Underwater Camera Floods: Avoiding the High Water Mark

No subject scares underwater photographers more than having an expensive housed camera turn into an aquarium. Even a bit of water can turn electronics into a corroded mess.

Here are a few general tips on maintenance that should help you avoid finding Nemo in your housing:

1) Read the manufacturer’s instructions. Yeah, that little pamphlet you put your beer on while you unpacked your new baby. Wipe it off and carefully read through it. Housings all vary in care and feeding. For example, some housings use silicone gaskets that don't need silicone grease. Some o-rings are not removable but need to be wiped off. Some housings have controls that are user-serviceable, some don't. Just read it.

2) O-rings are probably the most important and miss-serviced parts. There are lots of the little buggers on uw cases. In addition to the large, noticeable o-ring on the back cover, every control has one or two, as well as the ports or strobe bulkheads. Some are black, some are blue, some should be serviced, and many should not.

Following rule #1, you can generally service the rear, port and bulkhead o-rings as follows. Remove them carefully by pinching the o-ring at the corner and pulling it out/off. If it sticks, use the corner of a credit card to gently pry it up. Your credit card will work great, since it won’t be of much use for anything else anyway after buying all of your photo gear. A blunted wooden cuticle remover also can also be useful, but do NOT use tweezers, screwdrivers, needle-nose pliers, vise grips or any other sharp, medieval devices.

Then just wash the o-ring in warm water with a bit of soap. Pat it dry completely with a lint-free dishtowel; NOT a paper towel or used Kleenex. Try not to stretch it as you dry it.

Examine the o-ring in a bright light. Use a magnifying glass if you're as old as I am. Look for dirt, cuts, dog, cat, rat, weasel and hamster hair. Be picky and meticulous; even the smallest hamster hair can ruin your day, and then you'll want to put the hamster in the housing and ruin his day. It really can get out of hand.

O-rings can get cut or abraded fairly easily as salt crystals form and slice them with their sharp edges. Replace them from your spares as necessary, and order replacements.

You do have fresh spares don't you? O-rings need to be stored in an air-tight bag away from strong sunlight. They get brittle with age, and should be periodically replaced.

If an o-ring is clean and in good shape, lubricate it with just a drop or two of the proper silicone grease. Do NOT use anything other than the grease that is from your housing manufacturer. For instance, using black o-ring grease on blue o-rings has been known to melt them, which generally results in you melting down when your housing floods.
Put a couple of drops on your fingertips and gently pull the o-ring through them to apply.

Now repeat the mantra; OMMM... "MORE IS NOT BETTER...MORE IS NOT BETTER...". Do NOT over grease. Silicone grease is ONLY a lubricant, NOT a sealant. All you want to see is sheen on the o-ring, not globs of grease. If you apply too much, all it will do is act as glue for sand and dirt to stick to.

3) Carefully clean the flanges and grooves where they contact the o-rings. Use foam swabs, or a cotton swab with a piece of lens tissue wrapped around the tip. Blowing them off carefully with a can of compressed air is ok, but try to blow the dirt OUT of the housing. Again examine all these surfaces carefully, they should not resemble "Beach Blanket Bingo" with sand everywhere, nor should there be any deep cuts or warping that would result in a bad seal. Do NOT apply grease to the flat surfaces.

4) Now carefully install the clean, greased o-rings, making sure they are not twisted and lay flat in their intended spots. If it seems out of shape, let it sit there for a minute, then try pressing it into place again. They can get heated and misshapen from your sweaty fingertips and enlarge slightly.

5) Install your camera with fresh batteries and carefully close your housing. Be sure that there's not a sync cord or the edge of a silica gel bag stuck in between the surfaces. If you have a clear housing, check to see that there is a solid line where the o-ring seals. Breaks in color usually mean hamster hair.

6) I wipe off copper electronic sync cord contacts with rubbing alcohol, and even use a bit of silicone grease on the threads when I install them. Then I leave the cord connected for the whole trip. The contacts are fragile and if it's working, it does not need to be serviced between dives. Covers need to be immediately put on sync cord ends; copper and salt air is a bad combination.

7) Be sure to try your installed camera with the strobe before you go diving. It’s easy to get something a little out of kilter, and nobody likes to hear bad words underwater.

8) A piece of thin sanitary pad usually fits in most housings and provides a bit of "oops a few drops got in" insurance. It’s a good idea to tape it and any silica gel packets in place with a bit of electrical tape. It’s really a bummer to see the words “Dry-z-Air” when you are trying to focus on a whale shark.

