Hi Rich, This was super-useful. I would welcome a video when you spent more time demonstrating the features of the Ninja V+ in more detail, and talking about their importance to you - are you using the waveform or exposure (zebra) indicators? The focus indicators? The RGB button and the color indicators? One thing that was not entirely clear to me, and I hope you can explain, is how you decide when to record on the in-camera memory cards, or when to record on the Ninja V+? An additional tech video on how you end up getting the best video while you're underwater, and how you use the monitor, would be very welcome.
This is great feedback! I have not used the zebra indicators. I have used the focus peaking. I have not used the rgb button. As for when to use camera memory cards versus the ninja SSD it is really dependent on 2 situations. 1. Given the diving conditions, can I take the Ninja? If not, I record internally. The second is when I am recording at 120 fps. In this case I record in the Sony. Now a third situation would be if I wanted to record in raw and needed more space. The Ninja can take a 2 terabyte card. I will consider a video of how to get the best video underwater. I definitely need more time with the camera before I can deliver something meaningful for viewers and I need Sony to fix that white balance problem first as well. Thank you so much for this great feedback!
We updated to the latest Sony v3.0 firmware and largely for the breathing compensation which is very helpful for macro. It appears this feature is only available for just over 50% of their lenses, None of which are used in this rig setup. Also people don't film in 24p for underwater so the DCI feature for this is not that exciting. The touch display features don't help you in a housing. I could go on. So, frankly upgrading the firmware is a lot of work for not a lot of value given that they erase all your settings and you have to set them back. The partially done breathing compensation is very frustrating. In other words more hype than value.
Thanks for the video! Question - I wouldnt like to have the ninja housing sit on top of the sony housing. Is there any way to mount it more in front of the rear part of the Sony housing so the rig becomes more streamlined? Thank you!
@@Mexico-Magico there is no such ball. Isn’t toward the front but with a extra long ball mount clamp you can swing it forward putting it toward the front. I do this and I tilt the ninja housing forward a bit for easier viewing.
I apologize for an off topic comment - I know at least your wife is allowed to hunt lionfish. There's a few that have been hanging out at the jetty at Harbour Village, visible on their underwater cam nearly every evening and morning for the past several days, in case that's you might be able to take care of (I feel like if Harbour Village wanted to deal with it themselves, they would have already). Please don't feel any obligation to explain why you can or can't go hunt these down. Love your videos BTW - gonna check out a few of the sites you've featured that I haven't been to yet when I'm down there in a couple months
@@ADiversLife both this morning and yesterday they were visible on the cam around 6:30. I’ve seen them in the evening as well but I guess the light burned out so now the webcam is took dark at night to see anything. A couple evenings ago there was 3 of them hanging out in one of those domes that teens4oceans put in a few years ago.
@@ADiversLife just a little more detail - The channel Mods on the Harbour Village Bonaire live cam actually keep a google doc of daily sightings - lionfish were seen nearly every evening in January between around 8ish and 10ish
@@ctsean ok. I am not sure how soon we can get in over there but going early morning when hunters are sleeping is a good time as the lionfish feel safer then
Sorry for lots of questions can ask you what the configuration you use for Sony 90mm? for me I use auto focus (continue) the lens constantly hunt And it looks really bad in the movie
Continuous AF, however I have to work very hard to maintain my distance to the target. My focus area is a single spot. Also, I film macro at 60 fps and play back at 30 fps. This allows you to keep more images in focus before you or the fish move. Buoyancy also needs to be spot on. I also had challenges
Excellent review! I have exact same set up as u, and found your suggestions spot on! On side note, no one beats the knowledge and support we get from Reef Photo! ‘Lee’ is a master ‘yoda’ of cams at Reef & photo!
Thank you. I was just at Reef to make an adjustment on my Ninja housing and had the great opportunity to meet Lee. He really is amazing. His, I believe brother, Phil works there too. It must be a family operation.
I'm sure enjoying your videos! Hey in one of your videos (of course I can't find it), the audio blew me away. I couldn't hear you breathing, but could clearly hear a fish moving some rocks in a pile. This seems like as good a place to ask as any... Do you just use the internal camera mics, or external hydrophones? I'm considering a simple rig (E PL10) for when we move to Bonaire (closing in a couple months). Thanks!
Just found your channel today as I was hunting down some info on the additional Nauticam ball mounts you have used to mount your Ninja housing to. Thanks for the great video! Out of interest how have you gone getting the rig neutrally buoyant? I am considering using triple clamps to add an additional carbon fibre float arm horizontally between the two ball mounts, as it is a frightfully heavy rig.
