Category: photo tips

waterproof digital cameras and how to use them

Suction Cup Mounts on Inflatable Badfish SUP ?

I am using suction cups on all my kayaks and canoes to mount cameras and GPS devices. Of course, you need a smooth surface to attach a suction cup. Rinsing the deck of your boat with water usually provides a stronger grip. But, what to do with decks which are not smooth like in the case of inflatable boats?

I faced that problem during my first paddling this season on Beaver Pond with Badfish inflatable SUP (stand up paddleboard). Here is my quick and temporary solution: a lid of plastic box tacked under bungees and a handle in the front deck of my SUP. It provided just enough smooth surface to place my Garmin Forerunner GPS on sticky pod suction cup and GoPro Hero camera on its original suction cup mount. My suction cup dashboard worked pretty well for quiet water paddling.

As a more permanent setup, I would probably use more a solid plate (plexiglass?) with holes to tie it to available anchor points. Do you have any other suggestions or ideas?

It was rather cold and cloudy day …

which ended up with some snow.

Two days later (March 15, 2013). Paddling Badfish SUP on Beaver Pond in Arapaho Bend Natural Area with a smoke plume from Galena wildfire behind me.

Related posts and links:
MCIT 11.6′ Inflatable SUP Badfish at Colorado Kayak Supply
Sticky Pod Camera Mounts
GoPro HD HERO3 camera (I am still using GoPro Hero 2)
10 Minute Double Suction Cup Camera Mount for a Kayak Deck
Kayak Video Camera Mast – Sticky Pod Combined with Monopod
A Simple Suction Cup Mount for Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS
Sticky Pod Review – Suction Cup Camera Mounts for Kayak Photography

March 18, 2013
Paddling CLC Patuxent Kayak with a Telescoping Camera Mast

April 2010. Paddling CLC Patuxent 19.5 kayak with Canon Powershot G11 camera mounted on a telescoping mast assembled from a monopod and sticky pod platform.

Related post:
Paddling with Canon PowerShot G11 Camera on a Monopod Mast
Kayak Video Camera Mast – Sticky Pod Combined with Monopod
A Bird’s-Eye View of Kayaking with GoPro Hero Camera

September 6, 2012
Paddling Photography in April (2005-2008)

I am trying to return back to my older articles through “Paddling Photography a Year Ago” series. However, I am running this blog for over 5 years. So, today, I offer a look at selected April posts over the recent 4 years. I am writing a similar post in my Fitness Paddling blog as well.

Big Thompson River below Loveland

2005

Paddling and Exploring the Big Thompson River below Loveland, Colorado
Big Thompson River from I-25 to Hillsboro Dam
Paddling Upstream Can Be Faster than Downstream – Hail Storm on the Big Thompson
First Impressions of New Waterproof Camera – Pentax Optio WP
Big Thompson River with a New Pentax Optio WP Camera

North Platte River above Seminoe Reservoir in Wyoming

2006

No Viewfinder? 10 Tips on Shooting Pictures without Viewfinder
North Platte River in Wyoming above Seminoe Reservoir

Dear skull on the shore of Horsetooth Reservoir

2007

Ez-Vee Roof Racks from Kayak Pro – Review
Anybody Remembers C1 Canoe Racing on the South Platte River near Greeley?
Launching Thunderbolt Kayak on Horsetooth Reservoir from Lory State Park
20 Paddling and Photography Destinations – Wayfarer Trip Index
Paddling the Skeleton Coast
10 Tips How to Avoid Blurry Pictures when Shooting on Water
Blue Paddle from New Belgium through a Pinhole
Racing Kayaker and a Paddle Stroke – 4 Pictures by Björn Olin

Quarry Cove of the Horsetooth Reservoir

2008

Springtime Paddling on the Horsetooth Reservoir
Paddling the Horsetooth Reservoir and Looking for the Past

April 11, 2009
Canon EOS 40D Camera on the Bow of a Racing Kayak

I always carry one of my waterproof Pentax Optiocameras attached to a life jacket to document my paddling trips and races. The image quality is fine to display pictures on-line, but it may be not sufficient for commercial applications. Pictures shot with compact digital cameras usually show a lot of digital noise when examining at 100% view.

In November 2007 I started to sell my pictures through microstock agencies. It forced me to carry a DSLR camera for paddling trips. It is a little bit tricky in the case of a low volume racing kayak like my Thunderbolt-X. Most often, I just pack a camera with a tripod and shoot from land. However, I am also trying to shoot from a kayak cockpit or from a decked mounted camera.