9) Always test your housing in the dunk tank on the boat. That's a plunge, swish-swish, watch for bubbles dunk...NOT a toss it in until I'm ready to dive dunk.

NEVER leave your camera in the rinse tank between dives, or for longer than a couple of minutes. MOST floods happen in the rinse tank. Cameras get dropped in on top of each other and latches get sprung, etc. Scratched ports are the least of your worries. Also, during your dive the housing and controls get compressed. Coming up from the bottom and then putting the camera in a non-pressurized tank of water can allow some controls to weep a bit. So just rinse it well, take it out and leave it under a towel between dives.

NEVER let anyone clean their mask out in the camera rinse tank. Anti-fog solutions have been known to be hard on o-rings. Gently prod the offender with your dive knife as you inform him of this fact, it’s usually effective.

10) Dried salt water is your housing’s enemy. Salt crystals form in the controls and they can cause leaks. If you don't have access to a fresh water rinse, leave it in salt water. As long as it doesn't dry, it's fine. Soak it thoroughly at home in warm fresh water.

Once a year or so you should send your housing into the manufacturer's repair center for servicing. Those small o-rings in the controls generally are not user-serviceable and need periodic replacement. Springs and controls get worn as well. Don't just pack the housing and take it on a long trip without checking the system on a test dive first.

The above doesn't have to take a long time, and a complete cleaning is not necessary every dive, but take your time and examine your housing carefully before you get in the water.

And watch out for those pesky hamsters.

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Want to Make Sure? Considering a new housing? Just a thought (ok, shameless plug ;-) ). Fantasea housings come with 1 year of free flood insurance. When a customer has a problem, DEPP replaces their camera and Fantasea fixes or replaces the housing. Doesn't make up for a lost vacation, but it helps. The FP5000 for the CoolPix P5100 is an awesome combo.
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Jack Connick is a Seattle diver and graphic designer who always wanted to be a photographer. He has traveled extensively around the world, logging over 800 dives in ten countries.

His company Optical Ocean Sales.com, is an authorized dealer for Fantasea Line and other underwater photography products.

Visit and join his free Cold Water Diving Flickr photo group.

Look Honey! It's Diver Jack!

My aquarium dive buddy Tim and I were walking back to our cars after "performing" our feeding show at the Seattle Aquarium today. I worked comms and topside support as I had wanged my eye with a strobe cord yesterday (don't ask), nothing serious, but no diving for a couple of days.

Tired and laden with wet gear I suddenly heard a woman in very excited tones say, "Oh look, it's Diver Jack! Honey, it's Diver Jack. May we take your picture?" Huh? Me??? What'd I do??

Diver Jack is my stage name. We now do feeding shows, talking to the audience, taking questions and showing off the wolf eels and animals when we feed them. The wolfies are my pets and will sit on my head to eat squid. We use full-face Aga masks and comms with surface-supplied air. As part of that, we wave to the crowd, talk to kids, and get people involved, so that we can impart a conservation message.

But I never thought I'd have groupies!

My groupie was cute as a bug, pretty in pink, and about 3 years old. Very excited, Mom asked to take my picture with her daughter Gretchen. I taught Gretchen how to make an "ok" sign. She was so excited she could hardly talk. So was I.

They promised to come to other shows, and it seemed we had both made our afternoons.

Five Tips for Better Underwater Photography

This is the second monthly column written for NW Dive News Previous column: Getting Started in UW Photography

Have a Conversation!
Originally uploaded by Pixel Letch.

Got a new underwater camera? Photos not quite up to snuff? Here are 5 quick tips to help you out.

Tip #1. Get close, have a conversation. If you think you are close, get closer. Two to four feet away is where most digicams shine. Many have a macro setting that can focus the lens from 1" to 4'. That’s the setting to use most of the time, as it is the perfect range for your strobe and for best sharpness. Remember that the more water you have between the camera and the subject, the less sharp and vivid your shots. But be careful in getting too close, there is a point where cameras cannot focus, check your manual.

Try to capture the head and eyes of your critters. Have a conversation with them, just like when you meet someone and shake hands.

Tip #2. Shoot up. Use the available light to help light your backgrounds for "reefscapes".

Tip #3. You can't light everything. In combination with Rule #1 & 2, try a type of shot called a close-focus, wide-angle.