Hi, I am traveling right now so I don”t know specifically the floats I used. I also use 2 ball mounts with two float arms on each side. This allows you to move your lights in and out. I use a ver large bigblue float (don’t recall the size) as the nearest float and then a metal arm with two small floats on the end. Please email me at rich@adiverslife.com and I will look when I get back. I also leave my handle for carrying the rig on and I am slightly negative. This is for wide angle/dome port configuration. I take the handle off for macro . The Sony macro lens is heavy. Once I figure it out I will add it to the description. Wish I could get you a faster answer.
Thank you for taking the time to so completely explain your set-up. I have been thinking of upgrading mine from the Sony a6300 / Nauticam with 10-18 wide zoom and small kit lens to the a7s3, which I also already own. I have several lenses including the new 14 mm 1.8. I got a bid for the Nauticam housing, and was taken back a bit by the cost. My question for you is how did you end up choosing the Nauticam system over the significantly less expensive manufacturers? Also do you feel that your wet wide angle performs well compared to what I am thinking of: using the 14mm with a port? Again, thanks for your good work.
Hi Blake, Great questions. One of the things I have learned from living on an island and diving a lot all year round is that most dive gear just can’t stand up to the constant use and extreme conditions. In fact, my wife and I can go through a BC in 2 years. Regulators with cheap plastic parts or materials that corrode can fail in 3 years. Booties - 6 months. We dive Bonaire’s wild east coast which is rough on equipment and I also do tech dives where the equipment is under higher pressure. When I get a product that is well designed and can take the extreme conditions I stick with it. My GH5S Nauticam housing did all that and the vacuum seal system never failed. With the Nauticam designed for the A7s3 it also improved the button locations for easy access. Their ball mount clamps are also fantastic. So, given my experience the main reasons I did not go look at other housings are Nauticam’s proven track record, familiarity with how it is laid out, and ease of use. Regarding the dome part, a wet lens will give you a somewhat sharper image at the expense of flexibility and the ability to do above and below shots. If I were you, I would go with a glass dome port if you can reuse all your lenses. You are also used to shooting with those lenses. There is a lot to be said for supporting how you shoot.
@@ADiversLife Thanks much for the reply and the advice. But a lot of people like the system that you have come up with.. So I am going with Sony 28-60 and the WWL-1b. I was worried that that lens might not be that good because it's so cheap! But everyone says the results with a wet lens are great.... especially compared to a dome port which I have been using. We are heading to Fakarava this June for the Marbled Grouper event. Looking forward to getting the white balance at depth nailed with the new a7s3. Thanks again.
Dude!!! Nicely done. That’s a real bummer Atmos support isn’t up to the level you’d expect at that price point. I’m wondering though if the overheat issue is similar to GoPro had on the 10 if you try to record long max resolution and frame rate clips. With the GoPro out of the waterproof housing it has fewer issues because it can shed the head by radiating it into the surrounding air. In the case it can’t. Does the display give you issues if you test it outside of the waterproof housing?
Hi Caleb, Thank you. With the replacement ninja I ran it for over 1 hour at 60 fps 4K. This is when the Sony started showing the overheating icon but continued to run. That is acceptable. The first ninja started to over heat almost immediately. I am sure being in the housing does not help but the fan was defective on the first Ninja. All these higher end formats are pushing the camera’s computation requirements. Apparently Canon got it right in their latest camera - no overheating.
@@ADiversLife I wonder at what point we start to design cameras and monitors with the ability to match up to a heat sink on a housing. Housings aren’t that much. What’s a little more for some cooling? 😉
@@Chogogo717 I would not say housings are not that much. I think the real issue is that camera manufacturers are not working that closely with housing manufacturers. In fact, in working with Sony with the white balance problem it is clear they don’t do a lot of underwater testing. I think what would be need is a way to vent and draw the heat out of the camera and pass it over a heat distribution mechanism in the housing. This would take up a lot of space in my housing which I don’t have. I think housing manufacturers would need to increase their size to enable this.
Hi Ken, aside from some usability issues the product is powerful but they do seem to have the customer awareness of a newborn. As you will see in an upcoming video they are not alone. Hopefully, they will see this and get better. Thank you for your comment.
Another killer tech video. Thank you so much. Things dreams are made of.
Thank you!
Spectacular Rich. I am agog at all that it takes to generate your videos. Thanks for sharing not just the product, but the process. Good diving!
Thank you Michael! I hope you will be back to Bonaire soon.
Hi Rich, This was super-useful. I would welcome a video when you spent more time demonstrating the features of the Ninja V+ in more detail, and talking about their importance to you - are you using the waveform or exposure (zebra) indicators? The focus indicators? The RGB button and the color indicators? One thing that was not entirely clear to me, and I hope you can explain, is how you decide when to record on the in-camera memory cards, or when to record on the Ninja V+? An additional tech video on how you end up getting the best video while you're underwater, and how you use the monitor, would be very welcome.
