First time with Panasonic LX7 and Ikelite housing Underwater

Well I almost though i could say "finally", after months of research and trying out different ideias, I had finally arrived at something i thought would be an ideal setup between quality and price. Knowing how good the little pana LX7 could be and with so many people raving about it's excellent image quality and amazing 1.4 lens, i though i was a good to go.

So it arrived and it was even better of what one could expect. I was delighted. So the next step was the housing. Since I already owned some ikelite flashes and sync cords, and considering the price differences the ikelite was an obvious choice. And to complement it all one, amazing, and brilliantly engineered Inon 28M67 typeII UWL-H100 wet lens. I was set. Finally. And then everything went wrong. If one is going to shoot film then this is more than good enough combo. Just add some light and you have an affordable and excellent video setup. But if you are going for stills have in mind that there a few problems, some of which can make your dive uncomfortable and stressful. Below 10 meters or 33 feet the lever which operates the rear dial is very hard to use since its jammed against the housing by the pressure thus pressing the rear dial and locking up the camera. Also. The aperture lever is poorly placed and sometimes, more often than not, it also operates the aspect ratio of the picture. And to top it all off, but maybe not as important, vigneting is a very noticeable issue, only disappearing at around 35mm equivalent. On the plus side every other control works well, with no issues and maintenance is easy. Ikelite material is cheap but not to bad, and in the end you do get what you paid for. In order to get the best conditions do get a good tray and arms, and balance the system. It will improve handling and improve the final product. And always shoot RAW if possible.

In conclusion, you can probably live with this issues and maybe find a way to get around them, but for stills i would immediately go for something like the nauticam housing, although a lot more expensive, it is remarkably better.

Paracord

So what is paracord? Well it's something amazing let me tell you. For those of you not familiar with paracord, simply put it's a rope. But not any rope. Paracord is a nylon or polyester encloser and inside you will find, most commonly, seven strands of nylon, each composed of two interlaced strands. Why is this brilliant? Well, not only it gives an amazing resistance (a 4mm strand of paracord can whitstand about 200-250kg) but also it can have tons of applications. You can use it to make shoelaces, improvise tents with it, small hiking, backup cord, and you can even use those 7 strands inside to build a fishing line. It can also be used, and that is probably its biggest use as a fashion element, as there are countless numbers of tutorials online with different types of bracelets that can be done. Using one may seem as an idiotic thing to do but taking into account that we use around 2-3 meters of cord to make one may make you rethink. You're carrying a light and in a fashionable way 3 meters of cord that can be used to make everything. I would recommend to at least give it a try.

Public Workstation WTF?

Ok, so to start of let me just say that, i've experienced such thing in already a multitude of places and really it's something that it really shouldn't happen. I'm talking about erratic computer behavior in public places such as in schools, public libraries, etc. So, today, after being out of work for three weeks due to illness, i had to resume my activities and had to catchup with all i had lost. That meant downloading shitloads of PDF files and print them. So, first, no toner on work printers, at least not the main ones. WTF? NO TONER. IN A SCHOOL? WORKING EVERY GOD DAMM WEEK OF THE YEAR? Yes you may think i'm being harsh, because sometimes it ends right? But how about order in advance when it's ending? Maybe? Hum? just an ideia. Anyway, because of this i had to rely on the smaller printers connected to the all network of computers, meant to print small quantities at time. Not something like 50-70 pages. But anyhow, before printing i had to pick one of 20 computers to order the print. Seems simple enough? Well it should be, unless of course you had to run them all to see which work and which don't. And this seems to be like an increasing trend. How hard is it to keep a workstation computer...working? Really? They can't run games, they are filled up with protection and yet they can't seem to be able to do a simple task such as printing. Or even booting up. And don't come with heavy use excuse as they were meant to do that. I believe that all they require is just a little maintenance. It's not expensive and everywhere public there is if not a team, at least one person capable of doing it. It would improve productivity and well, lets face it, a more extend life to the computer itself, as someone would be tempted to smash them to floor....... It's ridiculously how printing can take half an hour.............

What it is and Why?

I've created this blog for two simple reasons. Number one: I'm bored. Well, sometimes. And at that times i want to do something, something different for when it's raining, etc. Number two: If something really bothers me i want to write about it. Just to get it out of my system. Now. I will post whatever i want (that's the beauty of the internet, right?), and from every possible subject i can think or care. Thank you.