Get close to say one fish, a nice outcropping of coral, or an anemone. Light that with your strobe. Point at an upwards angle, setting your camera on auto, or meter the water column and select a slower shutter speed (not any lower than 1/60th) to let the available light open up the background. Center the subject and take a half squeeze on the trigger to focus. With your finger still holding the half-press, re-compose with the subject close and to the side, maybe lower in the frame. Hold your camera steady and squeeze the trigger the rest of the way. Now you have a nice shot of a subject and it's environment giving greater depth and drama.

Tip #4. Macro. To get a nice black background, use your strobe in TTL, or auto, and increase your shutter speed. Set it as fast as possible, with a low ISO for sharpness and the strobe as close as possible to the subject for the best color saturation. You may have to turn the power down and use a diffuser to soften the light.

The background is always controlled with shutter speed. Want to open it up? Shoot slower. Want it blacker? Shoot faster. Can't get what you want? Adjust strobe power or position so you can work with it. Close in is where TTL usually shines. If you’re shooting in mid-water, you'll do better with manual strobe settings.

Tip #5. In-between. What about fish portraits and buddy shots? Set your camera to manual, or on program mode. Set an aperture somewhere in the middle (maybe f4) and shutter speed to as slow as you can hold, usually about 1/60th. Increase the strobe power or use TTL/auto.

Set the ISO as slow as possible. Remember, higher ISO means more noise, seen as fuzziness. Set it at ISO 100, or lower, for macro. For other shots, try to not go above 200 to 400.

On digicams where you don't need the depth of field, the middle aperture setting (f4) gives the best sharpness. This is due to the very small actual apertures on these lenses and the way light waves pass through them.

Tip #6. Break the rules! Hey, you said 5 tips. Well, the sixth is simply to break the rules. Try things out. Experiment. Many times the best shots come from bending, breaking, and creating your own rules. Look at your mistakes carefully, learn from them and try another variation.

Have fun with underwater photography, the more you shoot, the better your shots will get!

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Jack Connick is a Seattle diver and graphic designer who always wanted to be a photographer. He writes a blog, Optical Ocean on diving, sailing and underwater photography, and has traveled extensively around the world, logging around 700 dives in ten countries.

His company Optical Ocean Sales.com, is an authorized dealer for Fantasea Line and other underwater photography products.

Visit and join his free Cold Water Diving Flickr photo group.

Junkyard Dogs

Red Flabellina
Originally uploaded by Pixel Letch.

Randy, Jim and I dove the wickedly tricky Alki Junkyard on a photo op yesterday around 4pm. The rain had let up and conditions were quite easy. Parking even became available as we pulled up.

An easy swim out to the white buoy with a blue stripe landed us in junkyard central. I have to say this is one of the best macro sites I've seen around here. It was loaded with small fish, anenomes and most of all - nudibranchs!

I quickly spotted Janolus fuscus, Flabellina trophina, and found a very cool Armina californica out on the sand. Or; a clear one with yellow dots, red with white dots and a striped nudibranch. The later is one I'd never seen before, mostly because it is a burrowing nudibranch that feeds on sea pens. Even stranger is that it has no external gills on its behind like most do.

Everything was pretty small though; many the size of a quarter or half dollar. I could of used a 100mm macro lens as opposed to my new 60mm I was trying out on the new D80/Fantasea rig.

The current picked up while we were out and shooting out on the flat became hard. Everything wanted to go into the current and I couldn't get ahead of it to get "face" shots. But there were a few piles of junk that you could hide behind, and I found some scaly-headed sculphins there, always a crowd pleaser with their green eyes.

We spotted lots of crabs and shell middens, but no octos, but they sure looked like they'd been around recently. Also spotted "dinner" several large male dungeness crabs up in the shallows.

We didn't go far up into the current, staying at 50' or so the entire dive as a result we had a long hour dive, Randy did 70 mins.

This is a great photo friendly site with easy access, no rocks to trip over and a wall to set your rig on after the dive.

Photos are here.

Getting Started in Underwater Photography

Buoyancy control is important

I’ll be writing a monthly column for Northwest Dive News on underwater photography, one of the most popular activities in diving today . I’ll be concentrating on cold-water dive photography which has it's own set of skills and equipment. Tips, tricks, gear and local dive sites, I’ll try to touch on them all and more.

I’ll re-print them here monthly in my blog, with a little more room for explanations and photos.

Your Experience Level and Guarding Against Task-Loading
Before we "dive" in, lets do a quick review of dive skills and experience necessary for your safety and the protection of the natural environment that you want to photograph. You need to have excellent buoyancy skills with intuitive, well-practiced, abilities as a diver to get into dive photography. I feel that it takes most new divers between 50-100 cold-water dives, because you will be adding a lot of task-loading and additional skills.

