This seemed like an excessive purchase, so I put it off for a long time. It wasn’t until I got an iPhone 13 that I even considered it. And that was only because the picture quality was so good on the phone that it seemed like a reasonable back-up to my higher end cameras. And after the trouble I experienced earlier in the year in Iceland, it seemed like a reasonable investment.
About mid-trip, the waves at HT’s weren’t great, so we decided to head to a different island to take advantage of more favorable wind. Because we were accessing the line-up that day from the boat, I was able to try out more equipment due to a shorter paddle. After shooting with my primary (Edge) housing, I paddled in to switch it out for the Axis-go. I got the bundle with the blue tooth trigger and dome port, so I was excited to give it a try.
The blue tooth was easy to set up and pretty functional. I will say that a few times after getting rolled by bigger sets, I had to re-connect the BT, but it wasn’t too bad and easy enough to do from the water. The dome port started out good, but later I noticed water on the inside. Turns out I missed the o-ring in the packaging so it was bound to happen. I took it off and because there was a primary flat lens in place, was able to keep shooting.
While the trigger and shot burst wasn’t as fast as my Sony set-up, the video was great. Crisp, easy to use and swim with and with the 13, really high quality. Afterwards, I was able to pull images from the video and that ended up being some of the best of the trip.
Beyond that, on a different day, it started raining hard and I wanted to get in the water quickly to capture it. My primary set-up takes some time to dial, but the Axis is quick, so I grabbed it. Another solid experience.
While it’s not the best for every situation, it packs incredibly small and is a great option to have in your kit. Highly recommend.