The Dawning of the Day

This snippet of news was kindly donated by the wee blonde fella. It turns out that Google have updated their SEA view again, this time with the wreck of the Mary Celeste in Bermuda, so if you can't make it to Bermuda for a dive on it, you can take a virtual tour online.

Link: HERE

"Google has mapped the wreck of paddle steamer the Mary Celeste, which sank in 1864 and sparked a maritime mystery. The wreck was catalogued as part of Google Street View using images from the Catlin Seaview Survey and allows computer users to browse the remains of the ship without getting wet. The ruined vessel rests some 55 feet below the waves off the coast of Bermuda complete with one of its huge wheels."

The Maid of Amsterdam

Ok, so it's not quite the same as direct contact with the water but you got to admit that it looks pretty damned fun! The video footage of the whales and whale song is pretty amazing too. One more thing to add to the christmas list........

"DeepFlight Super Falcon, a $1.7m personal submarine that is hand built by Hawkes Ocean Technologies. Of course, it looks like it comes from a sci-fi or spy movie because Graham Hawkes, the designer of the Super Falcon, has made submersibles for films like For Your Eyes Only and Aliens of the Deep."

"With an obscene number of  GoPro cameras and some hydrophones, Hawkes and his co-pilot Lee Behel decided to dive off the coast of Hawaii in an attempt to capture a whale song. The DeepFlight Super Falcon is capable of dropping to almost 400ft and the battery powered electric engine can move it around at 2-6 knots (up to 6.9mph)."

Link: HERE

Tickle-me-shark

I want one of these for christmas. Way better than a cat or a dog........

If your browser doesn't support video playback, you can also see it: HERE

Kiss that frog

Well another photo makes it into the local rag again as photograph of the week. Must be a slow week...........

Some day my prince will come

So my former colleagues at Sony have finally (officially) announced the A7 and A7r this morning and what a corking pair of cameras they are as well. A lot of the features we knew of but they kept us guessing as to the final shape of the body right until the end.

Link: HERE

With 24MP and PDAF on the A7, 36MP on the A7R and weather sealing on both, they are just some of the wonderful new goodies Sony has brought to the table as well as allowing for native E mount usage as well as the new FE standard for the bodies not to mention A mount support through adapter as well as every other manufacturers lenses through adapter as well. This on top of the announced 15 new FE lenses to be released over the months.

It just doesn't get much better. Or does it? I've no doubt Nauticam will have a housing ready to go for these bad boys in no time. Get ready for some FF shots in the near future........

Snowblind

The viz was shockingly bad today (as you can see from the pics) but undeterred, we made a bid for the main wall and were instantly greeted by huge shoals of jacks, snappers, sweetlips and groupers. The snappers were particularly frisky today with constant nudges and bumps and continuously wanting attention. It's like having a wife!!

Demanding constant attention......and the snapper!

The current wasn't too bad at all despite a 9 knot NE blowing a the surface and a change in tide so it was nice just to hang out in the blue and admire the scenery for a bit.

There a were a few nice little stingrays with escort mooching around in the sand as we headed back in to shore, unfortunately there were proving to be a little camera shy today. Obviously don't like to be watched whilst they eat.......

We had a short wait whilst the sun melted over the horizon and crowds of tourists dispersed before we got back in to see what we could see. Almost straight away Jill caught sight of nice big eagle ray cruising over the hardpan at about 5 metres.

As soon as we illuminated it, it done a nice little vertical loop for us and swam off into the depths. No shots I'm afraid, too dark, crap viz and macro lens just aren't conducive to good photos.

There were some extremely nice nudis out tonight with a frightening number of fringe backs all precariously perched on coral and algae. Maybe they were chased up there by sea dogs or something........

"How did I get up here?"

Still, despite the acrobatic antics of the nudis, there were a few yellow spotted rays cruising around for a midnight snack before bed time whilst the peacock flounders where content to park their flat backsides and watch the reef go by.

Yellow spotted ray needs food, badly

"What, you want me to move around for the camera? No"

Oh, and did I mention fringebacks doing a balancing trick? The lettuce leaf slugs were in on the act as well. There must definitely be something in the water..........

"alley-oop!"

And to round off the evenings festivities, we had an unexpected guest in the shampe of a stone fish parked right underneath the jetty, just happy to sit there and mind it's own business. It was probably trying to figure out why all the nudis were so afraid of being on the ground............

Pondering the innate abilities of climbing nudibranchs