Not having this experience can result in damaging a reef, or more dangerously, an unsafe situation for you. You should feel that diving is intuitive to you and not have to think about it too much.

That doesn't mean that you can't buy your camera and become just as intuitive with your camera skills while you gain diving experience. It's a little tough to read a manual when you're 60 feet under water, so knowing your camera well really helps.

A hidden danger to a dive photographer, particularly in cold-water, is task loading beyond your experience level, or what the diving conditions can dictate. If in doubt, leave the camera topside, explore and shoot another time. Dive safety and protection of the underwater environment must come first!

Getting Started
Diver-photographers are faced with a bewildering assortment of cameras and options when it comes to buying a camera. Digital camera technology seems to change every day. Rather than just buying something that looks cool, or that a salesman recommends, I’d suggest a more methodical approach.

• What do you want to do with your photos?
  Use them on a website or in emails? Print snapshots, or large wall-prints? Maybe see your work published?
  
• How much do you want to grow your system? Are you starting out with a digicam and thinking about growing into a DSLR system later, or is your use more casual, capturing a few shots from a dive trip for fun?
  
• Where are you going to be shooting? Tropical or cold water? Working controls with gloves on, strong strobes and having durable equipment is important here in the Pacific Northwest. In tropical waters a lighter, smaller system may work fine for you and be easier to pack and carry.
  
• What do you like to shoot?Macro? Fish-portraits, maybe a close up of your buddy? Or do you want to “shoot up the reef” and do wide-angle shots?
  
• Do you want a camera for above-water, as well as underwater, use? How well supported is it, can it take good top-side photos as well?
  
• How much are you planning on upgrading in the near future?What strobes will it connect to? External lenses and other add-ons? Can they be used with other cameras and systems?
  And, oh yeah, how much are you able to spend? This is not a cheap hobby, and you pretty much get what you pay for.

My Recommendations
I generally recommend a camera and housing as opposed to an amphibious camera, or dedicated camera/housing solution. Canon, Olympus, Fuji and Nikon build an amazing amount of cameras and many can be used very successfully underwater in a housing. The competition between these companies means that their feature-sets and technical advances are changing much faster than dedicated underwater cameras. Plus, there are more housings, external equipment and third-party solutions available, that can be moved to an upgraded system later. Simply put, they are a better value and can be used well above water too.

There are some very good, dedicated amphibious cameras; some have good controls and a sharp lens. They are smaller to carry and simpler to use, but you'll be at the higher price range to get the control and quality you want. I think housed systems offer more quality for less money.

My company Optical Ocean Sales.com, is an authorized dealer for Fantasea Line underwater photography products, which makes housings for Nikon CoolPix digicams and DSLR housings for Nikon, Canon and Olympus. I really like the CoolPix P3 and the Nikon D80 or Canon xTi 400 for underwater use.

Make sure whatever camera you buy, that you have as much manual control as possible. Why? Because most automatic camera features are not designed for the low light conditions you find underwater. Also with an external strobe, you’ll need to use manual or aperture/shutter priority modes to adjust your strobe exposure.

Whatever camera you have, my best advice is to get out there and shoot! Practice does make perfect!

Next Column: 5 Tips for Better UW photos

New Flickr Group: Cold Water Diving

Tube Worms & Ed
Originally uploaded by Pixel Letch.

I've started a Flickr group to discuss and post photos taken in temperate to cold water conditions. Dealing with a dry suit and shooting photos can be tricky. What are your tips and tricks? Post your best shots!

It is public, but you have to be a Flickr member to join.

Flickr: Cold Water Diving Group

Jack

Truk Trek, Part 3

Final part of my dive journal from a recent trip to Truk Lagoon, see Part 1 and Part 2.

Day 5- Dive 15
San Francisco Maru. This is the deep, big-time "money" wreck here in Truk. The Odyssey is much more organized in diving it now, as before Capt. Lenny only took a few of us out to do it in the skiff. Now they have just put in a mooring and with enough DM's in the water, they are able to lead groups of 6-8 down to it's decks at 165'. Called the "million-dollar wreck" for it's wealth of cargo and relatively un-touched state, it's a very interesting dive with lots of see.

