NCD Club dive 12/4/2010 @ Gerstle Cove

[Peter_C]

Drive all the way down to the main parking lot and that's where we'll be.

Keith and I plan to leave at 7:00 am. It is an hour and 25 minute drive or so, with a quick stop for sandwiches. Our usual routine is to back the truck down the single lane road to the bottom of the cove. We quickly dump our gear, then drive the truck back to the parking lot before packing the gear the rest of the way to the beach. At the bottom of the hill if people park their vehicles far to one side or the other two vehicles will fit side by side.

 

[aquaregia]

Sort of guessing on how long it'll take us, we'll shoot for early. I figure I'll be looking for dudes with doublehoses. I'm the dude with long hair, one of my friends is a tiny blonde girl and the other's a shorthaired, muscular version of me (wearing my spare wetsuit). Feel free to let us know if we violate any local customs or anything

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I just got back home.

Well...
Great visiblity and serene conditions...underwater.
On the surface...not so much.

Vis was 25 feet and not any surge to speak of.
On the surface it was torn up, howling winds up on the bluff, white caps galore out on the ocean and
a south wind and swell that was hitting Gerstle cove directly on the beach. There were knee highs and an occasional thigh slapper but everybody got in and out no problem. I think the beautiful water made it so much easier. Even on the beach I could put my face in the water and see everything so clearly, that makes it nice.
It was great meeting Andrew (Aquaregia) and friends. We hope to see more of you guys up here soon.

Actually we had a pretty good turnout.
A few went to the northern cove at Gerstle (the cove north of the main parking lot) and reported great underwater conditions.
A few ended up meeting at Gerstle but then going to Stillwater and also reporting stellar underwater conditions.

Passing by, Stillwater looked like the place to be. It was more sheltered from the wind and the beach was flatter.

Next time we'll do Stillwater.

Add: Pics to come soon. I have to get the B/W film developed rofl3 that was in my Nikonos V.

 

[blewgrass]

Here is some video from Stillwater:

Here is Peter signaling me to keep up...Looks like he's gonna fly the bird at the end
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8dk2gHes0E

This is a small fish we saw on the bottom. Can anyone identify?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THU1CvRIwCU

 

[blewgrass]

pardon

Does anyone know how to "embed" this in the post? Maybe it's not possible on this board...

Steve

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

That was it for the video?

 

[blewgrass]

No Eric..I've got more...but I'm slow in uploading it to you tube... no editing whatsoever... I truly suck at photography, and I'm not able to color correct these... the videos that is... I basically need much more training with the gear I have... or need to realize this gear isn't worthy of quality photos.

I have a Panasonic TZ5 with the housing.... the flash unit had dead batteries so I had to rely on the onboard flash and video setup... I need to learn to color correct in Photoshop or another software program...

I will try to get more links up in the coming days.

Thanks to everyone for the cool diving and good to meet all of you.. I look forward to seeing you guys all over the place here in Nor Cal.

We really do have some fantastic dive spots on the North Coast. It's really fun lookint at those huge abalone and urchin up close.

I'll post some of the nicer pics too..

Steve

 

[TaoH]

If your camera can do manual white balance, that should help get the green out of the video when shooting with natural light. I often calibrate using unpainted SCUBA tanks, white slates, rocks, sand and I get usable results. White/gray surfaces work best, sometimes a few shades off will work.

I wanted to go, but my regs are still at the shop and I've been busy lately. Hope to be able to go in January.

 

[blewgrass]

That's very helpful. Thanks Tao. I'm finding it easy to correct the stills in photoshop, but not the video (I have CS4 extended... which I was told has some video capabilities). I understand (after the fact) that it is best to do color adjustments to the camera before the dive. I do have a decent strobe flash unit and I am in the market for a quality video light, but I find that the light needs diffusion. Time for me to do some reading/resarch after my finals....

Steve

 

[TaoH]

I've used AVIDemux on Linux to correct slight green in videos and it has worked okay; very dark green is difficult to fix and often hardly salvageable. I'm sure the windows version should work as well: Avidemux - Downloads

From the Video Menu on the left pane, go to Filters>Colors>MPlayer eq2

First thing I'll do is increase Red and maybe Blue, then I'll play around with the rest until I get something I think will work.

White balance is best done during the dive because you need the calibrate the camera to the lighting conditions underwater or whatever your scenario may be.