and shoot cameras have a 28mm wide lens (the basic one is 35mm) and there are even ones in the market that go as wide as 24mm. Of course a wide angle lens can normally be added but it will come at a price.

If you are diving in the Mediterranean or other lakes where water are unclear , you will most surely be taking only macro photos as a wide angle shot cannot be seen in these waters. In this case , make sure your camera has a good Macro mode and can focus easily and quickly on subjects 4-8 inches away.

3) What's your budget ?

The most basic underwater camera starts from 350$. A decent prosumer one is close to 1000$ and a DSLR is over 2000$. Your budget should be a good start point for looking to buy a digital underwater camera. Note that purchasing online can sometime expose you to more deals and better prices so this would be a good place to start looking.

4) Which accessories can be added to the package in the future ?

If this is the first underwater camera you are buying , I wouldn't suggest getting any accessories to start with. It is much better to start diving with your camera and only then understand what you are missing according to the nature of your dives. When purchasing your housing, make sure it can be extended with the necessary accessories such as a wide angle lens, red filter, strobe or video light.

It is always recommended to consult with one of the major retailers both online and locally and take some recommendations and tips from divers who have experienced with many different types of gear and accessories. The underwater photography industry if flourishing and there is a very large variety of cameras for you to choose from that would meet your budget.

-Tal Mor

Tal Mor is a diver and underwater photographer working for Mozaik Underwater Cameras

Fish Underwater Composition

When photographing fish and other creatures try to focus on the eyes of your subject. This will create a center of interest. Finding interesting angles while maintaining eye focus will create unique and intriguing compositions. Keeping proper spacing in your frame of the image will be imperative. Make sure if possible that your subject is slightly off center. Subjects should have good "white space" on either side of them, often referred to as room to swim in fish photography.

Swimming around the subject will allow you to explore different angles and lighting scenarios. Getting up close often gives better image quality and focus on the subject. Many interesting shots have been captured by getting slightly below the subject and shooting upwards, always keeping the eyes in focus.

Try to seek out a background that does not hide the subject or distract from it. If necessary try using a smaller aperture to blur out a distracting or unwanted background. Use of differing angles can create interesting shots. Diagonal composition lines can be difficult to obtain but make interesting photos. This would be when your subject fills the frame from one corner to the diagonally opposite corner.

Getting up close and personal can create some intriguing photos as well. Try filling the entire frame of your image with the subject of your photo. Remember to keep focused on the eyes, and keep your subject slightly off center.
Shooting for color can be fun, try to shoot complimentary colors with one another, blue and yellow are good together, as are red and green.

Use leading lines in your composition to draw viewers into your photo. Leading lines are parts of the image that tend to lead our eyes into the photo, often to accentuate an interesting image that is off-centered. An S-curve is an additional tool used to show off an interesting image. This involves having an S-curve shape working through the photo leading the viewer to the main focus of your image.

The most important rule about composition is that there are no hard, fast rules. Composition is an art form, practicing fearless and imaginative photography will allow you to grow and learn as a photographer.

The Quick Method for Getting Great Underwater Shots

The Aquapac is one such item. The Aqua pack is a heavy-duty plastic bag with an amazing seal that protects the camera from sand, water and anything else. When using this method, make sure you place the camera in the bag in a dry atmosphere to prevent fogging. Also, don't use a flash or it will reflect on the packaging and give you a whiteout. The picture quality with an Aquapac isn't ideal though, so if you want crystal-clear shots try a container made of hard plastic or glass. These containers are much more expensive but will ensure unrivaled quality.

Next, here are some tips to help you get the best possible underwater shots. Don't use your digital zoom above all else. Also, try to cover the housing in front of your internal flash when using an external strobe to prevent backscatter. You should also keep your external flash far away from the housing to reduce the risk of backscatter. If you're having trouble focusing your camera, try using a dive light. This will allow your camera to adjust its focus automatically.