After a through briefing, we split into two groups and gear up. We are diving 23% EAN, really actually air, with a 15 min (or 1500 # of gas) bottom time starting on our descent that takes around 2-3 mins. Time is very short and I have a pre-visualized dive plan to take pictures of the tank, deck gun and hold one where land mines, artillery shells and cordite are stacked to the ceiling. Things go pretty much according to plan, I'm not too narced, concentrating on my dive plan helps. I get some good shots and enjoy shooting up out of the ammunition holds with no one around. I'm sort of amused at myself directing Paul a little higher and lower over the deck gun, art direction at 170'...once an A.D., always an A.D.

I have one minute left of bottom time and motion Paul that I'm going back for a couple of quick shots of the tank, after which I get turned around, but sort myself out and head quickly for the mast and start up. In the one minute or so, I burned 300# of gas!

We ascend slowly, taking lots of time up the mast and switching to the line at 100' then back to the boat. I clear my 30' stop on the way up and move up to 20' to do 3-4 mins there, only to find that the line is loose and I bob up towards 13'. Charlie comes over and motions us to the mooring ball and line that is fixed better and I clear, wait a bit for Paul and then take off for the hang bar at the back of the Odyssey, finding a bit of a swim in the current and with the boat swinging away from me. I make it there and have another 4-5 mins or so of final deco at 10', but Paul comes up and his Suunto has him slammed with 12 mins. During the week, we're finding that his computer is much more conservative than my Oceanic, and I consider it to be a fairly conservative computer.

The second group also enjoys their dive and all are back on deck after doing a fairly difficult planned deco dive.

Dive 16
Rio de Janero Maru. This is one of my favorite wrecks here in Truk. It lies on it's starboard side with the bottom at around 140' and the top, or port side, at an easy 45'. It is massive at 360' in length, a converted freighter/cruise liner that was fairly well-known before the war and infamous during the war as a coastal raider and transport. The US was quite happy to put ships like her and the Heian Maru on the bottom. I guess I like it because of it's history and that it really looks like a wreck as depicted in the movies.

Only in Truk can you dive wrecks like the SF Maru and the Rio in one day and it's a real treat. We drop in and swim down, enjoying decent viz to start that seems to diminish as the dive progresses. The scale of the wreck is awesome, huge stack on it's side, holds and bomb damage twisting plates and making for interesting views. Our plan is to make for the props and take a few shots of Paul, myself, as well as out friends Carol and Greg. The props are massive and make for a good frame. After the others leave, I drop down over the huge rudder and enjoy shooting the lower prop and rudder. I even sit on one blade and take in the vista, dwarfed by the looming wreck. We swim back around and poke around the various spaces, spying s small eagle ray circling about. There's not a lot of growth on this wreck, mostly small mounds of hard coral on the side of the hull. I shoot a porthole on the side that still has it's glass in it. The Odyssey is swinging on it's mooring in a wide arc and after swimming up to the hang bar we enjoy and E-ticket ride swinging back and forth above the massive wreck doing our deco stop.

Dive 17
After hearing good things about the engine room, Paul and I ask guide Kent to take us there. We quickly swim down to a doorway and into the pitch dark wreck at 80', ducking over and under gangways and pipes. We make it into the engineers' space with walls covered with gauges and valves, engine telegraphs gleaming in the dark. A small clock lies hangs upside down stopped at 7:20 am, presumably when the ship sunk. Kent leads Paul further into the tight spaces while I take some pictures. The strobes are firing intermittently now and it's driving me crazy. Seems like a bad sync cord.

We exit the engine room and go to the aft hold that is about half full with beer and sake bottles and boxes. Again I see deterioration in the wrecks and although there's still thousands of bottles and cases, much of it has fallen down to the bottom. This is mostly the result of natural deterioration of the wood cases.

We come up on top and it's now too dark to shoot much, so I decide to swim up to the caved in bow. Four years ago I got turned around in the blown apart forward magazine and I had a personal ghost to exhume to see it again. I thought it was just along the edge, but I forgot that the whole bow had partially collapsed because of the explosion. It seemed that it too has fallen down further from deterioration as well, but I can't quantify it in my mind.

I swam on down to 95' and looked for what was left of the magazine. All I could find was a twisted opening and it didn't look like where I had been on the earlier trip. But I stuck my head in and it started to look a bit familiar, however I couldn't find the unexploded 6" shells that I found before. I looked it over, wondering what the hell I was thinking when I went in there at night with limited air the other time. I guess I found my peace and thanked some higher being for my good luck in finding my way out. Coming up over the edge of the hull, I found the name on the bow and brought Paul down to see it as well. I was into a few minutes of deco, so we went up, found the Odyssey on it's swing over the wreck, went up to the hang bar and paid our dues to the deco god.

