Photography
One
of the greatest beneficiaries of the advent of
digital cameras has been the diver, and even the snorkeller. So to cut
straight to the chase, don’t even think about a traditional film
camera, go straight to digital. You may already have a compact digital
camera, and for many of the mainstream manufacturers
there is a range of good value underwater housings, priced at under £200
and good for depths of up to 50 metres.
If you have never taken an underwater photograph before, it is probably
best to start with a compact digital in a housing
that will fit in the pocket of your BCD. This
also enables you to use it for all your other
holiday shots they are not just dedicated underwater
cameras. These are made by Olympus, Sony, Canon,
Nikon and Sea and Sea. This will ensure you can
choose when to have your hands full and when
you just want to be free to enjoy the dive. It
will also enable you to gently immerse yourself
in this incredibly taxing discipline with ease
and it will hopefully add to your diving skills, most particularly buoyancy.
The next step would be an external flash or ‘strobe’, possibly
attached to the same camera housing (make 
sure
that the housing has the capability when you
buy so you can add to it later), and finally a wet
mount wide angle lens (this means you can mount
and take off the lens underwater as opposed to
some cameras where you have to decide before
the dive whether to put a wide angle adaptor
inside the housing.) After this you move to a
macro lens, twin strobes and SLR’s.
It is somewhat of a minefield and so good advice is essential and the men to guide you reside at Ocean Optics who will provide totally unbiased and honest advice even to their own detriment. They will also show you all the ins and outs of assembly and whilst the word discount is never mentioned, it is one of the few times I have been happy to pay sticker price.