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Subal C1S housing for the Canon EOS-1DS
Canon’s IDs and IDs Mk11 set a benchmark for professional photographers needing exacting
quality from a camera body small and light enough for photo journalism. These qualities, along with being able to use fisheye lenses, also make the IDs and 1Ds Mk11 an exceptional tool for the digital underwater photographer. Steve Bloom, the wildlife photographer and Andrew Sutton , the underwater film maker, both use this system.
Subal’s housing accepts both the IDs and the 1Ds Mk11. The housing was developed for use by clients who are likely to make their living from photography. Arnold Stepanek has created a housing with highly responsive controls for fast, instinctive shooting so you won’t miss fleeting picture opertunities and made the housing as compact and lightweight as is practical to keep drag to an absolute minimum in the water and make air travel that little bit easier. Throughout the casing only the highest grade materials are used, ensuring the housing is a long term investment that will last many years in the professional arena.
The hull is carved from a solid billet of aluminium, then anodised and painted repeatedly. Alloy helps keep the weight down and the great lengths Arnold goes to to prevent corrosion maintains Subal’s reputation for housings that just go on and on without problems occurring with the metal components.
Tremendous care has been taken with the layout of the controls, again underlining Arnold’s talent for creating housings that are fast and instinctive to use in the water.
The shutter release is the famous Subal paddle type. This soft touch release helps you to avoid camera shake at slow shutter speeds or when shooting high magnification macro. Naturally, there’s an on/off switch. A large thumb operated drive wheel controls your sub dial. A top mounted control accesses your main dial You can turn on your panel display lights, great at night, in low viz, at depth or on penetration dives. Exposure pattern, exposure lock and exposure compensation are available to you, for perfect light control. Focusing mode is on tap. For use with Magic and UR Pro filters you’ll find white balance control invaluable and so that is also provided. Menus, display, select, quality, protect and delete can all be selected from outside the hull. You can also zoom and manually focus many of Canon’s lenses.
Two hand grips are supplied. The right hand grip incorporates a strap that sits across the back of your hand. This is a comfort feature. It means that you don’t have to grip the handle constantly and can relax and flex your fingers. Especially when waiting out a shy subject or when your hands are cramping with cold, this seemingly small touch becomes a major advantage. A conventional pistol grip sits to your left.
Your Canon 1Ds sits on a saddle secured to your tripod socket. The camera then slides in and out of your housing very easily, reducing down time and the fumble factor. The hull secures using two Subal Quick Locks. In service since 1998, the Quick locks make removing and installing the back of the hull fast and positive. A safety lock is built in, so you cannot open the locks by accident.
The Subal IDs housing is supplied with two strobe connectors as standard. For manual flash photography 3 pin Nikonos sockets are fitted. These accept most underwater guns, including Inon’s - our recommended strobe range. For TTL S6 connectors are used. Subal offer housings for the 55 and 58 land strobes. These housings offer pretty much full control of your strobe under the water and have a mounting shoe for an aiming light or laser. Two mounts are provided for strobe arms. A mount is also provided for a focusing light. This is set above the centreline of your housing allowing a small torch to be used as a spotting and focusing aid for both macro and wide angle photography. Our wholly owned dive store, Mavericks Diving, carries a selection of suitable lights.
The Subal 1Ds housing is available with a choice of viewfinders. The standard viewfinder is an image reducer. Image reducers work by making the image a bit smaller so you can see all of the viewfinder while wearing a facemask. Reducers are found on almost all SLR housings, but are often misrepresented as magnifiers. As reducers go, Subal do , of course, make one of the best!
The GS180 Finder is the alternative. This is a genuine magnifier and uses a combination of lens elements and prisms to provide a right way up, right way round oversized image. Similar to the speedfinder found on Canon’s F1 series, the GS180 produces an image around 1.5 times larger than that provided by the IDs on land. This makes it much easier to see detail in the photograph you are composing, helps greatly with manual focusing and makes reading information displays a breeze. The GS180 also provides additional clearance when using full face masks or bulky regulators.
Obviously it’s best to try and compare viewfinders before purchasing. Whichever one you choose, a black skirted, low volume facemask is a good investment. Our dive store , Mavericks, offers a selection of suitable models and can arrange for corrective lenses to be installed at your option.
Subal offer an excellent port system, allowing huge scope for creative underwater photography with the most challenging of subjects under the most difficult conditions. You can choose lenses from full frame fisheye to tele macro with the option of using tele converters and close up lenses. Subal ports offer optical glass lenses.
Ocean Optics Ltd, operated by UWP publisher and Ocean Optics founder, Peter Rowlands, ensures servicing and repairs to your housing will be available when you need it. Peter has more than thirty years experience in designing, building, maintaining and repairing underwater camera equipment, so your Subal is in very good hands.
We would always recommend booking one on one time with us to discuss housing your Canon 1DS. Expect to spend upto an hour and a half with us on a first visit. If you bring your camera, you can then try it in the housing and get a feel for its key features. When buying a Subal from us, we will ask you to put aside a full morning or afternoon so that one of our team can take you through assembling your system, how to make strobe and other checks and the all important procedures for keeping the water out...(including the proper use of the built in leak detector.
Finally, the Subal IDs housing is only made in very small batches. Ocean Optics endeavours to keep two in stock, but please call first before making a special visit to view and plan your purchase with plenty of time in hand!
Subal CS1 specification * Machined from solid aluminium * Hard anodised and painted external finish. Controls for: * On/off, Shutter release, Manual Focus/Zoom, Front and Rear main Dial,Lens Release, LCD-light, Exposure comp, AE lock, focus Area Selector,Mode, AF-Mode, Exposure Metering System, Protect, Menu, Select, Display,delete, Quality, White Balance * 2 x flash socket (options: Nikonos, Ikelite, Subtronic S6 sockets. TTLmode ONLY available with S6 socket and Canon digital flash strobe) * Quicklock closing mechanism. * Left handle and right handle. * 2 x M6tapped holes underneath for attachment of tray and other items. * 1 x monitor window for straight view behind the camera. * Top mount accessory shoe with M6 stainless steel 'helicoil' fitted. * Dimensions: 260mm x 230mm x 155mm (B x H x D), w/o handle and port * Weight: approx. 2.7 kg * Max. Depth Rating: 70 meters (210 feet)
DSLR
Steve Bloom, the celebrated wildlife photographer, took on the challenge of shooting elephants underwater for his latest book, "Elephant!". Steve chose to house his Canon 1Ds Mk 11 in a Subal housing from Ocean Optics.
The striking images Steve Bloom shot under the water have attracted tremendous interest and have been widely published in support of the launch of "Elephant!". Steve has very kindly included a thank you to Steve Warren of Ocean Optics in "Elephant!". For Optics, it was a genuine pleasure to work with Steve Bloom and see his audacious ideas become a truly exceptional underwater portfolio.