Day 6 - Dive 18
Nippo Maru. Another nice wreck, a water carrier, a bit deeper than some, but with a particularly good wheelhouse and deck cargo of cannons, tanks and munitions. We jammed down to the wheelhouse and got in there before the viz got spoiled. I took a few shots, now really fighting the strobes and ten continued down to the aft deck at 135' to shoot the deck cannons and have a look around. As we came back, Paul found a nice pair of mating nudibranchs and I switched over to macro to shoot them. Lying at 125' trying to get them in focus and having the strobes first over-expose, then not fire was frustrating. I finished the shot and swam up with about 1100# of gas left and into 6 mins of deco and made for the bow and up line. I couldn't find Paul, he went into the cabins apparently and racked up a long deco stop, so that I was on the boat before I saw him again.

I shot a few quick shots and a couple of natural lighted bow shots on the way up. Back on board I determined that the optical sync cord had broken at the strobe connector and I was able to strip off a new end to fix my lighting problems.

Dive 19. Feeling that I hadn't done the best job in the wheelhouse, with its wheel and telegraph still standing there, I went back and got better shots. We also went down into the forward hold and I shot some large piles of artillery shells there, as well as some nice bow shots and finally captured the anchor lines I was looking for with the ship anchored for eternity. we finished up on the mast I shot a small moray eel without much success.

Dive 20
Kensho Maru. This was the only wreck I hadn't dove on before. Located back in the repair anchorage where we started our cruise. It was a smallish freighter without a great deal of interesting cargo, but with a very open wheelhouse, cabin and engine room.

When we got in we were greeted by very cloudy viz and huge numbers of jellyfish that made it difficult to find see much of anything at first. Following a line down to the ship, we swam around the cabin and I amused myself shooting some artifacts, not really seeing much else. I had wanted to find the radio room and while looking I saw both guides swim quickly through a skylight down into the center of the wreck. Swimming though I found a massive, wide-open engine room with huge pistons, boiler and valves that I played around shooting. Coming up Paul pointed me to the radio room, now just a rack of old gear. Poking my head up through the cabin roof I found a very nice telegraph that I also shot.

We came up the forward mast and found some nice anemones with their resident clownfish to finish the dive shooting. Making our way back forward and to the Odyssey in the murk and jellyfish, I felt that it had been a very good week rediscovering some great South Pacific diving in Truk lagoon.

Epilogue
We spent a night packing and eating leftover food and drink on the boat. Sunday, we were delivered to the Blue Lagoon Resort for dayrooms until our flights.

After everyone rested a bit we met for lunch at around noon. The restaurant is an exercise in patience, futility and exhaustion. It took nearly 2.5 hrs to get a burger and meals ordered and eaten. The food is ok, or mediocre if you guessed wrong.

After that, we decided we needed a drink. Several folks had bought booze for the boat, only to find that it was included. So there was a spontaneous cocktail party starting in our room and quickly spreading to the lawn. Lawn chairs, coconut palms and a stunning sunset to enjoy. 151 rum is dangerous stuff and by the time our dinner reservations were ready, a few members of the group had to be carried to the table. They had plenty of time to sober up, as dinner again took 2 hours+, with repeated trips to the kitchen to beg water, silverware or "service". The waitresses are locals and really, they just don't get it. Not their fault, cultural I think, but the hotel needs to spend much more time training them to work in a touristic environment. Although the hotel is nice, and their in-house dive op good, trying to get fed in the place is enough to drive you nuts.

After getting onto the Guam/Hawaii flight we had an ugly incident with a man having a heart attack in mid-Pacific, three to four hours from anywhere. Luckily there were two docs and three nurses on board who worked very hard under difficult circumstances to give CPR and resuscitate him. Unfortunately he didn't make it and died. After guiding his poor wife to first class, they wrapped the body up and left it in about row 40 for the duration. Pretty surreal. We were met by the coroner and sheriffs in Honolulu, and after a brief investigation were were allowed to continue our way home.

Photo notes: Truk requires lots of strobe power and wide angle lenses. I was shooting two Inon strobes and I really missed my old S&S 120 at times. Buy the biggest dome lens you can find and long strobe arms. It's a pain to take into the wreck, and I would figure out some sort of dome cover that you can take on and off uw, but it's the right gear for the job. There's some macro life, but it's not prolific. Visibility is up and down there, I think the Spring may be better than Fall. It varies, as you get out to the outer anchorages it can improve, but the amount of junk in the water can be frustrating to deal with.

