BTS — or “behind the scenes” — footage has become an essential part of how I tell stories; not just for social media, but for documenting the reality of underwater work. When it comes to shooting underwater, there are a ton of factors to think about — from managing your buoyancy and checking the settings on your camera housing, to being aware of your surroundings and controlling your breathing. The last thing I want to spend time worrying about, then, is how I’m going to capture behind-the-scenes content at the same time.
That’s where a small, reliable action camera earns its place.
Over the past year, I’ve tested different ways of capturing underwater BTS and various ways of strapping an action camera to my underwater rig. Based on that experience, the DJI Osmo Action 5 Pro has become my go-to BTS camera for underwater shoots.
The Value of a BTS Action Camera
Before getting into the camera itself, it’s worth clarifying what I actually need from a BTS setup underwater. This isn’t about cinematic footage or replacing my main camera. Since I’m primarily focusing on photos with my main camera, I like to have a video camera running simultaneously to ensure I don’t miss anything.
For me, a BTS action cam needs to:
- Capture accurate color without the need for post-processing
- Be easy to mount and reposition on an underwater housing (or offer multiple mounting options)
- Be reliable across multiple dives
- Require minimal thought or attention once I’m underwater
Most importantly, it shouldn’t interfere with the primary goal of the dive: making the photos or video I’m actually there to create.
Color Rendering Straight Out of Camera (The Biggest Win)
Color is notoriously difficult underwater. Reds disappear quickly, contrast flattens, and many action cams produce footage that requires aggressive correction to get to the level of “usable.”
What I love most about the DJI Osmo Action 5 Pro is how clean and crisp the color looks straight out of camera. The blues don’t feel overpowering, and they don’t run too far into the green or turquoise. The highlights retain detail, and the footage feels perfectly balanced immediately off the card. I don’t record in log on my Osmo Action, so I don’t have to take extra steps to color the footage (especially since it’s usually just going on social media), but I bet it would retain colors equally well, especially since the Osmo Action 5 Pro offers 10-bit Log or 10-bit HLG color modes. DJI’s color science specifically for underwater scenes is the best I’ve seen from any of the action cams on the market.
Magnetic Mounting: Perfect for Vertical Shooting
When I first saw the magnetic mounting system on the Osmo Action 5 Pro, I really didn’t think much of it. But as I started to use it underwater, it felt like it made so much sense and offered so much more flexibility compared to traditional mounting systems.
Most action cameras are mounted on the bottom, usually in a horizontal/landscape format. This makes sense, of course, but remember how I mentioned that my BTS footage is mostly meant for social media? That means I usually want my framing vertically-focused. In the past, when I tried mounting other action cams vertically, I’d have to build out a complicated rig with special rotating arms to do so. But since the Osmo Action 5 Pro has magnetic mounting points on both the bottom and the side of the camera, switching between horizontal and vertical recording is basically instantaneous. If I know that I’m going to be shooting horizontal photos with my housing, but I’d like to get a vertical clip of the same moment for social, I can easily switch the Osmo orientation and get back to shooting.
It’s one of those features that doesn’t sound revolutionary or even particularly exciting, until you use it — and then it’s hard to go without it.
Internal Storage: An Underrated Safety Net
One of the most underrated features of this camera is its internal storage.
If you travel enough, you’ve probably been there: you forget a microSD card, one fills up unexpectedly, or you misplace it while hopping between locations. And if it happens underwater, there are no second chances.
Having internal storage means I always have a backup, but it also means I basically have two memory cards to rely on. Even if something goes wrong with my cards, I can still capture BTS footage without thinking twice. It’s a small thing that makes the camera feel much more forgiving, especially on expedition-style trips where I don’t have immediate access to all my gear/memory cards. This is also something that the other action cameras don’t have.
Underwater Audio That Actually Holds Up
I have never had to consider audio quality underwater until this past humpback whale season, where we encountered numerous singing whales.
I didn’t have a chance to really run it through its paces to know how well the Osmo Action 5 Pro can capture audio on the surface, but I’ll leave you a clip of some singing whales for you to hear for yourself. You can even hear the echo of the whale song bouncing off the reef in the bay!
Reliability Across Long Shoot Days
Lastly, I loved that I never had to worry about my Osmo Action 5 Pro running out of battery or acting up any time I was on the water.
Across multiple dives and long days, the Osmo Action 5 Pro was always very consistent. Battery life held up extremely well, and I’ve never experienced any random failures that have plagued other action cams in the past. When I’m already managing a complex setup and worrying about other factors, the dependability of this camera won a lot of points in my book.
Just Plain Reliable
The DJI Osmo Action 5 Pro has earned its place in my kit not by being super flashy, but by being reliable, intuitive, and genuinely useful underwater.
The clean color straight out of camera, flexible magnetic mounting, solid audio, internal storage, and overall ease of use make it my favorite BTS action cam for underwater work right now. It lets me focus on what actually matters: being present underwater and creating the images I set out to make.
And at the end of the day, that’s exactly what good gear should do — get out of the way and let you tell the story.
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