I would recommend a Fuji XP camera. I've had one for about 5 years. These cameras are dust, shock, freeze, and water proof to 10 meters. They take very good pictures as well. You should be able to score one on e-bay or amazon used at a decent price.
Mar 19. 2015
Day 78/365
Kind of a work in progress. I was playing around with lighting to show the inside of this watch. Me thinks I went a tad too far!
Duck safely found for the day.
I'm using a TTL flash. I see what you are driving at. Here are a few more where I gradually brought the exposure up. It does make a world of difference. I went back to three flashes again. left, right, and front.
I've taken a lot of portraits in the past in a sort of spray and pray sort of approach. This is my first go with remote flashes and soft boxes. I used two remote flashes and another mounted on my camera. No processing was used.