Photos: Truk - Part 3, Truk Scenics and Truk Portraits

Truk Trek, Part 2

A continuation of my dive journal, see also: Truk Trek, Part 1

Nov 15th Day 3
Dive 8
Hoki Maru. Gene and Judy, Paul and myself boogie into the water and down to the aft hold where there is a bulldozer, paver, trucks and other equipment. I missed the hold at first and drop over the side, but realize that at 128' I'm alongside the rudder. Oops. Back up and into the small littered hold, squeezing through the girders and drop down to the between decks where the equipment is. We manage to get our shots just before the thundering herd of fellow divers descends on us. Out and back aft I follow Gene into the steering station where the remains of the rudder gears and lines are. After that we break up and cruise around the wreck, not seeing anything too remarkable. Viz is much better here, maybe 80-100'. Finished the dive up the mast where the color is wonderful, I try to frame some divers in the structure to not much avail.

Dive 9
Fujikama Maru. This is a "money wreck" (what I call a dive site that you spend the money on a trip to see), lots to see and at a decent depth so there's lots of time. Sam, olur guide, leads Paul and myself on a tour of the engine room and machine shop. The wreck is more open then I remembered from last time, but still some tight squeezes, especially with the camera. We luck out and are the first to get to the machine shop and I get some good shots of the air compressor, nicknamed R2D2 that's pretty famous. After that I shoot the lathe and then back out to the engine room as the herd descends and spoils the viz.

We continue out into the superstructure and I frame some shots in the openings, definitely deteriorated since 4 years ago, with more marine growth as a result as the light hits it more. We duck out a window and then decide to go to the hold with the zero airplane fuselages. Dropping back into it there's lots to look at and I'm able to get some nice shots with he dome lens, still having some weird light flare issues, even pulling the strobe back and out.

Back out and I've used up my camera card, but linger a bit on the king posts, where there's very nice growth. I go into a couple mins deco, but clear by the time I get to 20'.

Dive 10
Paul and I head for the bow as I thought this wreck had some nice anchor lines going out that were covered with soft coral. This wasn't the case, but there was an interesting anchor still on the starboard side and as I shot it I spied a couple of grey reef sharks out in the gloom, as well as the school of snapper and jacks that the sharks were interested in. They circled around a bit, but never really came close, especially after a guide tried swimming out after them....no comment.

We poked around on both sides of the bow, it wasn't that interesting, but coming up to the top of the bow, the deck gun was pretty large and I took a few shots, waiting quite a while for others to leave the area...

Took a few deckscapes and then dropped over the side again after I saw a small school of tuna down near the bottom. Thought I might be able to drop down on them quietly, bu they were aware of me and lazily swam off. Likewise a few snapper wearily kept their distance.

I swam around the bottom at around 90' and thought I might wake up a large fish or something, but nobody was home. Came back up and swam around the deck, finishing the dive trying my luck shooting macro of some pink anemone fish, with about the same results as the rest of the dive...mediocre.

Came up, downloaded the pics to find that on the previous dive I had marred the dome lens enough that it was causing the camera to loose focus or for the marrs to show up on the shots...ARRRGH.

Dive 11
Evening night dive. Paul and I splash about 6 pm again and make for the aft of the Fujikawa, as we haven't toured it yet. Paul drops into the last hold and I follow after making sure it is pretty open and easy to find my way out of. It seems to be filled with saki bottles and other assorted cooking gear as well and what looks like a canoe or something.

We come out and find a few artifacts on deck and then I drop over the stern to see if anything is lurking there to shoot. Nothing but some nice small coral displays. We look around for a while, then at 1650 pounds of remaining gas, start to head back up towards the aft king posts as was our plan after hearing that the corals were nice there.

They are indeed, it's much more pristine, as most divers don't use it for a safety stop and haven't kicked it all to hell, as is the forward king post. I shoot some soft corals and small bright yellow tubestra tube coral. We motor back up to the forward king posts and find we each have a fair amount of deco obligation to clear. I wish they'd have set down a half rack of beer instead of an extra air tank there...

I think the Fujikawa Maru is in danger of being over-loved and dove. There is a lot there and everyone enjoys poking around in the moderate depths, but it's looking pretty beat up to my eyes. Broken coral, scraped areas and trashed holds seem to be the norm. Even then, it's still a great dive.