This is great feedback! I have not used the zebra indicators. I have used the focus peaking. I have not used the rgb button. As for when to use camera memory cards versus the ninja SSD it is really dependent on 2 situations. 1. Given the diving conditions, can I take the Ninja? If not, I record internally. The second is when I am recording at 120 fps. In this case I record in the Sony. Now a third situation would be if I wanted to record in raw and needed more space. The Ninja can take a 2 terabyte card.
I will consider a video of how to get the best video underwater. I definitely need more time with the camera before I can deliver something meaningful for viewers and I need Sony to fix that white balance problem first as well. Thank you so much for this great feedback!
We updated to the latest Sony v3.0 firmware and largely for the breathing compensation which is very helpful for macro. It appears this feature is only available for just over 50% of their lenses, None of which are used in this rig setup. Also people don't film in 24p for underwater so the DCI feature for this is not that exciting. The touch display features don't help you in a housing. I could go on. So, frankly upgrading the firmware is a lot of work for not a lot of value given that they erase all your settings and you have to set them back. The partially done breathing compensation is very frustrating. In other words more hype than value.
Thanks for the video! Question - I wouldnt like to have the ninja housing sit on top of the sony housing. Is there any way to mount it more in front of the rear part of the Sony housing so the rig becomes more streamlined? Thank you!
It mounts via a large ball mount on top of the Nauticam. Although this is large perhaps this type of a set up?
I use a pretty wide clamp and can move it back some
@@ADiversLife with additonal gear - would you be able to somehow almost mount in in front of the camera housing?
@@Mexico-Magico there is no such ball. Isn’t toward the front but with a extra long ball mount clamp you can swing it forward putting it toward the front. I do this and I tilt the ninja housing forward a bit for easier viewing.
I apologize for an off topic comment - I know at least your wife is allowed to hunt lionfish. There's a few that have been hanging out at the jetty at Harbour Village, visible on their underwater cam nearly every evening and morning for the past several days, in case that's you might be able to take care of (I feel like if Harbour Village wanted to deal with it themselves, they would have already). Please don't feel any obligation to explain why you can or can't go hunt these down. Love your videos BTW - gonna check out a few of the sites you've featured that I haven't been to yet when I'm down there in a couple months
Yeah, they got big because they no how to hide in that jetty quick. :-) what time in the morning are you seeing them?
@@ADiversLife both this morning and yesterday they were visible on the cam around 6:30. I’ve seen them in the evening as well but I guess the light burned out so now the webcam is took dark at night to see anything.
A couple evenings ago there was 3 of them hanging out in one of those domes that teens4oceans put in a few years ago.
@@ADiversLife just a little more detail - The channel Mods on the Harbour Village Bonaire live cam actually keep a google doc of daily sightings - lionfish were seen nearly every evening in January between around 8ish and 10ish
@@ctsean ok. I am not sure how soon we can get in over there but going early morning when hunters are sleeping is a good time as the lionfish feel safer then
Sorry for lots of questions can ask you what the configuration you use for Sony 90mm? for me I use auto focus (continue) the lens constantly hunt And it looks really bad in the movie
Continuous AF, however I have to work very hard to maintain my distance to the target. My focus area is a single spot. Also, I film macro at 60 fps and play back at 30 fps. This allows you to keep more images in focus before you or the fish move. Buoyancy also needs to be spot on. I also had challenges
Excellent review! I have exact same set up as u, and found your suggestions spot on! On side note, no one beats the knowledge and support we get from Reef Photo! ‘Lee’ is a master ‘yoda’ of cams at Reef & photo!
Thank you. I was just at Reef to make an adjustment on my Ninja housing and had the great opportunity to meet Lee. He really is amazing. His, I believe brother, Phil works there too. It must be a family operation.
Thank you for useful video Hop you do tutorial for hlg3 color correction
Thank you
Working now with Sony engineers, through their service rep. to correct their white balance bug. This is crucial.
Thank you
I'm sure enjoying your videos! Hey in one of your videos (of course I can't find it), the audio blew me away. I couldn't hear you breathing, but could clearly hear a fish moving some rocks in a pile. This seems like as good a place to ask as any... Do you just use the internal camera mics, or external hydrophones? I'm considering a simple rig (E PL10) for when we move to Bonaire (closing in a couple months). Thanks!
Thank you Mark! We are glad you are enjoying them. I am only using the camera’s internal mic. Moving to Bonaire - that is fantastic! Congratulations!
Here is a new TikTok from the channel of you like short videos too. We TikTok
vm.tiktok.com/ZMLjbewRY/
Here is a short video we put out on TikTok
We TikTok
vm.tiktok.com/ZMLjbewRY/
Just found your channel today as I was hunting down some info on the additional Nauticam ball mounts you have used to mount your Ninja housing to. Thanks for the great video!
