Underwater Housing to Rent?

Ami,
You can try contacting http://www.splwaterhousings.com out of San Diego. He makes the vast majority of all the water housings used by todays top surf photographers. They don’t go deeper then about 20ft but are lightweight and extremely amazing.

If your not going deep you could also try an ewa-marine … at the price they are you may as well buy one and keep it handy !!
Go to …….. http://www.ewa-marine.de/ ….. and there’s heaps of stockists in the States.

Brian

SPL is a good choice. His name is Sean Labrie. Also checkout Aquatech, that is what I have for my stills. They are based in LA and Australia. SPL might have a rental though. Tell Sean you spoke to me, he designed my video housing and I threw him a bunch of customers. I am a surf photg based in Hawaii. FYI the Ewa Marine bag works well too, it is basically a big ziplock bag but functional.

Biggest downside to Aquatech is the weight. They are so damn heavy you can barely lift them. If your in NY Ami, PM me and I can show you the SPL I have here. I’ve been using them for about 5 years now.

Thanks. I do have the ewa bag but was not sure how deep I could go. It says 150 feet but I’m a bit skeptical. Has anyone used ewa-marine and if so, to what depth? Thanks so much again. Ami

I have seen people scuba diving around 30ft with an ewa bag. I don’t know if I would push it further. The Aquatechs and SPL are good for 1 atmosphere(33ft). Although I never take my surf housings past 25ft or so.

I am sure there are plenty of people in villages in Bangladesh that could rent you some under water housing.

Ami, I have used the ewa bags down to approx 30 meters. I got pictures and felt safe that the bag would hold.

However, boyancy is a pain to get right, because of pressure underwater. Ewa bags are fine for shallow dives, where there is good ambient light. But not for going deep. This is what happens: too much air and you will be struggling to bring it down with you. Too little air and your camera will look like it has been vacuum packed, and once you get down, you’ll be unable to use controls even push the trigger, and if you have a flash on (a must for underwater photography at depht) the foot may break…

So in short, if you are serious about this project, you should use a proper housing. Ikelite is very affordable, though I doubt they’ve had time to develope a housing for the D3 yet.

Better to put a reasonably cheap DSLR with a good lens in a decent, proper housing, than putting a top end DSLR in a plastic bag. IMHO

and to end it all, some self promotion ;-) http://www.photoshelter.com/gallery-show/G0000sJ_dGIEnYf0/
http://www.photoshelter.com/gallery-show/G0000h1uftyrfM2w/

Thanks so much!! Looking forward to this. Ami