Nov 16, Day 4
Dive 12
Unikai Maru. The morning dive is on a freighter that has heavy bomb damage forward, actually splitting the ship in two. It's at moderate depths, so we start towards the stern, duck in a shoot up towards a missing skylight. I swim around the stern shooting heavily encrusted depth charges on the rails and some gangways and so forth. I then see some nudibranchs, and as it is the first I've seen and had time to shoot, I switch to macro mode and blaze away, lying on the deck at 100'.

Swimming alongside the cabin I see a small school of jacks going after some small fry excitedly. Continuing along towards where the bow was, I see another nudibranch in some green growth, and then a neat flat worm out in the open. It pays to look small sometimes, and most of the trip has been w/a.

I also shoot some artistically arranged gas masks and then play around shooting some sun balls behind the masts, but am unable to get Paul in the position that I want.

Sort of a "more of the same" dive, but a nice little wreck.

Dive 13
Pizion Reef Shark Feeding dive. We've been warned that we might not be able to do this, but skipper Nick is pleased to tell us at the morning brief that the weather is quite good and the trades are finally filling in to hold us off the reef while we dive. We motor about 1.5 hrs out of the lagoon and swing south to the low lying reef where they have put in a mooring. After chumming up the sharks a bit and briefing us on what to expect, we all get into the water and sit in a natural amphitheater around a tethered wire and when the fill a lift bag it brings down a large chunk of frozen tuna.

We are surrounded by lots of 5-6' grey reef sharks, a few smaller black tips and a large school of snapper as well. They go after it a bit at first, then in a huge ball of fish excitedly trying to tear chunks out of it. It's frozen very hard and each of the two chunks takes 15 mins to be fought over and disappear.

When the first chunk is being fought over they are able to pull the line over a bit practically in my lap. I gamely keep taking pictures, finally switching to a w/a lens. After my strobe arms are hit repeatedly and I have to punch several away from me, I decide to move over a bit, which is hard to do on the rocks. I also find that guide Charlie is riding herd on me, keeping them from hitting me in the head from the rear. I actually am fairly non-plussed, as after feeding the fish in the Seattle Aquarium it's not unlike the big king salmon bashing me around. Ok, these fish have teeth, but they are only after the food, and really don't concern me much.

Towards the end of the feeding a few much larger silver tips come in, including about a 11-12' female that the guides think is pregnant. She's the queen of the reef and takes no guff from the reef sharks. They are very elegant animals and even after the feeding is done I go down the wall a bit to 90' and watch them all swim back and forth. There was a huge temperature thermocline there, with the water 10-15 degrees cooler, and I think the larger animals like it.

I meander up to the shallows and pick up Paul and we poke around seeing some little reef fish that are all to shy to shoot. Four years ago this area was a very pretty shallow dive with lots more fish and hard corals, but apparently a couple of typhoons have hit it hard and it's pretty dead, with only a few small bits of coral alive amongst mostly dead rock.

We finish the dive sitting on the hang bar at 12' with the boat stern in 200' of water watching sharks go past in the crystal blue warm water.

Dive 14
Shankisan Maru. Coming back into the lagoon we anchor over the blown apart stern of this ammunition freighter. Swimming over the melted remains of the stern we find the middle section of the ship and continue to the holds. Once again I find that the ship's cargo has been scattered around or taken. Before there were huge mounds of bullets in the aft hold, with lots of untouched cases stacked around. Now they are a fine layer along the bottom, with just a few cases left along with some detonators. While they've enforced taking anything from the wrecks, they haven't enforced a no-touch rule and I think it's a shame to see such deterioration in the impact of the cargo to see.

We continue along checking out some airplane engines and so forth and then swim up to the bow for a look to see if there's any interesting growth off the bow. Turning back, I swim up amidships and find a cleaning station with a couple of jacks or small tuna being cleaned by small colorful wrasses. As the wrasses pick off parasites, the jacks shiver with delight, quite amusing to watch.

I loose Paul about that time and later find he ascended up the mast and then back to the boat. I continue on down the starboard rail, or what's left of it, and am rewarded with some large schools of black turbans and even quite a large, bump-headed parrotfish. I finish the dive shooting some nice soft coral and in the dusky light swim back trying to find the anchor line in blue water and after discerning the Odyssey, I see the anchor line which makes it easy to ascend and do deco. To cap the dive, I swim past a large barracuda hovering under the boat in near dark, as I make my way to the hang bar. I'm a bit worried about Paul, but they spot his bubbles just behind me and he's on deck a couple of mins later.


Continued on Truk Trek, part 3
Photos: Truk Trek - Part 2 photo set