Canon Ixus 60

[JAG]

Hi,

I have a Canon Digital Ixus 60 that I've bought to use as a topside and u/w camera, mainly to use in Dahab in February. I've not had a chance to play with it u/w as of yet and was hoping that someone has one of these and could advise whether the u/w setting on the camera is sufficient enough for my point and shoot capability or whether I should be looking at manual settings?

Many thanks,

Ian

[Mark]

Personally I don't know the Ixus camera. But with most compacts for macro use with the internal flash they work quite well underwater. For wide angle shots the internal strobe will be pretty useless, a big external strobe would work, but with the high ambient light they would need to be big. I would stick to ambient light for the wide angle shots using a manual white balance, that is all I am going to do in Thailand at Xmas. Instead of using a white card I point my camera at the surface to set the white balance, it is the light source after all.

HTH

[TimIngmire]

Hi Ian, builing on Marks suggestion of Ambient light, take a look at M A G I C - F I L T E R S these will be perfect for just pointing and shooting in Dahab. Just don't use your strobe at the same time. They really simplify taking photos UW.

Tim

[JAG]

Thanks for the advice guys - those magic filters look useful!

[Mark]

One question about the Magic filters, I know they do a blue and green filter, but surely there is an optimum depth for them to work in whatever water they are designed to be in. A suitable one for green water may be optimum at say 10m on the south coast of Cornwall, the north coast of Cornwall is a much lighter green, at 10m it would be showing its magenta tint, it may be ideal at 15 or even 20m. Surely it cannot be optimum for all depths!! If it were then it would be magic by colour changing according to the ambient colour. Whereas white balance would correct for whatever colour is ambient.

[Mattdiver]

Actually, the magic filter filters out part of the green light, and the white balance finishes the job of reestablishing a "correct" or neutral colour balance. The filter does have a sweet spot where it works best, but even a not-absolutely-ideal correction (at say 25m) gets you almost there, and you may then need to tweak things slightly on a computer (this works best if you shoot in RAW).