I've been chasing clear water in SoCal (so I can get some wide angle shots) all year. I've done 13 dives at Catalina, 4 dives at Anacapa, 3 on the oil rig Eureka, 3 at Santa Cruz and countless local shore dives this year. The water conditions have been very poor all year, with the best conditions ("best" as graded on a curve) being on the rigs in January.
After receiving an email last week stating there was openings on the Sea Bass going back to the rigs, I called Chica and we got on the boat to again roll the dice again in our pursuit of some good wide angle water.
Oh my. We hit once-in-a-lifetime conditions.
Saturday in SoCal was gorgeous. Our first summer-like day, with record temperatures all over the place. Clear, no wind, flat calm waters - perfect top side conditions for a rig dive.
We started our day on the Oil Rig Eureka (photo below by Elaine Jobin.)
The ride out was very mellow. I think this is the first open boat I've ever been on where all divers were in Backplates. No biggie, but it shows you how far things have come in SoCal over the last 5 years. Eureka is a good starting place, as it generally has the best conditions of the SoCal rigs.
DIVE #1
The plan was to drop with the wide angle until we got into (fingers crossed) some clear water and shoot like a beast. Its a live drop off the boat, so Claudette and I were the first ones in. The current was stiff, but not prohibitive. We got to the center of the platform and dropped into some pretty nasty soup. I was a little discouraged. But as we dropped, it got clearer and clear. By the time we were at 120 it was very clear. We dropped a little deeper and things got even better. We've done 5 previous dives on this rig, and we saw things this dive we've never seen. The crazy ropes (7 of them) hanging and swinging in the breeze of the current at about 125 was hypnotic. Just lovely.
I was taking lots of shots. Because of all of the yuck in the top 50 feet of water, and because on the rigs you're essentially in the shade, its very dark down there. I always forget for the first several shots, and I found myself adjusting the camera more than usual. You need to mash the light output of the strobes, but when you do you risk leakage on the sides of the shot when shooting very wide angle (I was shooting 12mm - 24mm... pretty wide) - imagine a clock, and from 2:00 to 4:00, and from 8:00 - 10:00 being over-saturated with light while the center and tops of the frame are OK. That's the problem down there. I made the necessary adjustments and things started clicking (pun intended....)
We had dropped on the west-ish (the dark side) of the rig. If you've seen my Nudi pics, you know I'm a big fan of negative (black) space in my shots to accentuate the beauty and color of the animal. I've never used negative space in my Wide Angles. I only recently (last Fall) starting shooting W/A in full manual mode, so I wanted to experiment and see if I could get the effect. Having years of shooting Macro in full manual, achieving black backgrounds is like breathing now. Because it was so dark down there I did a whole series with Claudette on a horizontal brace, leveraging the darkness to create a negative space in the clear-ish water. Without much gunk, there was very little backscatter.
I had us scoot to the east-ish side of the rig so I could get the rising sun to backlight some images. The water was very green - almost that H&R Block green with the sun on it. I had Claudette scoot off the rig going east, and come back at me (I remained inside the rig) so I could frame her against the bright green background. It was surreal.
I've been working out like a monstah since January, and I've lost some heft in my neck. I noticed my Neoprene seal was leaking as I moved my head around to shoot - so I was trying not to move it much. As we were zooming back up from depth, I saw a slow but intentional HID light signal from above me. One of the other divers, Eric (one of a team of two that brought dubs, deco 80's etc.) made a signal as I was on a trajectory to mow him over. I saw his light, and missed him by a mile - but it was a good thing he signaled me as I wasn't looking UP much because of the neck seal seepage.
I spun around after we passed him and unclipped my camera. I signaled Chica I wanted to stop. I have a large snap that straps the deathstar to my left chest Dring when I scoot, and I took the clip and rapped it on one of the aluminum strobe arms a few times (click click) to get his attention. Eric looked over and I motioned, asking if I may take his pic. Figured it was the least I could do. It became one of my fav shots of the trip, with very subtle negative space all around him.
Moments later we rolled up on his buddy (Matt) and I got some bottom up shots of him.
After the 48 degree dive at Vets on Thursday, the 53 degrees here felt very civilized. I got lots of shots on the descent, and we made long stops at 20 and 10 (19 minutes to come from 20 feet to the surface I think it was.) We spent most of the stop facing into the current, kicking to hold position and dodging jellies the size of dimes, nickels and quarters.
A wonderful first dive. I would have been very happy with it.
Who knew dive number two would be a once-in-a-lifetime dive.
Enjoy the pics below.
Full 4/12/08 Rigs gallery here: Linky
Part 2 of 2 link here: Linkola
I'll lather Chica in part 2. Trust me, I wouldn't be doing this stuff without here.
---
Ken
===============================
Chica in the blacknessness. Perfect conditions for my first negative space Wide Angle experimentation. I like this shot a lot.
Dette out of the green. It was way green down there. I'm shooting east into the sun, she's blasting out of the bright light into the darkness of the rig structure. Its a miracle she didn't mow me over, as I'm sure she couldn't see much.
This is Eric. I love this shot so much. The shades of black and gray behind him, with just enough light to make out the structure make this look very Space Odyssey. Man. I like this shot!
Unless you've dived the rigs, its hard to imagine the scale of the things. Here is Claudette at one of the more modest Star braces that are all over the place. Its a scooter playground to be sure.
Last one of Chica scooting out of the snot.
