Eddy's Scuba Blog

In April, I took a photo course with Marty Snyderman. This course was sponsored by the guys at Underwater Photo-Tech Tech, perhaps one of the best shops that specializes in underwater photography in the North East. And curiously, it is not even in the water, is about 1 hour inland in Southern New Hampshire.

Marty Snyderman is a well-known film producer, Emmy Award winner cinematographer, still photographer and has authored nine books. His website is martysnyderman.com. Marty's work can be seen on Diver Magazine, National Geographic, Natural History, Audubon, Skin Diver, Dive Training, Sport Diver, Newsweek, Monterey Bay Aquarium, New England Aquarium and Seattle Aquarium.

The course was a full-day course and gathered about 25+ people. In my opinion, his pictures are quite spectacular, especially the ones with big animals. The course was pretty good, very well organized and with lots of interesting useful tips. He started the class with the following quote:

"If you want to pay those bills, you need to get close."

Here are some notes from the course:

Composition

• A powerful photo makes a statement. If people start asking "what is it?", you've missed the point. Audience is mostly non-divers
• Isolate the subject
• Fill a pleasing percentage of your frame
• Zoom with your fins, not with your lens
• Travel tip: Use an igloo, has less weight. Use socks, underwear as shock absorbers. Carry camera with you. Everything else check it in
• 90% of divers frame pictures horizontally, try vertical composition
• Rule of thirds: Split your picture with a tic-tac-toe board and focus on filling the intersections except for schools, circular subjects
• Pay attention to horizontal lines. Usually split a horizon, 1/3 water(top), 2/3 land (bottom)
• Try to catch leading lines, "S", diagonals, parallel lines
• When photographing fish, focus on the eye. Get light on the eye
• Head on, no butts
• Give moving subjects somewhere to go
• Negative space should give a positive impression
• Use a flashlight during the day. Figure out the real color
• Contrast between subject and background
• Get low, get close, shoot up. Use the psychological effect of how an audience view a speaker, from below.
• Photograph divers doing things they enjoy
• Models: split fins, swimming action, wait until bubbles are out of the face
• Shoot same subject repeatedly
• Neutral buoyancy is important before getting a shot
• Turtles: swim along them first

Equipment

• Flood happens on the first days
• Avoid distractions when setting up your gear, stay focus, ignore people.
• Check o-rings, not too much grease is needed, kust to get it "moist"
• If you feel stickiness in buttons, take it apart.
• Avoid hurries, first day rush.
• Dunk equipment before a dive
• Don't jump with your equipment, let others hand it in.
• Don't let other people handle your camera
• Use lanyard as insurance
• 30 second rinse after exiting to get the salt out
• Disassemble part after trip
• Pay attention where you put your camera on a boat

Camera

• Synch speed: the faster the better
• For digital cameras, high ISO has more noise, the lower the ISO the better
• Problem with an automatic camera is that people turn camera on, brain off
• Automatic settings is the surest path to mediocrity

• Type of shots

  1. ID Images - Aquarium, Fish ID book, parallel to plate
  
  
  2. Animated Pose - Personality, angular
  
  
  3. Animal in its natural habitat
  
  
  4. Behavior
  
  
  5. Dramatic Shot

Exposure

• (Guide Number)/(Strobe to Subject Distance) = f/stop
• Guide number is provided by the manufactures of the strobe
• Guide number - Intensity of the strobe
• Guide number in manual varies with ISO
• Two strobe formula: GN_n = sqrt(GN_1^2 + GN_2^2)
• Position your two strobes light like a "W", where the two lights meet is where the subject should be. This avoids back-scatter.
• TTL works great with macro
• For wide angle use long arms
• For back-lighting use slave
• Bracket for exposre. Bracket= shoot the same picture and change the settings incrementally

Sillouttes

• Your eyes must see distinct contrast between subject and surrounding background
• 1/250 shutter speed, usually f16 with 1/250
• If you see detail it's not a sillouette
• Dark subject against light background
• Digital weakness: sun burst. Get subject to block the sun
• If you properly expose background, everything else falls into place
• Exercise: shoot the blue water with different aperture. Use shutter at least 1/125
• Be aware of your bubbles and make the current your friend. Make sure bubbles are behind you.

Wide Angle

• Definition: Strobe lit foreground plus blue water
• When ambient light is not a factor just use the formula GN/dist = f/stop
• Look at histogram, if off the chart ... bad
• Get on the sunny side of Mr. Big
• Fast shutter speed captures daffling light
• Shoot in the early morning or late afternoon, angle of the sun causes rays to be diminished

A little note from Marty himself:

Wed, 03 May 2006 06:45:14 -0700

Eddy-

Thank you for your note. Took a look at your web site. You have some nice material there. Hopefully next time we cross paths it will be on a boat in the middle of nowhere. In the meantime, good shooting!

Marty