During the DEMA show I met Michael Aw, the author of the essential and advanced guides to digital underwater photography. He invited me along to his and Mathieu Meur’s workshop in Manado, Indonesia during the second week of February. Underwater photography is something I have always loved and I already owned Michael and Mathieu’s book, so when the opportunity arose for me to take part in the workshop I was really stoked! Based in Sydney, Michael has been a strong advocate for the health of our oceans. Apart from his photography, his company OceanNEnvironment promotes and initiates preservation projects as well as endeavors to document the status of coral reefs, bio-diversity and the impact of man-made pollution through research programmes and educational expeditions. But recently he developed the hallmark magazine publication for the sea – Ocean Geographic, adding to an already impressive list of underwater publications.
With my new underwater camera rig, a Nikon D200 in Hugyfot hosing and Ikelite strobe which Michael helped me purchase second hand, I was ready for diversity of marine life that surrounds and flourishes in Indonesia! This trip was also special, as along with me was Jayne Jenkins, my scholarship organiser and already and accomplished underwater photographer. We were destined for Manado, Northern Sulawesi, and after a night stopover in Singapore we were ready to get wet. We spent three days diving at Cocotinos resort to get used to camera’s and the diving that we will be doing for the coming 10 days. With the camera performing flawlessly, I was loving the diving and the variety of marine life that we encountered.
The underwater photography workshop was held at Minahasa Lagoon Resort, the manager, Cassandra Dragon, was awesome and showed tremendous support for the scholarship hosting both Jayne and me to stay during the workshop. It was such a beautiful place, the beach front cottages were surrounded by palm trees and a natural river running though the resort allowed easy access to one of the three comfortable dive boats. The Bunaken National Marine Park was the destination for our seven days diving. These waters are separated by a 1500 m + tough between the Manado mainland, with the rich ocean currents providing the islands with clear warm water harboring some of the highest marine biodiversity in the world! Whist closer to the resort, the diving is predominately ‘muck diving’ still with nice corals but the small and interesting critters that are adapted for this unique environment take the focus. In addition to some of the estimated 2500 species of fish that are found in the region, we were able to find harlequin shrimp, tiger shrimp, boxer crabs, seahorses, ghost pipefish, mandarin fish and baby cuttlefish still within their translucent eggs!
A typical day for the workshop would begin for breakfast at 6:30am then a jam packed day would follow. Normally we were diving three times a day, between dives we downloaded and reviewed our images so we know how to improve on the next dive or try different techniques. Michael and Mathieu would give lectures on topics such as composition, lighting techniques, shooting in ambient light, using models, photography etiquette, conservation photography, post production, asset management and Photoshop techniques. However these days were broken up by relaxing three course meals and gossip, but most nights we would be up to 10:30 pm working on our photos and looking at how to improve with comments from Michael and Mathieu. To complete the course we were required to produce a portfolio of 10 of our images, comprising of macro, wide angle and wide angle with models. My portfolio can be seen here:
All of the eight participants graduated with essential or advanced certification and all of us were surprised on how much you can learn from courses such as this. I hope to make photography a big part of my diving career and this course was definitely a foot in the right direction. Also diving with us during the week was Leandro Blanco – the world renowned underwater filmmaker. One of the nicest people you can meet, he was able to give me some valuable tips about filming and editing for my scholarship video that I will be working on over the next month.
After another night stopover in Singapore and a day touring the city, with local Mathieu Meur, I was back on my way home with new skills and friends. A very rewarding time was had in Indonesia, and I look forward to going back yet again. But now my focus will be catching up on work and producing my video that I will be presenting at the OZTeK dive show in Sydney on the 21st-22nd March. For those that are considering coming along, I will be speaking at 9:30am on the Sunday. Hope to see you there!
