When is a diver ready for a camera?

[Zept]

I was divemastering at the weekend and the group I was leading included a father and his young (11) son. The son is recently certified, the father learned 18 years ago, but didn't dive again until his son was certified (he did well in a refresher, though).

During one of the surface intervals, the father told me he had an underwater camera and asked whether it would be safe to take it diving. I asked whether he meant safe for the camera or safe for the divers, and he said for the divers. I said, well, his son is very young and needs someone to keep an eye on him, and a camera can be pretty distracting, so I would wait until they had a bit more experience. I thought that was a reasonable answer and he seemed happy with it, but it does leave me with a question...

How would you decide whether a diver (yourself or anyone else) is ready for an underwater camera? What things would you consider?

Z

 

[James connell]

that's a tough question.
In the case you stated i think you gave a good answer. i'm not very comfortable about certifying 11 yearolds to start with, they certainly need more supervision than an adult, just useing the camera takes attention away for a while and many photographers get "tunnel vision", they concentrate on the subject or finding the next one, not on a buddy.
[opinion]
a photographer is the WORST buddy anyone can have! you are safer diving solo than with a photographer unless all you want to do is watch them take pictures.
[/opinion]

it very common for a photographer to look up from the shot and have to go find their buddyand visa versa.

i think a good guide is experience - if the person has not done deep dives then carrying a camera on a deep dive is a bad idea. the same for bad vis, current, ect. if you are comfortable / experienced doing that type of dive then a camera is not a great burden, if not it's one more task load you probably don't need.
personaly i don't think a person should carry a camera without good bouyancy skills.

 

[Diver Lori]

Having just completed Nikon School of U/W Photography in July I can give you "my" perspective.....and please take it for what it's worth...only my opinion about myself.

I have very good buoyancy and so does my buddy. We've got over 800 dives between us and are both active divers monthly year-round in all conditions....that being said.......

The skills I found to be ESSENTIAL for underwater photography were....excellent buoyancy, breath control, body control, personal awareness, high comfort level in the water, consciousness of where my buddy was at all times AS WELL AS attention to my camera.

We were in a class of 5 divers with a VERY EXCELLENT & CONNECTED instructor in the field on a boat with roughly 15 more unrelated divers to us. After a few days of diving and fulfilling our instructors objectives for each dive, a small contigent of 6 divers (all family) sent a spokesman for their group to our instructor to complain about two of the people in our group. They were "avid" photographers in "their" minds and would do just about anything for "the shot". Be it laying on a coral head.....or nestling down bracing themselves in between crushing marinelife at the same time. My buddy and I had noticed their behavior prior and had mentioned it to our instructor and he addressed it with them on more than one occasion. One of the dive op's instructors publicly ridiculed one of them openly after he climbed back up on the boat for the same type of behavior.

Later that day one of the family members of the group mentioned above sought me out and wanted to make it clear to me that they were not complaining about me or my buddy and assured me that they thought we had a very good handle on our skills. My buddy and I were very conscious of where our bodies were and if we couldn't get a shot without touching the reef....we just plain did without the shot. I must add that my buddy and I were completely green in our U/W camera skills and soaked up everything our instructor taught us. We had no preconceived notions about our "own" expertise in the field and knew darn well that we didn't know diddily! With this mindset, we were conscious of our skills first, what we were learning new second.

As far as buoyancy and breath control goes.....I found having the ability to hover motionless with a slight exhale or inhale to lock in my position for a shot to be crucial and vital.

Well....that about covers my thoughts. I look forward to reading some of the more experienced photographers in this group's observations.

 

[ssra30]

Bouyancy control is definitely a must. It is difficult to say after how many dives will a person be ready. There are some divers who after 50 dives still kick away at the reefs without even awaring of what he or she is doing while some seem to be a natural. Photographers will often get left behind so the person definitely has to be comfortable enough with being alone at least for a short while before regrouping and have a good navigational skill. If a diver still has to worry about looking after his divebuddy then photography is definitely not a good idea.
Of course much is also depending on what kind of photography are you talking about? Just a quick snapshot of buddies and friends for vacation album or the kind that takes 10-20 pictures of everything and dive 20m distance per dive?

 

[SimonJ]

Since my last trip, this is an area I have been thinking about alot. To me the issue is not when is a diver is ready for a camera, because this can vary so much person to person, but how aware are they of their surroundings, themselves and more importantly their buddy when they are diving with a camera.

I noticed on a few dives recently that one of the guys who was a videographer was never anywhere near his buddy. This really made me think about how I reacted to my buddy. Fortunately my buddy is also my wife, so I am extra attentive, but I really do feel that photographers are not great buddies, unless they are using their buddy as a model.

It would be interesting to have a poll and see what people think about underwater photographers....how they rate them as buddies, how they rate them as AWARE divers and so on. I guess this is just a little bit too bias a forum for that

Simon

 

[swisstrav]

actually my camera was reason to start diving (nikonos III). i took my owd in southern florida, john penekamp. cant remember on which dive, my instructor made me take the camera along. i do it ever since. it can be #5 or #200.

i have to admit that buoyancy control was never a problem for me. generally if you feel safe when diving, thats the time to take a camera along.

i have to admit too, photographers make usually no good bodys. simply they loose contact with their group and are very slow (dont think the fast ones in the group see more). thats a reason why i prefere to dive single (in dephts of approx 10 - 80 ft and yes dont forget the redundancy)

my personal target is, not to touch anything while taking pictures. yes i have seen a lot of photographers who care more about the picture than the environment.

i do honour very much that divers do not touch anything. however if you see people hiking, they brake of branches and if they have a chance to pet a deer, a cow or whatever, they will certanly do that
maybe we shold be a little bit more tolerant too.

sorry for my spelling
swisstrav

 

[Marvintpa]

An instructor I know once told his class when you can hover upside down, head 6-inches off the bottom for two minutes, without using your hands for skulling, you're ready for a camera.

It's crude, but does give divers something to work on.

 

[Meddler]

Perhaps you could have said yes with the proviso that he only takes photographs of his buddy. Then he gets some snapshots of his son and keeps an eye on him at the same time.

He probably would have been just as happy to let you have the camera and have you take some snapshots of them.

 

[clive francis]

regardless of how many dives or how long you have dived, if you can't handle yourself in water in every condition, then you shouldn't even be in it let alone trying to take photo's!!

for a non diver a photographer is a bad buddy in some respects, but if you dive with a photographer as people have with me, they say they see alot more than just normal buddy diving.

why?

because a photographer is always looking for the not so normal shot (critters etc.)

i was left many a time when diving in Thailand, but i kept an eye on the direction they went in and caught them up.

I got scared on one occassion though, i was photographing a zebra shark, went off in the direction they went and i saw another shark in the blue.

couldn't make it out, but it was swiming straight towards me at the same level. it wasn't until it got to about 6 foot away and turned parallel to me i saw it was another zebra, had to change my trunks when i got back on the boat

 

[Genesis]

will make you appreciate just how good - or bad - your watermanship skills really are.

You simply will NOT get the shot - either video or still - if you aren't composed in the water and able to practice excellent buoyancy control.

I shoot both stills and video (although I'm gravitating more towards video than stills - I like it better, overall) and decent shots in either medium require that you be able to dive first and shoot pictures second.