Point & Shoot Cameras

Todays point and shoot cameras offer the beginer or novice an affordable way to learn the finer points of underwater photography while still allowing for outstanding image quality. They cover a wide price range and many have housings available from several manufacturers.

Advantages of Point and Shoot Cameras

Price
Perhaps the single biggest advantage of point & shoot cameras over their SLR counterparts is price. It is possible to purchase an entire underwater point and shoot system including camera, housing and external flash for less than the cost of a single lens for an SLR system. If you are new to underwater photography, this is an excellent opportunity to test the waters, no pun intended, without breaking the bank.

Simplicity
Ease of use goes a long way when first getting into underwater photography. Especially if you are relativlry new to diving, or if you do not dive often. There is already enough to focus on with your scuba gear and dive saftey to have to now be fooling with a myriad of buttons, dials, etc on a more sophisticated housed DSLR.

Less Required Maintainance
Another appealing aspect is the far less time needed tinkering with orings and the many attachments that are part of the housed DSLR system. This does not only apply to beginners either. A good friend of mine after flooding an SLR system decided to replace it with a small simple housed point and shoot and he now spends more time relaxing in between dives instead of maintaing o-rings, charging batteries, etc.