[ScubaSteve]

Henry, there is no need to concern yourself about being an air hog. The more you think about it today, the less it will improve (not entirely true but watch water boil and tell me how it goes). SAC is something that I believe every single diver sees improvement on with experience. I was seeing improvements with my air consumption after 25 dives, 50 dives etc....

The important things to focus on are just getting experience in the water. Focus on your trim and buoyancy. If your trim is off then it is taking more energy to force yourself through the water and thus you use more air. If your buoyancy is off, then you will either breathe heavier to compensate (add buoyancy) or kick more than you should to stay up or down. Proper buoyancy allows you to sit in place in the water column with no effort allowing you to breathe as if you were on the couch watching a boring movie. If you need to fight to not sink or not ascend, then you are using your air faster than you need to.

Another thing to work on is proper weighting. If you are over weighted as many newer divers are, you will put more air in your lungs or in your BC to maintain a positive or neutral state. This is huge because less weight will also require less effort to push or pull through the water.....this equals less air.

Bottom line, just work on your diving skills and your SAC improvement will follow.

Again, I was an "air hog" and I am now much closer to matched with my regular dive buddy and we have very similar dive counts, experience and training. And he saw improvements too.

As for the actual breathing pattern, I truly breathe as I do on the surface and do not think about it. It is a slow steady inhalation, a short pause (which is normal) and a slow exhalation finishing off with a short pause.