(No longer) waterproof camera

I know this is a popular camera, so just a warning. Nothing lasts forever. Our trusty, shockproof, waterproof Olympus Stylus 720 changed its mind about the waterproof part last week. As best we can tell, it was by no fault of our own. The battery/memory card door seal just failed. She took on water, and died a soggy death. Ours was about 18 months old, so it may have just been wear and tear. (After drying out, the memory card amazingly was undamaged.) It was a great camera and there are newer underwater models by Olympus, so we’ll just upgrade.

If you don’t have an underwater camera, consider shopping for one. Several manufacturers make sleek little models and they take good pictures, above and below.

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 10th, 2008 at 12:05 am and is filed under General News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

9 Responses to “(No longer) waterproof camera”

1. quenton
   January 10th, 2008 07:56
   1

   good morning

   thats sounds like a darn good camera.
   afterall you’ve done alot with it over the
   course of the past months.

2. Steve S
   January 10th, 2008 09:25
   2

   Did you film that turtle underwater using the 720SW?

3. Jeff
   January 10th, 2008 09:47
   3

   No Steve. Video camera.

4. sarah
   January 10th, 2008 10:07
   4

   Sorry you lost your camera! But glad you didn’t lose any card images. Got the Canon PS850 IS for Christmas. It is an excellent camera!

5. Rob7
   January 10th, 2008 13:27
   5

   I told you Jeff….you need a Canon TX-1

6. Tim
   January 10th, 2008 19:45
   6

   The Canon SD1000 is a great camera and is compact. Canon sells a waterproof case as an accessory. It is very nice, and I can not tell the difference from when the case is on to when it is off. Both on Amazon.com for fairly good prices. Just a thought.

7. Water Buffalo
   January 11th, 2008 05:25
   7

   Glad you had a back-up camera to keep your show on the road. You guys don’t miss a beat!

8. Richard N. Kurpiers
   January 11th, 2008 12:17
   8

   Now you know why there isn’t an establishment called The Soggy Camera Bar.

9. Tellurian
   January 17th, 2008 11:13
   9

   After some research, I recently bought an Olympus Stylus SW 770; it’s rated for deeper than the 720 — BUT the fine print on these cameras is that the seals should be replaced every year, which gets expensive. DiCAPac makes inexpensive underwater housing (about $30) I am going to try using the camera with this soft housing when I know the camera will be underwater for a while and without when it only might get splashed or such. My hope is that will extend the effective waterproof life. You can read about the housing here:
   http://www.dicapac.com/eng/info-01.htm Best price I found was on e-bay, $29.95 + $4.95 shipping.