There are a number of mistakes beginners commonly make when shooting underwater shots. Before you head out, make sure your JPEG image quality is set high enough so the pictures have a high quality when you view them. You don't want to spend an entire session shooting on a low picture quality! Also, don't oversaturate your photos. Here's another great idea: think about what you'll see before you go and set your strobe and f-stop before hand. This will prevent you from missing a great shot because you're trying to fix the settings. If you find a great static background underwater look around for a foreground subject. If you find a great static foreground subject you can wait for a background to swim by. These tips will ensure you get the best quality underwater shots with minimal effort!

Underwater photography can be quite a difficult task. You might think that it is the same as all photography, but will find the pictures to be severely overexposed or underexposed due to lighting difficulties. Too much light will result in colors being too white and not true to the subject you are photographing and too little light results in dark colors in the photos. The deeper you are in the ocean, the more difficult the lighting becomes and taking photographs in underwater caves can prove to be a nightmare.

Underwater lighting

To produce quality underwater photos, it is essential to understand the inner workings of your camera. The total amount of light used for exposure in your photo is controlled by the shutter cycle. A long exposure captures more light with less intensity and a series of short shutter cycles captures less light with more intensity. This is the same principal of taking outdoor photos with sunlight taken into consideration, which may overexpose or underexpose your picture.

I find that a good underwater digital camera with TTL (through-the-lens) metering will take all of the guesswork out of your artistry. This type of camera has an auto exposure lens which measures the light through the lens as you are seeing the subject and it chooses the correct exposure for you. A SLR (single-lens reflex) camera is generally digital for the utmost clarity and includes the quality of TTL. This type of camera is great for beginners with it's no fail properties. This camera will meter the light with an imaging sensor that is located under the mirror. It uses light metering and autofocus to obtain perfect underwater photos. Most of the advanced models have a bracket or dot that is visible through the lens and you place the dot or brackets on or around the main subject of your photo. This is where the lighting and exposure is set for that area of viewing. For example, if you are looking at a group of fish and one in particular is your main subject, then you use the dot or brackets to focus on that particular fish.

I definitely recommend these types of cameras to the beginning underwater photographer for success. Many people call this a point and click camera because you don't have to adjust anything. The camera does all the work for you and it is definitely worth it's weight in gold when capturing your memories of beautiful underwater fish and sea life. It is just too disappointing to go diving and see the perfect photo, that when developed, is much less in quality than what you actually saw.

Underwater Camera Settings

F-Stops

The F-Stops setting will control what your background looks like. You may want to have a slightly blurry look to your photo. This can be done by increasing or decreasing the numbers on this setting. The thing to remember is that when the numbers go up, this will mean a smaller lens or range, aornd when the numbers go down, the lens will open me. So, up means less and down means more. This will take some time to remember, but practice makes perfect. Be patient and have some fun seeing what kinds of photos you can get with each setting. You can try one type of setting at a time each time you go underwater. When you go back up, take some notes. This will help you to remember as you write it down and keep track of your photo shoots.

ISO Settings

The next camera settings underwater to learn about are the ISO settings. This has to do with the grain. Grain is basically the speed of your camera when taking photos. Have you heard anyone say the words “noisy photo” before? They were talking about the grain and their camera. They say it is better to have a noisy photo than to have taken a blurry one, but if you were trying to take a blurry photo, that is great! Some blurry photos come out wonderfully!

Shutter Speed

The next setting on your underwater camera is shutter speed. The shutter speed affects motion. Have you ever seen a photo that looks like someone’s hands were trembling when they took the photo? This can be very frustrating if all of the photos developed are like this. Sometimes, with the shutter speed not set right, you can end up with a photo that has blue behind it.

I am assuming that if you are reading this article, you have already done some underwater photo taking and are familiar with diving. If you haven’t been diving yet, you may want to take some diving lessons first to get comfortable with the diving part before you begin underwater photography. Then, you can learn all about camera settings underwater.

Right underwater camera

Regardless of your interest, an underwater camera frees you up to take those shots that previously were off limits. But how do you know what kind of camera to purchase? Like standard digital cameras, underwater cameras come in a variety of price ranges, each with different features, abilities, storage capacity, and quality levels.