Out of interest how have you gone getting the rig neutrally buoyant? I am considering using triple clamps to add an additional carbon fibre float arm horizontally between the two ball mounts, as it is a frightfully heavy rig.
Hi, I am traveling right now so I don”t know specifically the floats I used. I also use 2 ball mounts with two float arms on each side. This allows you to move your lights in and out. I use a ver large bigblue float (don’t recall the size) as the nearest float and then a metal arm with two small floats on the end. Please email me at rich@adiverslife.com and I will look when I get back. I also leave my handle for carrying the rig on and I am slightly negative. This is for wide angle/dome port configuration. I take the handle off for macro . The Sony macro lens is heavy. Once I figure it out I will add it to the description. Wish I could get you a faster answer.
Thank you for taking the time to so completely explain your set-up. I have been thinking of upgrading mine from the Sony a6300 / Nauticam with 10-18 wide zoom and small kit lens to the a7s3, which I also already own. I have several lenses including the new 14 mm 1.8.
I got a bid for the Nauticam housing, and was taken back a bit by the cost. My question for you is how did you end up choosing the Nauticam system over the significantly less expensive manufacturers? Also do you feel that your wet wide angle performs well compared to what I am thinking of: using the 14mm with a port?
Again, thanks for your good work.
Hi Blake,
Great questions. One of the things I have learned from living on an island and diving a lot all year round is that most dive gear just can’t stand up to the constant use and extreme conditions. In fact, my wife and I can go through a BC in 2 years. Regulators with cheap plastic parts or materials that corrode can fail in 3 years. Booties - 6 months. We dive Bonaire’s wild east coast which is rough on equipment and I also do tech dives where the equipment is under higher pressure. When I get a product that is well designed and can take the extreme conditions I stick with it. My GH5S Nauticam housing did all that and the vacuum seal system never failed. With the Nauticam designed for the A7s3 it also improved the button locations for easy access. Their ball mount clamps are also fantastic. So, given my experience the main reasons I did not go look at other housings are Nauticam’s proven track record, familiarity with how it is laid out, and ease of use.
Regarding the dome part, a wet lens will give you a somewhat sharper image at the expense of flexibility and the ability to do above and below shots. If I were you, I would go with a glass dome port if you can reuse all your lenses. You are also used to shooting with those lenses. There is a lot to be said for supporting how you shoot.
@@ADiversLife Thanks much for the reply and the advice. But a lot of people like the system that you have come up with.. So I am going with Sony 28-60 and the WWL-1b. I was worried that that lens might not be that good because it's so cheap! But everyone says the results with a wet lens are great.... especially compared to a dome port which I have been using.
We are heading to Fakarava this June for the Marbled Grouper event. Looking forward to getting the white balance at depth nailed with the new a7s3. Thanks again.
@@TheBlakerunner yes. That is my experience. Have a great trip
Dude!!! Nicely done. That’s a real bummer Atmos support isn’t up to the level you’d expect at that price point. I’m wondering though if the overheat issue is similar to GoPro had on the 10 if you try to record long max resolution and frame rate clips. With the GoPro out of the waterproof housing it has fewer issues because it can shed the head by radiating it into the surrounding air. In the case it can’t. Does the display give you issues if you test it outside of the waterproof housing?
Hi Caleb, Thank you. With the replacement ninja I ran it for over 1 hour at 60 fps 4K. This is when the Sony started showing the overheating icon but continued to run. That is acceptable. The first ninja started to over heat almost immediately. I am sure being in the housing does not help but the fan was defective on the first Ninja.
All these higher end formats are pushing the camera’s computation requirements. Apparently Canon got it right in their latest camera - no overheating.
@@ADiversLife I wonder at what point we start to design cameras and monitors with the ability to match up to a heat sink on a housing. Housings aren’t that much. What’s a little more for some cooling? 😉
@@Chogogo717 I would not say housings are not that much. I think the real issue is that camera manufacturers are not working that closely with housing manufacturers. In fact, in working with Sony with the white balance problem it is clear they don’t do a lot of underwater testing. I think what would be need is a way to vent and draw the heat out of the camera and pass it over a heat distribution mechanism in the housing. This would take up a lot of space in my housing which I don’t have. I think housing manufacturers would need to increase their size to enable this.
It makes me think that Atomos is a start up company
Hi Ken, aside from some usability issues the product is powerful but they do seem to have the customer awareness of a newborn. As you will see in an upcoming video they are not alone. Hopefully, they will see this and get better. Thank you for your comment.
I am curious what was total cost for this setup :D ?
Hi Steven, a few months prior to covid inflation, and excluding lights about $18k. Lights arms add about $3k.
@@ADiversLife thanks for fast response. I have Sony A7R 3 and im now researching what would i need to build a rig.
@@stevangajic88 Reef Photo a video (Ft Lauderdale) is a great resource to get equipment