The Asia Dive Expo (ADEX) is one of the biggest dive shows in South East Asia. In fact, 17 years ago, my very first dive show in Asia was ADEX Singapore. Organized by Asian Diver Magazine, the event was an important date for dive related businesses, from tourism to equipment manufacturers alike. A big show like this one will usually have the same resorts and exhibitors year after year.

Our own Shawn Heinrichs, friends Berkeley White of Backscatter, Todd Essick and other photographers were on hand to give talks about shooting photos and video.

Given the scope to covering such a show,

I’ll just highlight some of the more interesting things I saw while I was roaming the floor:

One of the biggest developments in the last 2 years has been the 3D push by manufacturers. TVs, game consoles, big and little cameras, everyone wants 3D it seems. No other topic has been hotter in the imagery world. At NAB last year and this year, manufacturers have been pushing out 3D products like hotcakes for sale. From TVs to camcorders, 3D is the new DV.

So it’s no surprise that David Cheung of Scubacam Singapore, was showing off his beam splitter 3D rig. Using 2 Thomson sensored HD1200 Lux Media Plan feeding 2 HD SDI, it captures full HD up to 1080/60p in RAW 12bit data stream through HD SDI. It is a heavy rig but is designed to fit into the Patima 3Diver housing. Basically it’s a dual purpose rig that’s custom built by David.

David says there is a huge demand for 3D content in Asia. This is in contrast to the 2D-3D conversion which the US seems to be embarking on to save costs. Should everyone
go out and grab a 3D rig just now? Perhaps not but content is pretty lacking and it’s a matter of time before 3D can be viewed without the hokey glasses. Obviously there’ll be software which will convert red/cyan 3D to the new format as well.

Scubacam is also the dealer for other brands like Seacam, Subal, Nauticam and Aquatica.  All those manufacturers are heavily featuring the Nikon D7000 camera, which seems to be the new latest most desired camera.  Since there’s been extensive coverage of the Nauticam D7000 on Wetpixel by Alex Mustard, I decided to just cover the latest housings at ADEX: The Subal and Seacam.