Here's a little animated GIF from dive one - the top shot, above, is from this series of shots.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Part two: Dive of a Lifetime!
.
.
.
.
.
.
After receiving an email last week stating there was openings on the Sea Bass going back to the rigs, I called Chica and we got on the boat to again roll the dice again in our pursuit of some good wide angle water.
Oh my. We hit once-in-a-lifetime conditions.
Saturday in SoCal was gorgeous. Our first summer-like day, with record temperatures all over the place. Clear, no wind, flat calm waters - perfect top side conditions for a rig dive.
We started our day on the Oil Rig Eureka (photo below by Elaine Jobin.)
The ride out was very mellow. I think this is the first open boat I've ever been on where all divers were in Backplates. No biggie, but it shows you how far things have come in SoCal over the last 5 years. Eureka is a good starting place, as it generally has the best conditions of the SoCal rigs.
DIVE #1
The plan was to drop with the wide angle until we got into (fingers crossed) some clear water and shoot like a beast. Its a live drop off the boat, so Claudette and I were the first ones in. The current was stiff, but not prohibitive. We got to the center of the platform and dropped into some pretty nasty soup. I was a little discouraged. But as we dropped, it got clearer and clear. By the time we were at 120 it was very clear. We dropped a little deeper and things got even better. We've done 5 previous dives on this rig, and we saw things this dive we've never seen. The crazy ropes (7 of them) hanging and swinging in the breeze of the current at about 125 was hypnotic. Just lovely.
I was taking lots of shots. Because of all of the yuck in the top 50 feet of water, and because on the rigs you're essentially in the shade, its very dark down there. I always forget for the first several shots, and I found myself adjusting the camera more than usual. You need to mash the light output of the strobes, but when you do you risk leakage on the sides of the shot when shooting very wide angle (I was shooting 12mm - 24mm... pretty wide) - imagine a clock, and from 2:00 to 4:00, and from 8:00 - 10:00 being over-saturated with light while the center and tops of the frame are OK. That's the problem down there. I made the necessary adjustments and things started clicking (pun intended....)
We had dropped on the west-ish (the dark side) of the rig. If you've seen my Nudi pics, you know I'm a big fan of negative (black) space in my shots to accentuate the beauty and color of the animal. I've never used negative space in my Wide Angles. I only recently (last Fall) starting shooting W/A in full manual mode, so I wanted to experiment and see if I could get the effect. Having years of shooting Macro in full manual, achieving black backgrounds is like breathing now. Because it was so dark down there I did a whole series with Claudette on a horizontal brace, leveraging the darkness to create a negative space in the clear-ish water. Without much gunk, there was very little backscatter.
I had us scoot to the east-ish side of the rig so I could get the rising sun to backlight some images. The water was very green - almost that H&R Block green with the sun on it. I had Claudette scoot off the rig going east, and come back at me (I remained inside the rig) so I could frame her against the bright green background. It was surreal.
I've been working out like a monstah since January, and I've lost some heft in my neck. I noticed my Neoprene seal was leaking as I moved my head around to shoot - so I was trying not to move it much. As we were zooming back up from depth, I saw a slow but intentional HID light signal from above me. One of the other divers, Eric (one of a team of two that brought dubs, deco 80's etc.) made a signal as I was on a trajectory to mow him over. I saw his light, and missed him by a mile - but it was a good thing he signaled me as I wasn't looking UP much because of the neck seal seepage.
I spun around after we passed him and unclipped my camera. I signaled Chica I wanted to stop. I have a large snap that straps the deathstar to my left chest Dring when I scoot, and I took the clip and rapped it on one of the aluminum strobe arms a few times (click click) to get his attention. Eric looked over and I motioned, asking if I may take his pic. Figured it was the least I could do. It became one of my fav shots of the trip, with very subtle negative space all around him.
Moments later we rolled up on his buddy (Matt) and I got some bottom up shots of him.
After the 48 degree dive at Vets on Thursday, the 53 degrees here felt very civilized. I got lots of shots on the descent, and we made long stops at 20 and 10 (19 minutes to come from 20 feet to the surface I think it was.) We spent most of the stop facing into the current, kicking to hold position and dodging jellies the size of dimes, nickels and quarters.
A wonderful first dive. I would have been very happy with it.
Who knew dive number two would be a once-in-a-lifetime dive.
Enjoy the pics below.
Full 4/12/08 Rigs gallery here: Linky
Part 2 of 2 link here: Linkola
I'll lather Chica in part 2. Trust me, I wouldn't be doing this stuff without here.
---
Ken
===============================
Chica in the blacknessness. Perfect conditions for my first negative space Wide Angle experimentation. I like this shot a lot.
Dette out of the green. It was way green down there. I'm shooting east into the sun, she's blasting out of the bright light into the darkness of the rig structure. Its a miracle she didn't mow me over, as I'm sure she couldn't see much.
This is Eric. I love this shot so much. The shades of black and gray behind him, with just enough light to make out the structure make this look very Space Odyssey. Man. I like this shot!
Unless you've dived the rigs, its hard to imagine the scale of the things. Here is Claudette at one of the more modest Star braces that are all over the place. Its a scooter playground to be sure.
Last one of Chica scooting out of the snot.
Here's a little animated GIF from dive one - the top shot, above, is from this series of shots.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Part two: Dive of a Lifetime!
.
.
.
.
.
.
