Fogging-Free Heroes

«Dry Suit» for my HD Heroes.

Lately, my GoPro HD Heroes have been massively plagued by fogging when filming under water. And this after years of fog-free operation – despite (or because) of the anti-fogging strips that GoPro sells.

While I could salvage most of my footage by declaring it to be a work of true art, I yet had to find a working solution. It seems that I was successful in keeping my Heros free of fogging...

IBAN Specialist

For quite some time I asked myself: what really differentiates the Ten-Star-Instructor from the diving plebs and instructor subworkers?

The IBAN expert: gets you high ranks.

Since a few days ago I now understand, thanks to a friend: it is the knowledge. Knowledge about numbers. But not arbitrary numbers, but only these numbers that matter: the IBANs of dive tricking organizations (for those in the U.S.: IBANs are an internationally agreed means of identifying bank accounts across national borders). So it is exactly this card that makes the difference. Only with it, you are a real master.

Oh, sweet irony: the idea for this particular specialty card was born of all places in Schwabach, a German town near Nuremberg, which is especially famous for its gold foils. Go figure...

Impressions: Happurger Baggersee 2014

The first dive for this new year 2014 was in a small quarry pond, Happurger Baggersee. And we could finally find and photograph one of the crabs rumor had for a long time already. Another pleasant experience was to dive into a swarm of small fish and enjoy all the glittering and sparkling of my dive lights getting reflected on the small bodies.

Out dive took 70 minutes, water temperature was 4°C: the perfect environmental conditions for wearing my trusty Dräger full face mask. By the way, it was my 85th dive with this fine mask. Fog-free view, comfortable breathing without biting into a mouth piece, warm head ... what else do you want?

Happurger Baggersee (BY/D), 70 mins at 4°C.

PS: Many thanks to Jörg Lucinski for the photos.

New Year's Eve Pikes 2013

The last beautiful and calm dive in 2013: the New Year's Eve pikes in Lake Murner See. Enjoy the nice impressions from the final dive (61 mins, 6°C)  of the year just bygone.

Murner New Year's Eve Pikes (view on YouTube)

This video shows that next to suitable and willing actors you cannot get away with the following two important indegrients for getting good shots: light and sight.

So when it comes to light: the money I spent on my two video lights Sola 2000F from Light & Motion was spent very well. Appearently these lights are quite an improvement for scene lighting. Even with the overcast sky the pike in their environment show fine colors. You know what? I rarely had so far so much fun grading the underwater raw footage ... because I mainly just had to adjust the contrast, while colors were already almost fine, apart from really small adjustments.

And Now For Something Completely Different: Speakers

The coins in the register ring ...
the fans to heaven they spring?

Imagine the fidelity of this miniature speaker: chrrrrrr ... hchchchchch ... chchchcrr...

Any attempt to return them is probably spoiled right from the beginning. Come one, you knew what disharmonic factor to expect, didn't you?!

Personally, I would rather opt for the Lord Dark Helmet merchandise instead, if at all.

There is one thing left that leaves me still puzzled: what are they pouring into their coffees over there at The T HQ? Maybe we can expect a new Espresso capsule series «Imperiale»?

Hero Under Water Basic Equipment

So what equipment does it need in addition to a GoPro HD Hero 3/3+ to shoot good videos below the water line? Apart from that it takes a different camera, that is? Of course, it depends: on your demands and standards. However, if you want more than just shooting some short and shaky fun clips à la smart phone quality: please read on for my highly subjective suggestions. From my own experience, these suggestions proved to be practical so far to improve my standards.

But of course, equipment is just one part of the overall equation. Without any skill, competence, and pain even the best equipment never cuts the mustard. But one step after the other...

Impression: Dive Vader and his Light Sabres

Poking the Pike Lightly (BY/D)

Axel again showed his clear eye and shot this funny photo in Friedberger See (a former dredging lake). It was a cloudy, overcast, dull, and cold day. In return, we were the only divers below the wakeboard complex ... and we saw fish, a lot of fish.

Much whiting, and that of course draws a bunch of pikes. There were almost fed up, hanging around motionless, barely taking any notice of us divers. The land of plenty for them, it seems.

Here, I've discovered a tiny pike, just from this year. It tries to not move at all, lurking at the rim of some sea plants, waiting for prey. And it probably hopes that Dive Vader won't grill him with his laser swords...

Hero Protection

In some situations it is impossible use its protective case when shooting footage with your GoPro HD Hero 3. For instance, when I'm filming aerial videos using my DJI Phantom Quadcopter I need to directly mount the cam into the Zenmuse H3-2D gimbal for weight reasons. Unfortunately, dirt and dust stirred up by the propellers' air blast may some day cause scratches on the lens.

Fortunately, GoPro finally took notice of this problem and now offers remedy...

Hero Lights: Light and Motion Sola Video 2000F LED Lamps

Neufelder See (LA/Ö).

When filming under water a well-proven rule of thumb applies in many situations: you need a lot of light to get good footage. Without light you quickly hit unpleasant limits and all you get are grainy shots in dull colors.

However, the wide field of view a GoPro HD Hero 3 cam has to offer isn't exactly easy to illuminate: your lights should feature evenly distributed light cones and yet still cover a significant area, and all this without bright spots. Otherwise you will get the desired bright colors only in a small spot and everything else drowns in darkness and flat colors.

After my previous LED dive and video light had bugged me long enough, I finally made up my mind and invested in decent video LED light: I allowed myself two Sola Video 2000F's by Light and Motion which give real good light. Luckily, they arrived in time to give them a first try in Neufelder See, just at the gates of Vienna...

Big Frame Hunter

Ready to Shoot: The Big Frame Hunter.

Don't get bogged down by these tiny little critters: think big ... think big game hunter. You got the cam, we've got the specialty.

Correct Sidemount!

Make sure your bottles contain only the best stuff...

It was surely about time: the one and only true sidemount specialist training. Deep down you simply want the best ... stuff in your bottles, that is.

PS: Many thanks to Axel for this shot he made in Neufelder See near Vienna.

Evening Gold & Hero Red: Protune Grading

Burg Thann, Nuremberg county. (BY/D)

This time in my series «one video lies more than a thousand words» I'm showing how to carefully emphasize an evening mood in Protune footage. This gives, for instance, castle Burg Thann more atmosphere.

Without further manual grading, Protune footage may appear rather very neutral and even appear to be slightly cold. But adding some nice touch to your footage is really easy. Just take Kdenlive, no need for any professionals' tools or similar marketing balderdash...

Kdenlive Video: Color Grading Protune Footage

Following my motto «a picture lies more than a thousand words» I produced a short video tutorial: color grading Protune footage. I'm demonstrating my technique on a short but vivid autumn scene. My goal is to achieve almost the same result as if filmed without Protune and thus with the camera-integrated automatic image processing.

While working on the specific video effect set to reproduce the genuine GoPro video look I noticed something interesting going on color-wise inside these cams...

Castle Burg Thann

Nuremburg county is rich of relicts from our ancestors. This is giving the landscape its flair. After my friend Wolfgang had infested me to film in somehow ruined locations I had to throw up my little cam copter into late Autumn air...

Kdenlive Effect: Protune

In my article Grading of Hero 3 (Above Waterline) Footage I've shown how to create a new effect template in Kdenlive for uncompressing the tonal curve of Protune raw footage. This effect is really useful for working with Hero 3 video footage.

You can also directly create the effect outside of Kdenlive without fiddling around with the curve handles...