A few years ago, someone posted in CDF that they were looking for cave divers for a TV project. The divers had to have "big personalities." Two of the biggest personalities I knew also happened to be GUE instructors -- Ed Hayes and Bob Sherwood. I copied their resumes from the GUE site and sent in some photos of us diving together. We were contacted by a production company, did Skype screen tests, and were hired to shoot a series for H2 called "Ghost Town Divers." Both our producer and DP producer were divers. They said that watching us underwater was incredible. They'd never seen anything like it. But, watching us hold still and propel efficiently was boring for TV. They wanted us to flail around, fin a lot, and create drama. During the pilot episode, it took about 20 minutes to get Ed's manifold impaled by a tree limb and rescue him. First, we had to find the tree, then find a branch that would fit through the space between the cylinders and crossbar, then we had to find one that wouldn't break, etc. Even when they get divers who can dive well in front of the cameras, they don't want to show the public quality scuba diving. It's rare. I've seen it on the WKPP Britannic expedition documentary and here and there. But, as AJ pointed out, most divers are not that skilled. Here is a sizzle reel from our show after we tried to look bad:
By the way, we were doing "deep, dark, and dangerous" diving in 12 feet of water. I think our max depth was 40 once when we needed to find good visibility for scooter shots. I filmed most of it underwater along with a second cameraman who wasn't part of the cast.
