Waterproof Digital Camera

For our full Waterproof Digital Camera range, please Click Here.

Probably the first thing to decide is are you looking for a waterproof digital camera or an underwater digital camera ? It is important to understand that the two items are not always the same. You need to compare what is offered by each type of camera and then decide which is best to suit your requirements.

Waterproof Digital Camera - Explanation

Waterproof digital cameras are exactly that - water proof, in the same way that your car is waterproof when all the doors and windows are closed, that of course does not mean that your car can be driven underwater - unless your name is James Bond.

To be more precise, a waterproof digital camera is usually a fully weather resistant, robust & sturdy camera and is ideal for outdoor sports photography as they are usually shockproof as well. They can usually also be used underwater to a depth of 3 Metres. This type of camera is perfectly suitable for taking photographs while swimming and even for snorkelling. They are however, not suitable for scuba diving where the photographer will often dive to depths of 30 or 40 metres or even more. For deep diving camera equipment the price will be slightly higher and we explain more about these cameras here.

The big advantage of waterproof digital cameras over underwater digital cameras as that they dont require the underwater housing case to completely seal the digital camera inside. This means that they are usually small enough to fit into a pocket and be used in or out of the water with ease. Almost all digital cameras now also have a video mode meaning that they can be used as a movie camera as well as just a still pictures camera. Some popular manufacturers of these type of all round sports cameras include Pentax Olympus Nikon Sanyo and of course Canon.

Small Camera case with hard lens. Perfect for snorkelling or diving to 5 metres. For full details, please Click Here

Fuji Finepix Big Job. Waterproof - shockproof and dustproof digital camera Perfect for all outdoor and sports photography For full details, please Click Here

For our range of fully underwater digital cameras and cases which are more suitable for deep diving to 40 metres or more then please visit our dedicated page at: Underwater Digital Camera

We have recently aquired an Underwater Case Panasonic DMW-MCTZ7 for the Panasonic Lumix DCM TZ6 TZ65 and TZ7 range so will report back in the performance when we have used it.

Underwater Photograpy - A few tips

Probably the most important thing I discovered when taking my first underwater photographs was that the white balance setting on the camera will become your new best friend. Rather than just using the underwater setting on the camera (which will still produce reaonable results), learning to use the White Balance setting effectively will allow you to take really colourful photographs that the underwater setting might not fully capture.

The reason for this is that at different depths the light from the surface is defracted more and so the colour settings on the camera need to be adjusted to allow for this. So to compensate for depth effect on the light, when you are at depth with some good sealife - say 20 metres - take a white balance setting against something white that is also at 20 metres with you e.g a bare arm, or a whiteboard or even the sand on the bottom of the dive site if you are close enough. This will allow the camera to calculate how the colour white looks at that depth therefore reproduce all the other colours accordingly. Later in the dive when you move up to say 10 Metres then take a new White Balance setting to allow the camera to adjust again. This fairly simple step will make a huge amount of difference to the colours that can then be seen in your digital photograps.

Also try not to use the Flash unless you are very close to your subject - by close, I mean less then 2 meters. As there are a lot of particles in sea water (even if it looks very clear) when you use the flash on a subject that is a long way off, the flash can often bounce off these particles and you often end up with a photo that just shows thousands of illuminated particles.

Try not to forget all about your dive tables and pressure levels when using an underwater digital camera. It is very easy to become distracted once you start snapping away and often some interesting sealife can distract you from your group and also make you forget to maintain sensible and smooth ascent rates. It is really not worth the risk of decompression sickness to affect your dive profile by going up and down to frequently during the dive just to try and get the perfect picture.

An extremely useful piece of software that is perfect for improving photographs that are taken both underwater and in everyday life is Adobe Photoshop. It is not cheap but it is the best photograph software on the market and is used by industry experts as well as just home users. Just take a look at the improvements that can made in just a few seconds by using Photoshop, such improvements just cannot be made using the cheapest image software.

Morray Eel underwater Before Photoshop

Morray Eel underwater After Photoshop correction

Adobe Photoshop can be ordered online directly from Amazon. Click here for full details.

The final tip for today is to Stay Safe When Diving. Never dive alone and do not dive at all unless you are PADI or SSI certified or if you are with a Divemaster or Instructor who has passed the PADI or SSI Divemaster or Instructors exams. If you are diving with a diving School then please ensure that you are using a PADA or SSI certified school and check the schools reviews by doing an Internet search. More information on the PADI and SSI certifications can be seen at these sites: Padi.com and Divessi.com