Custom logbook page needs your opinion

[Blackwood]

Personally, I consider a log book to be a personal thing. It's for no one but yourself except in the (in my experience) exceedingly rare instance that someone will demand you to present it. As such, IMO it shouldn't limit what kind of info you put in. A rigid structure may do just that.

Couple of questions:

Is having a graphic and some set fields for Bottom Time, Depth and Stop going to limit your ability to log dives other than those of simple square single-stop variety?

Do you ever breathe anything other than air? If so, where do you put it? Would you rather call your consumption fields "Gas In" and "Gas Out" so that it doesn't say Air when you are on EANx?

While the little column at the left is cool (checkboxes for conditions), are the particularly useful? Personally, if something is worth remembering, I'm going to write it down. Simply looking at a page and seeing "this was a dive with waves" wouldn't tell me anything.

What is the purpose of the "verification signature" field?



I used to maintain a logbook, but I found that as I learned more about diving I kept changing it around because each rigid structure limited me in one way or another. Now I just fill out a line-item type of log, and only for dives where I think there is something worth recording.

My main columns are:
Date (yy-mm-dd)
Site
Max Depth (ft)
Run Time (min)
Average Depth (FSW)

Prior SIT (min)
Deco Level (FSW) <-- Average depth that goes into decompression computations
Bottom Time (min) <-- Time that does into decompression computations
Bottom Mix
Decompression Profile (Gas: Time/Depth) <-- eg: 21/35: 1/110 1/100 1/90 1/80 EAN50: 4/70 4/60 2/50 2/40 3/30 10/20 5/10
Notes and Comments



The Deco info and the Notes and Comments are the big ones.

 

[Walter]

Walter- I am curious. What are you using to log your dives today?

I've found these to be ideal. The price might seem at tad high, but they have 300 pages and even at only one dive per page, it's a bargain. I logged over 450 dives in my last 300 page log. I'm currently using a 500 page log. I have 545 dives logged in it so far. It takes too long to fill and takes a beating on lots of dive trips. I'll go back to the 300 page log when I finish this book. Nancy uses a similar book, but hers is prettier. I get something pretty basic and slap on a dive sticker.

 

[Ice9]

I'm just curious, but what program do you guys use to go about making these?

I used ZeusDraw on the Mac. Its pretty nice.

 

[sambolino44]

Your page looks good. I use a basic spiral notebook and just copy the field labels over from the page before. I have enough reminders, and flexibility I wouldn't have with a printed page.

I first noticed you have no mention of tides, then I noticed you're from Missouri. Probably not a lot of tidal action in Missouri.

The lists and check-boxes may be a good reminder, but I feel that a long list of unchecked boxes is a waste of space. I put lists on a page at the front or back of my book, and refer to them when I fill my dive pages. That way only pertinent information for that dive goes on the page; no spaces filled with N/A.

I have space for tide information (rising, falling, when was the nearest high or low tide), current (speed and direction(s)), sea state, sky conditions (cloudy, sunny, raining), gear configuration (did I take my big light, etc.), suit (usually that's something like "see dive #124" because it doesn't change much) what kind of cylinder (my X7-100, or a rented HP ST 95, etc.). And then the back of each page is where I put my narrative description of the day, the dive, the events, the wildlife, the beer, the pizza (sometimes including illustrations).

Except for the lists of boxes that might remain unchecked I like your pages, though. Good job!