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Extraordinary underwater living project re-visited

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Bournemouth and Poole Sub Aqua Club in the UK celebrated their 60th anniversary by recounting the inspirational story of a former member who made history by living underwater for an entire week.

Back in September 1965, Colin Irwin, who was then aged 19 and science officer for the club, spent seven days on the seabed of Plymouth Sound in a specially made steel cylinder to investigate long-term survival in an underwater habitat.

The Glaucus Project – named after a Greek sea god – was a tremendous success and still has its place in the Guinness Book of Records.

Colin gave a gripping account of his adventure to members of the club when they gathered to mark its 60th anniversary at a special event in the Harbour View Suite of the RNLI College in Poole on Saturday 29th March.

Inspired by similar experiments carried out in the early 1960s by legendary French diver Jacques Cousteau, he decided to set up a project to put an undersea habitat in place and occupy it for a week along with fellow club member John Heath, then 21.

Adrian King, who has been a member of the club since 1976 and served as its chairman for the past six years, said: “Even by modern standards this was a hugely ambitious project which at the time – and indeed since – had only been attempted by a few majorly funded operations such as Jacques Cousteau and the likes of the America Sea Lab.

“A sub-committee was formed to raise the £1,000 needed to finance the project. The father of one of the members owned a local boatyard and they built the steel cylinder for the project from scratch. Weighing two tons, it was 3 .7 metres long and 2.1 metres in diameter, standing on legs and ballasted by weight in a tray beneath it.

“Entry was made via a tube on the underside which was open to the water. Pressure inside would therefore be the same as the surrounding water, resulting in the divers being at pressure for the duration of the project.

“The main cylinder was equipped with two compartments, a main living area and a separate toilet compartment.

“The two young men kept in touch with the surface via an old ex-army wind up telephone and there was also a small CCTV camera to allow the condition of the crew to be monitored constantly from above.

“The cylinder was towed into place by a tug then lowered 35 feet or 11 metres to the seabed near the Breakwater Fort and marked by a buoy on the surface.”

Adrian added: “Where this one differed significantly from the Cousteau and American experiments was that the Glaucus Project cylinder was not linked to the surface by an airline but had its own artificially maintained air environment with a chemical `scrubber’ to remove the carbon dioxide.

“It was for this reason and the length of time the two men spent underwater that Glaucus still has a place in the Guinness Book of Records.

“The cylinder was far from comfortable to be in with the temperature being about 16 degrees. In addition the near 100% humidity caused by the open entrance meant that condensation was colossal and keeping anything dry became almost impossible. Food and drinks were sent down to them in army field pressure cookers.

“Despite these difficult conditions Colin and John continued with the project and even ventured from the cylinder into the surrounding waters to conduct a number of surveys aimed at proving the ability of divers to both live and work at depth.”

At the end of seven days, attempts to slowly bring the cylinder to the surface were abandoned due to buoyancy problems and the two crew members eventually made their way to the surface wearing scuba gear.

Colin Irwin, who now lives in the Liverpool area, has enjoyed a varied life of adventure including working for National Geographic magazine and sailing on a yacht through the North West Passage of Canada.

Now aged 68, he is a Research Fellow in the Department of Politics at the University of Liverpool and in the Institute of Governance at Queen’s University Belfast.

Colin said: “Although it was nearly 50 years ago I still clearly remember the time John and I spent down in the cylinder. In fact, I still have the daily log for the project.

“We had heard about the Cousteau experiments and didn’t want it to be something that was just done by the French, so we thought we would do our own experiment.

“What I recall most about our time in the cylinder is that it was very cold and damp. However, we did have our food sent down in an army thermos.

“After we had been down there for a couple of days a really ferocious gale blew up on the surface but luckily it didn’t affect us too much and the project was able to continue.

“John and I did some experiments in artificial atmosphere while we were down there. We raised the oxygen level to a point where we wouldn’t get the `bends’ when we came up and I think this must have worked because we didn’t get them.”

The Glaucus cylinder is still underwater not far from its original site. It is dived regularly and the club now has a project to fix a plaque to the structure marking the achievement of 49 years ago.

To find out more about the Bournemouth and Poole SAC, click here.

 

Source: www.bsac.com

News

Excerpts from Jeff Goodman’s Book Action Camera Underwater Video Basics, Part 1 of 6: Choosing a Camera

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Unlike DSLR or dedicated video models, action cameras are far easier to choose and understand. One of the joys of these small devices is that they can produce excellent quality results in their full auto mode even if you have no prior knowledge about video or photography. Other than the positioning or mounting of the camera there seems to be very little else for you to do except press ‘record’ and sooner or later ‘stop.’ However, this does put the camera and the technicians who created it in full control of how it shoots the scene or action that you are filming. the camera is making the decisions for you. this can work pretty well, but does not always produce the best possible results. these cameras are remarkably clever, but alas not intelligent enough to know what it is exactly you are trying to achieve. So with just a little extra knowledge you will be able to choose the right gear, take control of the settings and create video and photos much more to your own design.

A very basic rule is that you get what you pay for. So the more expensive the camera then the more options and add-ons you would expect to be available. At the time of writing, top-of-the-line cameras can cost upwards of £300 (roughly $400) whereas a lower end model may come in at £20–100 ($25–130) and do the required job reasonably well. Let’s look at the basic requirements and discuss additional features which will make your video life far easier and more rewarding.