This is the original my sticky pod, a camera mount with 3 suction cups, modified by adding a 1/4″ bolt. It is the same platform I am using for my telescoping video camera mast.

Now, we can add a tripod head. I am showing here my old 3-way Manfrotto/Bogen head great for shooting video. It provides much smoother controls and more solid mount than a simple knuckle coming with the sticky pod.

Canon EOS 40D camera with EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM lensmounted on a front deck of my Thunderbolt-X kayak. This is my favorite lens for paddling or any shooting restricted to a single lens.

A wing paddle can be really wet… To protect the camera from splashes I am using a rain coat with a front glass from Ewa Marine. I bought it years ago for my camcorder and it fits pretty well my DSLR camera as well. I was not able to use the original lens hood inside this cover without vignetting, so I improvised a temporary paper hood.

Canon TC80N3 Timer Remote Controler attached to the camera also fits under the rain coat. It allows me to shoot pictures automatically with a desired frequency and delay.

This camera setup is pretty heavy and affects stability of the tippy Thunderbolt kayak! It is even more challenging if I move it forward to a narrow kayak bow. I would not leave it alone mounted on an empty kayak.

One of the pictures shot from the camera mounted in the front of the kayak cockpit on the Beaver Pond near Fort Collins. The light and scenery is not so great, but the camera setup work as expected. This picture is available for purchase from Featurepics.

Another shot looking backward from the kayak bow. Of course, this camera setup can be used only on calm water. The rain coat doesn’t protect a camera from waves or splashes coming from below. This picture is available for purchase from Featurepics

I am not really recommending it for use with racing kayaks, but it is not so risky with more stable and drier boats. I used this camera setup even without the rain coat on the front deck of Sea Wind canoe.

Related posts:
Kayak Video Camera Mast – Sticky Pod Combined with Monopod
A New Shooting Angle – Camera Video Mast on Thunderbolt Kayak
Canon EOS 40D, Programmable Selftimer, Sticky Pod and Sea Wind Canoe
How to Make a Simple Camera Mount for a Kayak Deck – Video Mast
Sticky Pod Review – A Suction Cup Camera Mount for Kayak Photography
How to Mount a Camera on a Kayak Deck with Suction Cups from Sticky Pod
A View from a Kayak Cockpit – 3 Paddlers, 3 Cameras, 3 Boats

April 5, 2009
Kayak Video Camera Mast – Sticky Pod Combined with Monopod

As many other paddlers I was inspired by a video camera setup used by Justine Curgenven in her This Is The Sea DVD series. So, last year, I started to experiment with my own mast for kayak photography and video. My idea was to combine the sticky pod suction cup camera mount with a telescoping 50′ monopod. However, I did not want to make any permanent modifications to my rather expensive, 6 segment Carbon Fiber Traveler Monopod by Gitzo. It is just another job for my Gitzo.

This is “my sticky pod” – a camera mount with 3 suction cups. It comes with a mounting 3/8″ bolt. My Gitzo monopod and photo tripod heads have 1/4″ sockets, so I drilled an extra hole and I added 1/4″ bolt. The first thing I added was a tether!

Note that the original bolts and rivets are getting a little bit rusty. It would be nice to have stainless hardware for a wet environment. The triangular base is made of aluminum.

I removed a head from my Gitzo monopod and screwed it upside down to the sticky pod. You can use any monopod, just be sure that is has 3/8″ or 1/4″ socket. Aluminum monopods are not very expensive, starting around $20.

Now, we need to attach a camera to the other side (i.e., normally bottom) of the monopod. As a temporary solution I used a small toy tripod with flexible legs and some plastic wraps. I believe I got that tripod together with a memory card order.

Here is my camera, Pentax Optio W30, mounted on the mast. Don’t forget a tether!

I added a temporary lens hood a year ago. It’s ugly, but it works protecting the lens against direct sun and water splashes.

Flexible legs of the little tripod allow me to adjust camera position. I can shoot in both landscape and portrait mode. It’s not very robust solution however. For rough conditions I would use more solid mount to prevent camera movement or just more plastic wraps or even a duct tape.

The camera mast mounted on the stern deck of my Thunderbolt-X kayak. It is almost fully extended and even with a light Pentax Optio camera affects stability of my tippy kayak. A few inches lower and the kayak behaves much better.

