Hello and looking for help

[Drey]

Hello all. I am new here and I am looking for some help. I am in a program to become a scuba instructor, and for my Divemaster portion I will have to do a mapping project. Being the geeky thinker I am, I am looking into making an digital underwater map with I guess sonar equipment. I have no idea on where to start on this. Would anyone have any suggestion for me. Keep in mind cost and portability. Thank you in advance.

 

[tursiops]

Hello all. I am new here and I am looking for some help. I am in a program to become a scuba instructor, and for my Divemaster portion I will have to do a mapping project. Being the geeky thinker I am, I am looking into making an digital underwater map with I guess sonar equipment. I have no idea on where to start on this. Would anyone have any suggestion for me. Keep in mind cost and portability. Thank you in advance.

This is not likely to go well. You not only need the sonar equipment, which if any good is expensive and hard to borrow, you also need to know where you are, which is difficult. Yes, you can cobble something together that might work. But ask yourself, what is the purpose of that mapping project? It is about navigation, planning, task loading, data analysis and display, and getting it all done in a reasonable amount of time and dives. Suggestion: keep it simple rather than make it geeky...you are much more likely to get it done.

You might find it difficult enough to tow a taut-line GPS in a little floating waterproof box to tell you where you are, and use time marks as you log depths on a slate. Note obvious features and sketch them. On a later dive, after you have a trail map, correct and fill it in, and take some pictures of main features. You will need a buddy for all this, and having the buddy manage the GPS while you log depths and amke notes works well. Don't try if if a current is running....your nav will be terrible.

The Admiral in charge of the Navy Hydrographic (map-maling) Office once told me: "Hydrography is easy. There are just two questions: How deep is the water right here, and where is right here?"

 

[JackD342]

Yes, you are WAY overthinking it. Even more so than I did for my DM course.
Your dive map just needs to be a representative drawing that you or another diver can refer to for navigating a dive site.
You should not have to map the exact position of every point of interest on an underwater topographical map, but marking their relative general position to each other, with depths, and distances/headings between will do the trick.

 

[TMHeimer]

Yes, you are WAY overthinking it. Even more so than I did for my DM course.
Your dive map just needs to be a representative drawing that you or another diver can refer to for navigating a dive site.
You should not have to map the exact position of every point of interest on an underwater topographical map, but marking their relative general position to each other, with depths, and distances/headings between will do the trick.

Agree, that's what I did--depths, bottom topography, beach entry, the basics. I had at least half a dozen shore sites near our house to choose from that were way off the beaten path as far as other divers goes. I knew them well, but wasn't just taking the easy route. Pretty much all the other sites close the shop were already mapped by DMCs and were maybe 70 miles away.
I see you are from Salt Lake...Am curious as to what dive site options you may have in the area.
If you are taking the course locally.