I had a brilliant underwater shoot with Gina at the weekend. I only got the Hugyfot housing on 2nd March, I had a trial go with it at John Charles 5m dive pool that night to see everything worked and then straight in with Gina Modeling on Saturday 3rd March.
The housing was very natural to use. All the function buttons are virtually in the same place on the Hugyfot as they are on my Canon 5D Mk 2.
The instructions to put the housing together were clear and concise and the only bit I had trouble with was the port fitting onto the front of the housing (I just needs more elbow action) and the Hugyfot check system that is pressurised by a small vac device had a hose that came loose. A screw driver and the hose was back in place.
The Hugyfot check system is simple. You clamp the camera inside remembering to attach the LED unit to the hotshot of your camera (this also triggers the strobes). You seal the unit up with two alan key bolts (no snap latches like other cameras).
The red light blinks in the eye piece every 5 seconds to show it is not safe to dive.
You then attach the mini vacuum unit to the housing and press the on button. The housing now begins to depressurise. It drops down to about 0.5 bar. What this does is it seals the housing like a right vacuum so you can open the housing (same pressure as would be exerted at 5m below the water). This would be when most housing are most likely to leak. The LED changes from a blinking red for no dive, to a fast blinking red, to a slow blinking Green which means it is ready to dive (almost). You have to have it pressurised for half an hour before a dive. If the green light is still blinking then it is safe to dive. Air been thinner than water if there as likely to be a leak, the air would get in easier than water.
Andy Fenn was a legend when it came to helping me set up the camera. He would normally meet to set the camera up but as I was keen to get it he helped me over the phone at 10pm one night. Now that is customer service :)
So onto the photography. The first shoot at the deep pool went well and gave me time to play with the housing and learn some of the techniques you need with that sort of housing. It is slightly negative in the water so will need a lanyard to make sure it doesn't sink to the bottom of the ocean :S
The shoot with Gina was awesome. Everything went well and I learnt how to communicate with a model who cant see under the water. I found out that I need more light under water than I thought and also found out me and the model need more weight on us to sink gracefully. I ended up putting a weight belt on Gina from under the water with my scuba kit on. That was an experience.
Check out the first couple of unedited photographs from the shoot. They have only been lightened in light room and a slight beech bypass applied to them. I will add the edited versions later on this week :)
I'm off to play with my housing again :)
The housing was very natural to use. All the function buttons are virtually in the same place on the Hugyfot as they are on my Canon 5D Mk 2.
The instructions to put the housing together were clear and concise and the only bit I had trouble with was the port fitting onto the front of the housing (I just needs more elbow action) and the Hugyfot check system that is pressurised by a small vac device had a hose that came loose. A screw driver and the hose was back in place.
The Hugyfot check system is simple. You clamp the camera inside remembering to attach the LED unit to the hotshot of your camera (this also triggers the strobes). You seal the unit up with two alan key bolts (no snap latches like other cameras).
The red light blinks in the eye piece every 5 seconds to show it is not safe to dive.
You then attach the mini vacuum unit to the housing and press the on button. The housing now begins to depressurise. It drops down to about 0.5 bar. What this does is it seals the housing like a right vacuum so you can open the housing (same pressure as would be exerted at 5m below the water). This would be when most housing are most likely to leak. The LED changes from a blinking red for no dive, to a fast blinking red, to a slow blinking Green which means it is ready to dive (almost). You have to have it pressurised for half an hour before a dive. If the green light is still blinking then it is safe to dive. Air been thinner than water if there as likely to be a leak, the air would get in easier than water.
Andy Fenn was a legend when it came to helping me set up the camera. He would normally meet to set the camera up but as I was keen to get it he helped me over the phone at 10pm one night. Now that is customer service :)
So onto the photography. The first shoot at the deep pool went well and gave me time to play with the housing and learn some of the techniques you need with that sort of housing. It is slightly negative in the water so will need a lanyard to make sure it doesn't sink to the bottom of the ocean :S
The shoot with Gina was awesome. Everything went well and I learnt how to communicate with a model who cant see under the water. I found out that I need more light under water than I thought and also found out me and the model need more weight on us to sink gracefully. I ended up putting a weight belt on Gina from under the water with my scuba kit on. That was an experience.
Check out the first couple of unedited photographs from the shoot. They have only been lightened in light room and a slight beech bypass applied to them. I will add the edited versions later on this week :)
I'm off to play with my housing again :)
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