One example of picture shot from the back deck with a fully extended mast – paddling Thunderbolt kayak on Beaver Pond near Fort Collins. Pentax Optio W30 was set in an interval mode and was shooting pictures every 10 seconds. I was shooting with a similar camera setup last year on the Horsetooth Reservoir, but the camera was mounted much closer to a paddler.

It is a little bit tricky to set up a camera at that tall mast without looking at a LCD monitor. Perhaps, a small mirror would be helpful.

Related posts:
A New Shooting Angle – Camera Video Mast on Thunderbolt Kayak
Temporary Lens Hood for Pentax Optio W30 Camera – Ugly, but Works
How to Make a Simple Camera Mount for a Kayak Deck – Video Mast
Sticky Pod Review – A Suction Cup Camera Mount for Kayak Photography
How to Mount a Camera on a Kayak Deck with Suction Cups from Sticky Pod
Interval Shooting with Deck Mounted Pentax Optio W10 Camera

March 22, 2009
Wildwater Racing Kayak on the South Platte River

Here is a little picture gallery from the recent paddling on the South Platte River (Sunday, March 15). We paddled upstream 5 miles from Kersey to Plumb Ditch Dam and back down the river. Beautiful warm weather and pretty low water (slightly around 400cfs at Kersey).

I shot pictures of Jeremy in his wildwater racer below the dam with Pentax Optio W30 camera. At that water level I could walk without any problems on the dam crest.

We didn’t have any real problems with paddling upstream, but if water keeps falling down it may get too shallow under the bridge below the Plumb Ditch Dam.

Related posts:
3rd South Platte River Upstream “Rotten Egg” Race – March 22, 2009
Paddling, Training and Racing on the South Platte River
South Platte River – GPS/photo map and guide
Group Paddling Workout on the South Platte River
Returning Back to (Paddling) Life

March 18, 2009
Panasonic Lumix DMC-TS1 – New Waterproof Camera with Optical Image Stabilizer

Panasonic is entering a market for compact waterproof cameras represented by popular Pentax Optio W and Olympus Stylus SW series.

Lumix DMC-TS1 is waterproof to 3 m (9.84 ft), dustproof and shockproof. The camera features Leica DC Vario-Elmar lens with zoom from 28 mm to 180 mm (35 mm format equivalent) with, I believe, the first optical image stabilizer in this type of a compact camera.

Video options looks also promising:

The TS1 records HD motion images with 1280 x 720-pixel resolution. It uses the AVCHD (MPEG-4/H.264) format, via AVCHD Lite which stores less data than other formats and thus lets you shoot more minutes of HD motion images before running out of memory.

The camera will be available in April 2009. The price listed at amazon.com is $399. You can buy it in different colors: silver, orange, and green.

It looks like a good paddling camera. I will be looking for reviews of Lumix DMC-TS1.

Waterproof Cameras for Paddlers (a shopping guide)

Olympus 1030SW, 1050SW, Pentax Optio W30, W60 – Comparison of Waterproof Cameras

Poll: Your Paddling Camera

February 8, 2009

My Collection of Pentax Optio Waterproof Cameras

see Pentax Optio W60 at Amazon

My collection of waterproof Pentax Optio cameras for paddling and outdoor photography includes three models:

Pentax Optio WP

April, 2005.
I had been thinking for a longer while about taking a camera for Texas Water Safari, 260 mile non stop race down the San Marcos and Guadelupe Rivers. My first digital camera, Canon PowerShot S40 in its waterproof case was just too heavy to carry it through all portages and logjams of the race. So, I bought Pentax Optio WP, the first waterproof compact digital camera, as soon as it was available.

I started with placing the camera in a glass of water … You can check my first impressions from paddling and shooting with Optio WP. The camera worked pretty for all training and, eventually, the Safari, though I shot fewer pictures than I hoped to. One of the pictures from the start line up was published in Adventure Sports Magazine.

I shot over 1000 pictures with the Optio WP in March 2006 during the WaterTribe Ultimate Florida Challenge.

Pentax Optio W10

May, 2006.
A year later, the camera still worked fine, but, occasionally, used to freeze and the only cure was to disconnect a battery. I decided to upgrade to the Pentax Optio W10. The main motivation for the upgrade were better video capabilities. I carried the W10 for all my paddling, training, and racing. It was used to cover 2006 and 2007 Missouri River 340 races and 2007 Glenwood Canyon race. I shot numerous video clips and pictures from a deck mounted camera.