Before you begin looking for your camera, determine what you want to use it for. Do you take an annual beach trip and you just want additional snapshots of the family to put in your album? Do you travel frequently and love to take detailed pictures of ocean life? Think about the times you would use the camera, and why you want to take the pictures. If you're an amateur photographer and getting the perfect shot is important to you, you might want to look into which features suit you best. However, if you just want candid shots of your family and don't bother with settings very often anyway, one of the basic models might work perfectly well for you.

Something else to consider is how you'll be printing the pictures. If you intend to use the pictures for posters, advertisements, competitions, or you print them for the purpose of selling them, a higher megapixel camera will be important to you. You need the option to print at the largest size possible. You might look also at the zoom features, especially if you'll be wanting to zoom in on smaller objects.

Overall, the best approach is to consider your usage, your motive for taking pictures, and your desired objects of photography, and then to take a look at which features you do and don't need. Remember, too, to budget in extra money for accessories.

See if you can find something you could use in our underwater camera reviews...

With the many cameras on the market. this will be an interesting shopping experience for you. An important feature for any underwater camera, is keeping it sealed to keep the water out. In the past, the cameras were bulky and large, and even the batteries were big. Now there are very small automatic camcorders that have small long-life batteries.

Underwater camera selection

A wide-angle lens should be purchased with the camera. This will result in less depth of field and focusing problems. I find this to be very helpful in photographing the beautiful coral reefs and focusing on the fish that swim past them. I also prefer the pressure resistant housing that can work well at one hundred feet deep. I don't even like to go that deep, but it's tempting to do it. The housing should have a quick release snap and an o-ring seal.

To pick out your underwater camera selection, try to purchase a popular model that you've heard a lot about on the market. Be sure you can find a companion housing for the camera. Make sure it can accommodate the wide-angle adapter and long-life battery. Check out condensation problems the housing may have. I would personally get something that is inexpensive, small and easy. But you still want something sturdy.

A good underwater camera selection is also that kind that can take still pictures as well as videos. I like to have that choice. If you get a camera with a 4 megapixel or above, this will be the best bet to take that still picture and videos. There are usually two hours of recording time on a camera, as when you are underwater it sometimes doesn't offer the option to open the housing to change between video and still.

If you are more interested in just still pictures, then an underwater digitial camera is a good choice. You can choose between the compact or the dSLRs. The dSLRs have better optics, quality and less focus delay. Hard to imagine, but there are also underwater disposable cameras, and even some underwater cameras are so cheap, they cost less than $5.00. I would be careful in checking out everything first. If you want good results, you may have to spend a bit more. I know I have.

Read the online underwater camera reviews and see what you find...

Beginning underwater photography

The camera you use is not your largest variable. Underwater cameras are available for purchase, ranging from nearly affordable to not even close. Water tight housing cases for land cameras can also be used, for a slightly smaller investment. Add a light source, called a strobe, and you are half way there. In theory.

Most of my research on this type of photography has led me to believe that a masochistic bent to the psyche is nearly a prerequisite since a low ratio of the shots you will take will be considered keepers. Water as a medium is a difficult environment. Thousands of small, even miniscule, particles float between you and that angelfish you were so delighted to stumble upon, making your photo hazy and unclear. Water will also suck the warm end of the color spectrum out of your shots. That's why many underwater photos are studies in blue on blue.

To alleviate the color wash, basic rules have repeatedly been reiterated:

1. Get close to your subject - close enough to touch (however, experts do not recommend touching!).
2. Never shoot down. If you do, you will lose your subject in the background. Here is where a good grasp of diving is valuable. Positioning yourself below your subject will swing the odds in the photographer's favor. The solid blue of the water will create the best background for showcasing your subject.
3. Adding a strobe will be our rule #3. A medium to strong light source will go a long way to bringing back the true colors and textures you have fallen in love with beneath the deep blue sea.

And now you are on the road to great underwater photography.

Happy shooting!

SeaLife DC800

The SeaLife DC800 Underwater Digital Camera has the ability to be entirely submersed in water up to 60 meters, or 200 feet. This is very rare in modern cameras because many camera underwater covers become pressurized to the point of collapse in such depths. In fact, the average depth for most underwater casing clad cameras is only a shallow 5-10 meters. For many cameras of this class, 60 meters is simply unheard of. But this camera in the SeaLife line renders the fear of pressurization on a camera unnecessary due to the brilliant level of protection against this pressure.

