ricki
08-23-2011, 04:01 AM
http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/Ginnie_VR_s.sized.jpg (http://www.fksa.org/gallery/album606/Ginnie_VR_s?full=1)
CLICK image for full sized photo
Took the family up to cave country last month. It has been a very long time since I was last up that way! It was 4th of July weekend, HOT and so things were crowded at times. Still, I got to do some interesting free diving. Take it as given, free diving into any confined environment, particularly caves is a dangerous activity, it can readily kill you and is NOT recommended!
This is a video of free dives into Ginnie, Devils Eye and Little Devil Springs. Unfortunately, I think I mislabeled Little Devil as Devils Ear. I have some interesting video of what is Devils Ear but it didn't make it into this video. The opening still shot was from the first time I visited the spring in 1975. Ben Clarke took the shot of me with my Nikonos II and small Ikelight housed Vivitar strobe as I moved out of the orifice into the ballroom. I had crawled in against the strong outflow a short distance and thought I saw the light of a cave diving team coming out. It turned out to be my Fara-lite reflecting off a marble tombstone for a lost cave diver. There were lots of caving fatalities in those early days. I met a couple of NACD instructors at USF who elected not to make two separate dives. Guys died on those two dives tragically.
28048379
I have on my original USD diving vest and am trying to remember the regulator model. I think it was a Sportsway reg at any rate. It was a balanced diaphragm regulator as I had moved on from my first reg, an unbalanced piston, USD Aquarius. I was doing too much deep deco air diving in those years to try to tug on that design. I think the mask was a cat eye, can't say I ever really got use to it. It was low volume for the time though, like the USD Falco. I did like that mask except it turned to tar within a year.
I did take the Aquarius to 265 ft. on a black coral dive in Cozumel in 1973 but it had some breathing resistance. By coincidence Ben was on that trip as well. The Mexico trip was led by John Fletemeyer through Chuck Ciphery's Underseas Sports dive club in Ft. Lauderdale. I was using a steel 72 cft tank with my original flop all over diving harness in the photo above. Get that boy a diving backpack plate! Sometimes you stick with things simply because you don't know any better.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3219/2713389146_1100e3fce5.jpg http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/faralite_fara_lite_140.jpg http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/USD_harness.jpg
The Nikonos II, a great versatile camera a bit like the GoPro in that way. The Fara-Lite, miss that light. I took it into a lot of places, it worked well for the time. That is the pesky harness.
I think Jorge Ibizzari was along too. He was the guy who sold me the camera system, thanks Jorge! We were freshmen at USF and drove up to check the springs out. Today, there is a grate covering that entrance to the cave system. Tom Mount and Ike Ikehara installed on there in 1976 to try to cut down on cave diving fatalities. They were the UM diving officers at the time as I recall. This video represents the first time I had been back in 35 years!
A few things had changed in all that time. The site was on a farm during my first trip, there were dirt roads, no parking lot. The few people there just came and went. I didn't know about the other Devil's Springs, had no idea there were so close by. Today the place is a lot busier. Unlike the State Parks, alcohol consumption is allowed here making it a hit with youth. That and along with numerous river front camp sites makes this a crowded place on July 4th. The cave is about the same except for the grate. The tons of people swimming around, yelling made breathing up a little trickier. Free diving is all about relaxing, as much as you can achieve. They were running SCUBA diving lessons in the spring, that probably went on back in the day although I didn't see any during my two visits in the 1970's.
http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/1_GOPR1439.jpg
A shot from a couple of weeks ago of my normal rig out today.
I was in free diving gear in the video. I SCUBA dive rarely these days, preferring to free dive. I was carrying my normal complement of too many cameras including a GoPro in my hand in Eyeofmine.com housing and another in a chest mount in a Sartek.com housing and a Canon G12 shooting HD video in my other hand. I was trying out a Sartek EBL500LIV 500* lumen LED photo/video light for the first time. It is small, projects a 120 degree wide angle beam more appropriate for the wide angle GoPro cameras. At $250. it is a good tool to have along in dark settings. There is also some G12 video from Devil's Eye in the stock Canon housing. Next time I would probably leave the dive light and one GoPro on the surface given the lighting constraints in the cave and number of available hands. The chest mounted GoPro, video light and G12 would be enough in the cave. I do use the three cameras routinely in the open ocean where light is not as serious an issue. I was on an Apollo Evolution DPV for the Ginnie video using just fins in the other springs.
http://benlo.com/GoPro/hero-hd.jpg http://sarind.com/prodimages/EBL2200LIVSMALL_small.jpg
* http://sarind.com/proddetail.php?prod=EBL500LIV
That is the standard GoPro housing shown above. Although the housing is rated for service to 180 ft., the dome port isn't corrected for underwater use. It works great in air however. If you want to shoot images underwater you really need to get an after market "flat" lens port housing such as Sartek.com makes.