Pentax Optio W30

December 2007.
I realized that the Optio W10 camera may, finally, die after my intense use and abuse, and that I need a backup camera. I considered for a while GoPro Digital Hero camera for its video capabilities, but decided for another Pentax Optio W10 since still pictures were more important for me than video.

Then, I found that I could buy the newest model Optio W30 cheaper than the W10 (less than $200 including mail rebate at Amazon). So, I ended up with the Optio W30.

I paddled the entire winter shooting with Optio W30 from my Thunderbolt kayak on the South Platte River, shot animation from the Wyoming Outback Challnege and many pictures during 2008 Missouri River 340 Race.

I still need to experiment with installing a filter mount on one of my Optio cameras.

Pentax Optio W60

May 2008.
Pentax is releasing Optio W60 … No, I didn’t buy W60. Optio W30 is working just fine for my paddling needs, and I am rather saving money for some investments in DSLR cameras. It may take a longer while since Canon EOS 5D Mark II with video capabilities is on my wish list.

December 16, 2008

Canon PowerShot G10 with Waterproof Case for Paddling?

I am quite happy to paddle and shoot with Pentax Optio “W” cameras as long as producing pictures to be displayed online. They are waterproof, compact, easily accessible in any conditions. The image quality is OK for a blog or website, but usually there is just too much of digital noise for some commercial applications. So, for my stock photography, I am carrying a DSLR camera, Canon EOS 40D. It may be a rather challenging task if I paddle a racing boat like my Thunderbolt-X kayak.

In the search for some alternative solutions I have been watching evolution of Canon PowerShot G series cameras. Canon offers waterproof cases for them.

The newest Canon G10 certainly looks interesting, and arguably, it may be the best compact digital camera available. It’s not cheap: ~$420 for the camera and ~$190 for the waterproof case at amazon.com.

I have been spoiled by Pentax Optio W10 and W30 cameras with the interval (time lapse) shooting mode. Now, I would like to see that feature in any camera. No luck with the Canon G10, though. However, there is some hope to control this camera remotely since it accepts the same shutter remote as Canon Rebel. How to deal with the waterproof case with the remote attached is a different story.

Here are some reviews of Canon G10.

Trusted Reviews:
“The Canon PowerShot G10 is still going to be the benchmark by which all other high-spec compacts are measured, but it’s no longer the top dog. It is beaten on picture quality and portability by the smaller, lighter and slightly cheaper Panasonic LX3, and is beaten badly on value for money by most entry-level DSLRs. It’s still an impressive camera and can produce excellent results, especially in Raw mode, but the price means its appeal is a little too specialised for some.”

Digital Camera Review:
“At the moment, the advanced compact camera market has settled in terms of price at around the $500 mark. For that kind of outlay, it’s not unreasonable to ask yourself whether your needs might not be better served by an entry-level DSLR: basic models from every manufacturer will do essentially everything the G10 does, provide superior high-ISO and shooting speed performance without exception, and do so for only a little more than this PowerShot’s considerable price tag (not to mention that the G10 weighs almost as much as many of these larger cameras).”

The Online Photographer:
Canon has now demonstrated that a small camera with a small sensor can provide the ergonomics, speed, flexibility, and image quality that would please most serious photographers.

CNET editors’ review:
The primary reason to buy a camera like this, however, is the photo quality, and here the Canon G10 doesn’t disappoint. Color and exposures are great. There’s some wide-angle distortion at the 28mm-equivalent maximum, but photos have very good center and edge-to-edge sharpness at longer focal lengths. ISO 80 and 100 produce relatively pristine images and if you’re alert to it, you’ll see some noise-suppression artifacts starting at ISO 200. But photos look quite usable up to and including ISO 400; at ISO 800 they get visibly soft.

Luminuous Landscape: Comparison of Canon G10 and Nikon P6000.

byThom: Comparison of Canon PowerShot G10, Nikon Coolpix P6000, and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3.
“If you need pixels, you need the Canon, hands down. If you need the fast, wide, defect-free lens, you need the Panasonic. You don’t need the Coolpix.”

Ken Rockwell
“The G10 is the best compact digital camera I’ve ever used, but no compact is as good as any real (interchangeable-lens) SLR.”

December 14, 2008