Curacao trip report, photos, and review of vendors 6/28 through 7/5/2010

[dwilli10]

Nice report!

Have no fear, the TSA is good at finding knives in the Detroit airport. And they won't let you off with just a warning either.

 

[idocsteve]

Nice report!

Have no fear, the TSA is good at finding knives in the Detroit airport. And they won't let you off with just a warning either.

I won't have any fear if I happen to be flying through Detroit. However since I have no plans of going that way anytime soon, I guess I have no choice but to fly with fear. Along with my dive knife of course!

Great trip report, you even included my favorite yogurt.
I can't believe you managed to climb the mountain, visit other places and still make your flight; good job. It was nice meeting you. People come back to Curacao, especially back to Westpunt. I'm sure we'll see you again and you can finish seeing and diving the rest of your list.
Hugs and fishes! Sunshine

That's true. There is something to be said about going back to some place that you've been before because it's familiar and you have a good idea of what you want to see and how to get there. I would like to get a crack at the Superior Producer wreck and maybe walk a bit further into one of those rooms at the brothel.

We got up really early the morning of our flight to avoid the mid day sun and to give us time to see everything that was on our list. And that included missing the park entrance and driving into that next town where the barricades were set up. At that point I realized I went too far by about 10 minutes...and a local got us turned around in the right direction. That was about par for the course.

As far as the yogurt went, the vanilla with the chocolate pieces was probably better than any ice cream I ever had.

 

[Curacao Sunshine]

The closest thing to Danio in the states is the Greek Yogurt, try it and compare.
I'll follow your travels on SB.

 

[tarponchik]

Thanks for the report. Yes, Andreas is a German, who got stuck there. No mentioning of Guido, the Swiss DM, so he probably moved on.

The Neptune statute is really nothing but a nuisance. I once almost stuck my ass on the trident when ascending on a night dive.

 

[idocsteve]

The closest thing to Danio in the states is the Greek Yogurt, try it and compare.
I'll follow your travels on SB.

My girlfriend said the same thing and she got me a case of it, I think from BJs or another wholesale club. The flavored ones are in that same small 6 oz container. They're "ok" but not the same as the Danio stuff.

Thanks for the report. Yes, Andreas is a German, who got stuck there. No mentioning of Guido, the Swiss DM, so he probably moved on.

The Neptune statute is really nothing but a nuisance. I once almost stuck my ass on the trident when ascending on a night dive.

No Guido that I saw on the boat during the week we were there. There's a David, a Shawn, a Steve, a nice young woman whose name escapes me, and 2 local fellows who alternated driving the boat with Brian. And a couple of other women who work in the OEW dive shop.

 

[idocsteve]

Picture enhancement is complete!

Next thing to do is import all the pictures into a slide show and merge the slide show with the video clips taken with my camcorder and make a custom DVD with intro, titles, menus, and transition effects, and of course chapters and descriptive text where indicated.

Heres a picture of my girlfriend and myself on that private island of Klein Curacao we went to on the day trip. Notice the lighthouse in the background. It seems small because it's way back behind us.

 

[handben]

Hi idocSteve,

Thanks for the side by side comparison of the photo enhancements. I've taken up underwater photography over the past 3 years and am really enjoying it. I use an Olympus 1030 (point and shoot) with a housing good to 200 feet. I've become pretty good with capturing images; but could sure use help "touching up" the way you've done. I wonder if you might walk through the process you go through. (I probably need to buy better image processing software). Thanks, and sorry to those following this thread for going "off topic". Ben

 

[idocsteve]

Hi idocSteve,

Thanks for the side by side comparison of the photo enhancements. I've taken up underwater photography over the past 3 years and am really enjoying it. I use an Olympus 1030 (point and shoot) with a housing good to 200 feet. I've become pretty good with capturing images; but could sure use help "touching up" the way you've done. I wonder if you might walk through the process you go through. (I probably need to buy better image processing software). Thanks, and sorry to those following this thread for going "off topic". Ben

After reading posts in the photography section of this board I got myself a copy of Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 on Ebay for under $40.

Its does a lot, in fact it probably does everything you need to do to a photo. It might take a few evenings but the learning curve is fast.

When you open the program, you go into "Edit" mode and load up the photo. In "Quick" mode you can simply click "quick fix" as well as "lighting levels" and "color" and "sharpness" to enhance the photos as I did to the ones I posted on this thread. The quick fix button can be clicked several times to progressively enhance the photo, I have found the color button to not help much at all, the sharpness button can really improve a photo but can also emphasize back scatter...but your mileage may vary. There's also a "Guided Mode" but I have not used it.

In full edit mode you can remove imperfections and back scatter and photochop pictures by adding pieces of different pictures together as well as a ton of other stuff.

 

[seacreatures]

Steve, good report You guys might look at Adobe Light Room if you post on the web a lot as it mass corrects and changes the extensions in mass. It works in all formats, so you can shoot RAW and convert to JPG, correct and convert 100s at one time. Might be worth looking at?

 

[handben]

Steve, Thanks again. I just ordered a copy of photoshop elements 8.0 on Amazon. A lot of my pics look like the ones on the left; it will be fun to enhance them.