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DEMA 2006: Nocturnal Lights
Luckily, Tim Lau at Nocturnal Lights found me in the hallways because by the time I got to the Saeko/Nocturnal Lights booth, everyone was pretty much ready to pack up for the year. Nocturnal Lights offers a spread of dive and video lights with housing adapters and tray adapters for all of the major housing manufacturers.
DEMA 2006: Keldan Lights
I was really impressed with Keldan Lights’ booth—it was just about the brightest area at DEMA, and I blew out the exposure in a bunch of images while shooting product shots there.
Daniel Keller took me on a tour of the new Luna 8 WA Video Light, which looked really interesting…
DEMA 2006: Ikelite
A few Wetpixel members (John Bantin, Drew Wong, Shawn Heinrichs, Dave Haas, me) had a little reunion at Ikelite‘s booth while Dave Haas took us on a tour of this year’s DEMA goodies. Aside from its line of popular dive lights, Ikelite’s booth featured underwater housings for the Nikon D80, Canon Rebel XTi/400D, Nikon D200, and Canon G7 (with ETTL circuitry).
A new underwater flash/handle system with a built-in slave sensor was also on display and will likely be called the “i35 AutoFlash”...
DEMA 2006: NCUPS
Randy Hertz, Kathy Mendes, and Rick and Robbie Turner were at the show representing the Northern California Underwater Photographic Society (NCUPS), who just announced the winners of the SEA2006 photo contest. Best of Open went to Wetpixel’s very-own Todd Mintz!
DEMA 2006: Fantasea
Howard Rosenstein and Ran Vered of Fantasea showed new underwater housings for the Nikon D80 and Canon Digital Rebel XTi/400D. Fantasea specializes in housings for all Nikon Coolpix cameras. All new models include support for full control of the camera, and housing packages containing tray, arm, flash, and fiber optic cable run under USD $400 retail (impressive).
Fantasea has also been busy producing a line of accessories…
DEMA 2006: Sam in Palau, Bill in Yap
While wandering the aisles, I stopped to chat with the folks we worked with during the Digital Shootout Palau last year. Sam Scott was at DEMA representing Sam’s Tours Palau, and Bill Acker was there for Manta Ray Bay Hotel & Yap Divers, where Wetpixel video moderator Mike Veitch currently serves as photo and video pro.
Regarding Yap, if you’d like to spend some time there receiving photo instruction, check out Photo Week 2007 (June 22-28) with Mike Veitch and others!
DEMA 2006: AquaVideo
AquaVideo flexible housing designs are built using heavy-duty cylinders with custom-drilled holes for control placement. At their booth, they had on display a new underwater housing for the Sony FX-7 camcorder. A cool feature: Michael Hastings pointed out that batteries for lighting actually fit inside the housing itself for a compact package.
DEMA 2006: Aquatica
Exciting news! Accessory viewfinders are being more and more popular! Aquatica was proudly displaying a pro-production model of their new AquaView viewfinder, which featured a large, bright, clear picture. Also on display was the A30D housing for Canon’s EOS 30D digital SLR. I am impressed that the A30D’s ergonomic improvements over Aquatica’s earlier housings for Canon SLRs.