San Antonio Senior Portrait Photographers

If you are often near or in a large body of water, a waterproof camera is a great choice, especially now that these once costly devices are becoming more affordable by the day. Familiarize yourself with the points below to make sure that you will make the best out of it.

1) Sealing: A fundamental point, you should make sure that the sealing is tight all around that waterproof camera, and especially so on areas such as the various openings for cables such as USB hubs, the battery compartment, and the lens opening if the camera is an LSR with exchangeable lenses.

2) Next, the picture quality: Nowadays most cameras come with at least 5 megapixels of resolution and you may want to stick to that. Less resolution only represents a small saving, and much higher ones won’t make much of a difference for underwater cameras, except if you are a pro with special needs.

3) Construction and burden: Check that the waterproof camera is sturdy and well-build, with dependable materials. Make sure that you also get the supplementary equipment that you need. For most people a compact camera will do, don’t get an SLR just because it looks cooler, unless you really need to exchange lenses it will just load you up with extra bulk.

4) Industry certifications: Often overlooked by people when choosing a waterproof camera, these give you peace of mind about the standard that your camera was built to. You should look at Japanese Industry Standard designation Waterproof 8 for a camera that you can take on shallow dives, up to 5 meters.

5) Features: Important waterproof camera features for underwater sports / fishing photography are high objective aperture for low-light conditions, shake reduction, the possibility to mount a ring flash for SLR’s, burst mode, and a good memory card for picture storage.

6) You bought a waterproof camera? Great! Now clean it. Regularly. Be especially vigilant around dust, tar and sand, these will destroy your gaskets and water WILL leak into your device, rending it useless. Or your lens will jam. A well maintained camera is a long-lived camera.

7) Be aware of chemicals, they will also damage your camera’s waterproof junctions. And it’s not only nasty chemicals such as petrol. Chlorine will shorten the life if your camera, so keep it out of pools and only take it to natural freshwater or saltwater bodies. Use a cheap disposable waterproof “fun” camera to take pics of the kiddies in the pool.

make sure that you do not end up with a splash-proof camera, instead of a waterproof one. These are not intended to be submersed, and will assuredly leak and then break if you do put them under water.

9) Learn about your waterproof camera and its performance gradually. Don’t take it take it to a dive right away, experiment with it in a shallow place first. Read the manual and try out the effect of different picture options, and you will soon be shooting like a pro.

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