The SeaLife DC800 Underwater Digital Camera features a 2.7 inch LCD high resolution screen which is just above average for this grade of camera. This allows for easy viewing of captured photos or video due to the wide screen capability. It also provides perfect framing underwater. The SeaLife DC800 Underwater Digital Camera also features an underwater no flash mode called Sea Mode which provides white balance capabilities for the camera. These white balance settings are for two distinct kinds of water; blue ocean water, and green ocean and lake water. They are also subdivided based on the depth of the water in which the camera is being used in.

This stunning underwater digital camera does not just take photos, it also has some amazing color correction utilities which make your picture look as vibrant and colorful as if it was in perfect daylight. The Sealife SC800 comes with 5 new dive specific color correction modes to help your picture appear just how you wanted it to, without expensive underwater lighting equipment.

The basics of the Sealife DC800 digital underwater camera are just as impressive. With an 8 mega pixel resolution, 4x optical zoom, and 5x digital zoom you will always be able to reach that perfect photo opportunity, and if things are close up, the auto focus can take pictures from as little as 2 inches away. If that was not enough, the Sealife SC800 brings fast shutter technology to give you instant photographs, so you never miss the Sealife!

Fortunately the Sealife DC800 works just as well on land as it does under the wave. I was stunned to find that I could use it capably out of water! It gives perfect face detection, along with 22 other land mode abilities, to make this digital camera truly versatile.

The Sealife DC800 comes with large, widespread controls to give you complete control even with diving gloves on. When you are out of water the inner camera can be easily removed so you have a stylish camera for your out of water trips.

When it comes to underwater shots, light can always be a problem. I upgraded my Sealife DC800 with an external flash (You can have up to two external flashes) to give much clearer, well lit, shots for when I am in deeper water.

All in all the Sealife DC800 is an amazing tool to use for taking digital pictures underwater. It has some fantastic capabilities for in and out of the ocean, as well as up to 4GB of storage and 2 hours battery life. This great combination of functionality and durability make it my number one under water digital camera.

The SeaLife DC800 Underwater Digital Camera is a fantastic camera that shines above average. With all of its features and capabilities, it is a fantastic camera for novices and professionals alike.

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Sealife DC800 Digital Camera Pro Set NEW with Warranty    US $799.95

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Sealife DC1000

The number one feature of this camera is, of course, the underwater protective casing which allows it to be completely immersed in water without fear of damaging the internal structures of the camera. This feature has grown popular among teenagers and adults alike due to the protection that it grants while at beaches or pools, or even when out in the rain. Because of this underwater protection, cameras like the SeaLife 10.0mp Underwater Digital Camera shoot above other cameras in this class.

The SeaLife DC1000 Underwater Digital Camera has a 10 megapixel digital capability which allows very high resolution when taking pictures or recording video. Its heavy duty waterproof cover allows it to be entirely immersed in water up to 60 meters, or over 200 feet. This allows pictures to be taken of deep and remote sections of the ocean, lakes or ponds, and can handle absolutely any pool with ease. However, it can also be employed to take pictures or video in the rain without feat of damage being done to the internal mechanisms. It can be used in the snow as well, easily repulsing the harmful condensation of snow.

The SeaLife DC1000 Underwater Digital Camera also features a 2.7 inch LCD screen allowing for very easy viewing or already recorded photos and videos and allows deathly precise underwater framing. While shooting underwater without using the flash, the SeaLife 10.0mp Underwater Digital Camera has 4 underwater white balance settings including those needed for blue ocean water, and green water of specified depths.

With the intense spy mode feature, pictures may be automatically taken in 10 second, 30 second, 60 second, and five minute intervals. By setting the camera on a tripod and enabling the spy features, underwater life may be captured without being scared off by the photographer. With the camera housing, the camera is protected from water, but all features and buttons are still accessible to the photographer.

The SeaLife DC1000 Underwater Digital Camera is a very impressive camera with a wide variety of features that truly make it a camera among cameras. Overall, I would have to give this particular camera a 10 out of 10 because of its flawless underwater capabilities and inclusive camera kit that comes with all needed accessories.

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