With last year’s cave diving calendar about to turn to the final page (revealing far too many Christmas parties, I might add), I’m putting 2014 calendars on special. This year I have created both a cave diving and an ocean diving calendar. From now until Tuesday these are just $30 plus $2 postage within Australia. Send through your payment, your calendar preference and your postal address by PayPal to liz@lizrogersphotography.com by midnight on Tuesday to take advantage of the discounted pricing! The two albums below show the images in each calendar.
I already talked about my rationale behind taking my camera on my MOD1 rEvo course – I wanted to learn how I was going to handle both camera and rebreather at the same time, all while under supervision. During the course I learnt a few tricks and techniques for stowing the camera while dealing with a rebreather issue. The second part of managing the two together was working out how to take photos while diving closed circuit. I’m sure this is going to be a continual learning curve for the next year or two, so I’ll probably be revisiting this topic a few times. Here’s some initial challenges and thoughts. My first observation is on buoyancy. I know I tend [read more…]
There’s a varying range of opinions on the compatibility of underwater photography and diving closed circuit. I know photographers who say they’d never dive a rebreather because the camera takes all of their attention. And I know rebreather divers where the last thing they want is another complicated device they have to swim around with. For me I average about 100 dives a year and in the four years since I’ve had my camera rig less than 5% of those dives have involved leaving the camera behind. So the question isn’t whether it’s going to work, it’s more about how I can make it work. The cave diving I do already demands a split focus. Caves require situational awareness, and [read more…]
When I bought my current dSLR, I knew I was choosing an underwater camera rig over a rebreather. I could barely afford one expensive toy let alone two. At the time it was absolutely the right choice. The camera has lasted me four years so far, and I hope to get at least another two out of it. Despite the release of a new model I’m still more than happy with the shots I can get out of it. Since investing in my camera set-up, I’ve had a huge amount of fun taking photos, learning and improving my skills. This didn’t mean I forgot about the rebreather though… For me the rebreather advantage is significantly in the ability to use [read more…]
Running your own line is a lot more fun than following someone else’s, even though we knew this part of the cave has been visited 15 years before. We swam on through the second sump with the tunnel gradually becoming both wider and taller. After a few hundred metres the passage appeared to end in a flat wall. After checking each side I spotted air above and scooted up between the wall and ceiling to surface in the second air bell. This one was a lot more diver friendly with a few big rocks sticking out of the water, but deep enough to swim from one side to the other fully kitted up. The air seemed fine and there were [read more…]
Right, enough of the local stuff and back to the story! Following my muddy little grovel on our second day, we followed a tip from the local guy and went walkabout to look at a few laundry spots in the area. Just down the road and around the corner we discovered another huge doline with pools at both ends and a young woman having a wash in one of them (fully clothed!). After a quick free dive with mask and torch Stefan pronounced it good and we returned that afternoon with dive gear. Having spent the day tramping through the bush, clambering around other holes and evaluating prospects we didn’t have too much time left, so Stefan dropped in with [read more…]