.
CLICK image for full sized photo
Took the family up to cave country last month. It has been a very long time since I was last up that way! It was 4th of July weekend, HOT and so things were crowded at times. Still, I got to do some interesting free diving. Take it as given, free diving into any confined environment, particularly caves is a dangerous activity, it can readily kill you and is NOT recommended!
This is a video of free dives into Ginnie, Devils Eye and Little Devil Springs. Unfortunately, I think I mislabeled Little Devil as Devils Ear. I have some interesting video of what is Devils Ear but it didn't make it into this video. The opening still shot was from the first time I visited the spring in 1975. Ben Clarke took the shot of me with my Nikonos II and small Ikelight housed Vivitar strobe as I moved out of the orifice into the ballroom. I had crawled in against the strong outflow a short distance and thought I saw the light of a cave diving team coming out. It turned out to be my Fara-lite reflecting off a marble tombstone for a lost cave diver. There were lots of caving fatalities in those early days. I met a couple of NACD instructors at USF who elected not to make two separate dives. Guys died on those two dives tragically.
28048379
I have on my original USD diving vest and am trying to remember the regulator model. I think it was a Sportsway reg at any rate. It was a balanced diaphragm regulator as I had moved on from my first reg, an unbalanced piston, USD Aquarius. I was doing too much deep deco air diving in those years to try to tug on that design. I think the mask was a cat eye, can't say I ever really got use to it. It was low volume for the time though, like the USD Falco. I did like that mask except it turned to tar within a year.
I did take the Aquarius to 265 ft. on a black coral dive in Cozumel in 1973 but it had some breathing resistance. By coincidence Ben was on that trip as well. The Mexico trip was led by John Fletemeyer through Chuck Ciphery's Underseas Sports dive club in Ft. Lauderdale. I was using a steel 72 cft tank with my original flop all over diving harness in the photo above. Get that boy a diving backpack plate! Sometimes you stick with things simply because you don't know any better.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3219/2713389146_1100e3fce5.jpg http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/faralite_fara_lite_140.jpg http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/USD_harness.jpg
The Nikonos II, a great versatile camera a bit like the GoPro in that way. The Fara-Lite, miss that light. I took it into a lot of places, it worked well for the time. That is the pesky harness.
I think Jorge Ibizzari was along too. He was the guy who sold me the camera system, thanks Jorge! We were freshmen at USF and drove up to check the springs out. Today, there is a grate covering that entrance to the cave system. Tom Mount and Ike Ikehara installed on there in 1976 to try to cut down on cave diving fatalities. They were the UM diving officers at the time as I recall. This video represents the first time I had been back in 35 years!
A few things had changed in all that time. The site was on a farm during my first trip, there were dirt roads, no parking lot. The few people there just came and went. I didn't know about the other Devil's Springs, had no idea there were so close by. Today the place is a lot busier. Unlike the State Parks, alcohol consumption is allowed here making it a hit with youth. That and along with numerous river front camp sites makes this a crowded place on July 4th. The cave is about the same except for the grate. The tons of people swimming around, yelling made breathing up a little trickier. Free diving is all about relaxing, as much as you can achieve. They were running SCUBA diving lessons in the spring, that probably went on back in the day although I didn't see any during my two visits in the 1970's.
http://www.fksa.org/albums/album606/1_GOPR1439.jpg
A shot from a couple of weeks ago of my normal rig out today.
I was in free diving gear in the video. I SCUBA dive rarely these days, preferring to free dive. I was carrying my normal complement of too many cameras including a GoPro in my hand in Eyeofmine.com housing and another in a chest mount in a Sartek.com housing and a Canon G12 shooting HD video in my other hand. I was trying out a Sartek EBL500LIV 500* lumen LED photo/video light for the first time. It is small, projects a 120 degree wide angle beam more appropriate for the wide angle GoPro cameras. At $250. it is a good tool to have along in dark settings. There is also some G12 video from Devil's Eye in the stock Canon housing. Next time I would probably leave the dive light and one GoPro on the surface given the lighting constraints in the cave and number of available hands. The chest mounted GoPro, video light and G12 would be enough in the cave. I do use the three cameras routinely in the open ocean where light is not as serious an issue. I was on an Apollo Evolution DPV for the Ginnie video using just fins in the other springs.
http://benlo.com/GoPro/hero-hd.jpg http://sarind.com/prodimages/EBL2200LIVSMALL_small.jpg
* http://sarind.com/proddetail.php?prod=EBL500LIV
That is the standard GoPro housing shown above. Although the housing is rated for service to 180 ft., the dome port isn't corrected for underwater use. It works great in air however. If you want to shoot images underwater you really need to get an after market "flat" lens port housing such as Sartek.com makes.
.