They will also govern the overall quality of your video. If you don’t already have a camera these are some of the optimal things to look for.

Screen

Most action cameras have a screen so you can see exactly what you are filming. Some do not. As we look to move forward from the basic point-and-shoot way of using action cameras, a screen becomes important. It gives you certainty that all the action is happening within your frame and you are not clipping off anything important. A screen will also show you how your lighting looks. this is especially important when mixing an artificial video light with ambient natural light.

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If you have a camera without any sort of screen, I recommend practice and experimentation to get to know exactly what angle your lens covers at any given distance from a subject. Take a shot on land and when you play it back on an independent screen look carefully and note how much of the picture you thought you were taking is actually in frame. Try this for distance shots as well as close-ups.

Depending on what kind of optics your camera has, you will find that underwater the angle of coverage decreases by around one quarter. this is also affected by any additional lens you attach to the outside of your housing — see ‘Accessories: Lenses’ later in this chapter.

Depth rating and construction

Not all action cameras on the market are suitable for diving. Some are only designed to be water resistant, which is good for surface sports such as skiing, cycling or canoeing. Others are fully waterproof but only down to a depth of ten metres, which is good for snorkelling or surfing. For example, the GoPro or the Insta 360.

Be sure you pick a camera (or camera and housing) that has a depth rating suitable for your diving intentions. Most housings are guaranteed down to depths of 30m (100ft) or more, but do be sure and stick to the manufacturer’s recommendation.

Before buying, take a good look at how the housing seals are made and function. Are the closing clips flimsy, or substantial and well-made?  The same question should be asked of the hinges.

Resolution and quality

Many cameras offer video resolution of 720p or 1080p. Most also do 2K and 4K. Starting at the lower end, 720p is ‘High-Definition’ (HD), but is only half the resolution of ‘Full HD’ 1080p. This means 1080p has twice as much image detail and produces images that are twice as large in terms of overall pixel count. However, 1080p also takes up twice as much storage space on your memory card. There then follows the issue of having enough computing power to play back the larger resolution files. This especially applies when filming 4K, which has four times the resolution of 1080p. Although you should be able to play these very ‘high-res’ video files on your TV through your camera, it is not guaranteed that your edit computer will have enough processing power to play the files smoothly.

This becomes particularly noticeable when trying to edit and add effects.

720p has 1,280 pixels displayed across the screen horizontally and 720 pixels down the screen vertically. this gives us 720 horizontal lines on the screen. Before HD came in the normal resolution was 480p, standard definition (SD). SD is now seen as very poor quality.

For most people 720p produces a very high quality image and is excellent for editing and posting e.g. on YouTube. If you are able to process and edit 1080p and have a good speed on your internet, then this is the best option for even greater quality. If you are able to process and edit 2K and 4K then the world is your oyster. In short, film at a resolution that you can edit. Do a test. Film something at 2K then try to play and edit it on your computer. If it works well without any pixelation, breaking up or freezing of the image then try 4K. If the 2K doesn’t work then go lower, try 1080p and so on.

However, although 720p is usable at the time of writing this book, technology moves so fast that it is probable this resolution will no longer be used in the near future and be fully replaced by the higher alternatives.

It is possible to edit 2K and 4K on low specification or old computers by using proxy files and online editing. This copies video files to a lower resolution which your edit software and computer can deal with. then before exporting the final edited sequence or film the proxy files are replaced with the original full resolution versions. But this is for those who are experienced with editing software and is beyond the purposes of this book.

An alternative solution is to film everything in the best possible resolution and archive those files for future use. Meanwhile, convert the files you want to edit now into low resolution copies with video converter software. Free versions can be accessed on the web, for example Any Video Converter and Freemake Video Converter.

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When shooting at higher resolutions, the image size can be expanded or increased in the edit without too much noticeable loss of quality. This is particularly useful in re-framing your image or taking part of it to use as a close-up. Somewhere between 25–40% is usually as far as you can go before quality loss starts to become noticeable, but this does depend on the overall standard of the original frame where sharpness, contrast and image density are all factors. Higher resolution images are also better for extracting single frames to print out as photos or to use in publications.

NEXT WEEK:

Part 2 of 6 – Underwater Lighting

Action Camera Underwater Video Basics by Jeff Goodman is available now from DIVEDUP Publications:
https://www.divedup.com/shop/action-camera-underwater-video-basics-the-essential-guide-to-making-underwater-films/

About Jeff Goodman

action camera

Jeff is a multiple award-winning freelance TV cameraman/filmmaker and author. Having made both terrestrial and marine films, it is the world’s oceans and their conservation that hold his passion, with over 10,000 dives in his career. Having filmed for international television companies around the world and as author of two books on underwater filming, Jeff is Author/Programme Specialist for the Underwater Action Camera course for the RAID training agency.

Jeff has experienced the rapid advances in technology for diving as well as camera equipment, and has also experienced much of our planet’s marine life. He has witnessed, first-hand, many of the changes that have occurred to the wildlife and environment during that time.

Jeff runs bespoke underwater video and editing workshops for the complete beginner up to the budding professional.

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Gear Reviews

Gear Review: Zeagle Covert XT BCD (Watch Video)

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In a video created exclusively for Scubaverse.com, Jeff Goodman reviews the Covert XT BCD from Zeagle.

Find out more abut Zeagle products at www.zeagle.com.

Sea & Sea is the home of Zeagle and other leading diving brands in the UK.

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