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How to Make A Under $150 Camera Into a Great Underwater Digital Camera
Those high power, all everything, expensive cameras are what we drool over when looking to purchase a underwater digital camera. The problem is that many of us can't afford $800 or greater to plunk down for the purchase. There is a solution.
You can buy a camera for less than $150 that does a great job of recording our undersea exploits. Let's take a look at the top three brands.
The Nikon CoolPix L series
Nikon is world renowned for quality. The CoolPix series have great color, fantastic optics, and are simple cameras to use. These models are very small, fitting easily in your pocket. They use SD (memory) cards and AA batteries (alkaline, rechargeable, etc.) making them easy and practical. Both of these items can be purchased at many stores, from department to specialty stores.
Fantasea, a maker of underwater housing for digital cameras has a very sturdy and tight housing available for the Coolpix L2 adn L3. It is the FL-3 Underwater Camera Housing. It gives you full control over all of the functions of the camera and can be taken down to 130 feet. Fantasea has the exclusive feature of proving flood insurance in case of a leak for replacement of the camera. That is a lot of confidence in the performance of their housing. Caveat...it is not cheap.
Canon PowerShot A
Canon is also well known for their cameras. The Powershot series provides excellent color, great optics and have many additional features. They also use SD cards and AA batteries. Their slightly larger size normally means they have a larger zoom, aperture, and screen.
The Canon has an underwater camera housing available at Amazon. The manufacturer also offers housings directly. The Amazon offer certainly isn't as sturdy and tight as the (or as expensive) Fantasea so don't think you are getting a bargain here. You get what you pay for. This housing is only good down to 30 feet. Keep in mind that this is a generic housing or one size fits all.
Kodak C series
Kodak has been a name which always represented quality photography film, and their quality has crossed over in the digital age. The colors are always beautiful and their cameras simple and elegant to use, they also take SD cards and AA batteries.
The Kodak C series are good cameras but there don't seem to be any specialized housings available. The housings that are available fall into the generic category and offer some functionality. Ikelite does offer a generic housing that does seem to be built well and offers a tight, waterproof environment. It is a complete enclosure with handles that promise easy use. Check it out here.
This lens is everything you have heard -terrific, fast, and sharp. It works amazingly well in low-light situations, and low-light events. Photos taken with this lens from the front couple rows of a concert for example give you brilliant colorful well-saturated shots at low ISO settings. I do a lot of theatre photography – I love that this lens allows me to take stage shots with the stage lighting colors intact instead of getting that wash-out yellow tinging with other lenses. A great lens used more often than you would think.