Scuba Skills Tune-Up Event - May 16

--By Rachel Davis

Calling all ADA Members and Prospective Members! Save the date for Saturday, May 16th for the ADA Scuba Skills Tune-up Event.

This exciting event will generate awareness of ADA and encourage new members to join. ADA will reach out to the community and provide an opportunity for lapsed scuba divers to brush up on their skills in a relaxed, friendly environment. It will also provide an opportunity for prospective ADA members to meet and get acquainted with the membership, learn about our dive trips and join ADA! New this year – non-divers can Discover Scuba Diving in the pool and experience diving for the very first time.

Date: Saturday, May 16, 9am to 1pm

Location: A.D. Barnes Park Park Pool
3401 SW 72 Avenue
Miami, FL 33155
(305) 666-5883

Cost: Free to current paid-up ADA members; $25.00 one-day only membership promotion for certified divers wishing to join ADA at the event – offer available to new members only. Discover Scuba diving is $25.00 which includes a provisional ADA membership. Once you complete the open water course and become a certified diver, your ADA membership is free.

Events and Activities: Ongoing Scuba Tune-Up Clinics taught by Safety Officers and PADI-certified scuba instructors. Clinic topics include re-familiarization and assembly of scuba equipment, proper use of equipment, and refresh on the typical pool skills with scuba equipment taught in the Open Water course. Also covered will be safety topics, equipment, dive planning, underwater environment, computer use, etc. Note: This is not the official PADI scuba refresher course and participants do not receive any sort of certification for this event. Discover Scuba Diving is for non-divers to experience diving for the first time in the pool, limited to 8 participants.

Lunch: Poolside lunch served after the pool session compliments of ADA.

Equipment: Participants must bring their own scuba gear – mask, fins, snorkel, BC, regulator and weights. Each participant must also bring one filled air tank. Many local shops will rent the necessary equipment.

Volunteers Needed: If you would like to volunteer for the registration table, lunch setup, clean-up, or clinic instruction, please contact Rachel at rachelhancock7@gmail.com or call 786-316-9852.

Spread the Word and Bring Your Friends! We want to use this event to get in as many new members as possible so please spread the word and bring your friends. There will not be another opportunity to join ADA for just $25 for the rest of the year.

To RSVP or More Info: Contact Rachel Davis at rachelhancock7@gmail.com or call 786-316-9852.

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Be the First On Your Block....

.......to own the new Active Divers Association license plate frame, and the best part is it's FREE for the asking. A colorful red and white license plate frame with the ADA web address is available free to all ADA members. We will be distributing them at most ADA events. Each member is asked to install on your cars, and those of your friends and family. They need not be a member of ADA or even a diver. We hope to make our name more prominent around S. Florida, attract new members, and offer more new programs. Call Lon at 305-251-4975 if you need more frames.

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Active Divers Season Kickoff and Barbecue

--by Dan Baeza

Over 30 veteran and new Active Divers met on March 21st at John U Lloyd State Park Jetty Pavilion to enjoy tasty barbecue and beach diving for its annual Season Kickoff. Our own gourmet chef extraordinaire, Roy Wasson, prepared burgers, chicken, and his own secret chili recipe for the hungry crowd.

We also held our first annual Dive Gear Swap 'n' Shop. Divers brought their gently used dive gear including wet suits, accessories, and scuba-related paraphernalia and engaged in a lively sell and swap fest among their buddies. It was a great garage sale just for divers!

After everyone had their fill of eating and shopping, our guest speaker Amanda R. Costaregni of the Southeast Florida Coral Reef Initiative presented her research findings. Amanda showed how local residents and guests use the reefs in the southeast Florida region using a web-based interactive map. Hosted by the Southeast Florida Coral Reef Initiative (SEFCRI), this research brings together the community of local residents, reef users, business owners, visitors and the broader public in Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, and Martin counties. Based on the research, the SEFCRI develops management recommendations that can become part of a comprehensive management strategy to ensure healthy coral reefs in the future. (Mouse-over the photo at right to see Amanda lecturing the picnicers.)

Many thanks to all the volunteers who selflessly donated their time and talents to making the 2014 dive season a success. Our club exists for the sole purpose of serving its members. The hundreds of hours put in by our volunteers each year is the lifeblood that keeps our club vital. Pictured at left are some of our volunteers posing with their certificates of appreciation.

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Photography Part 3 - Choosing a Camera

--By Dan Baeza

The most perplexing activity for the intrepid photographer is not picking the right subject, but rather picking the right camera. For underwater photography, there are two classes of camera. The first class of camera is the land based device placed in an external underwater housing. The second class of camera has an integral housing. There are advantages and disadvantages to both.

Advantages of an external u/w housing:

• Easier to visually determine whether the housing is leaking
• Virtually any make and model of land camera may be operated in an underwater housing (although some lenses may not fit)

Advantages of an integral u/w housing:

• More compact
• Controls are easily accessible
• Possibility of changing lenses underwater
• Less costly

Once a decision about the type of housing is reached, we can enumerate the common features important to an underwater camera

Desired Features in an underwater camera:

• Pressure resistant, leak resistant, to at least 160 feet
• External viewfinder
• Wide angle lens (28 to 35mm)
• All external controls must be easily accessible
• Autofocus and/or easily accessible manual focus controls
• Auto exposure and/or easily accessible manual exposure controls
• Normal focus to 12 inches
• Macro focus to 1.5 inches (either built-in or interchangeable underwater lenses for normal and macro focus)
• Long battery life
• User-changeable battery
• Underwater color correction (either electronically or with a color-correcting filter)
• USB or wireless transfer port
• Capability to add an external light source and strobe trigger port
• Rapid recycling in photo mode
• HD video capability

There are several camera and camera housing combinations that have the features enumerated above. For example, the Sealife 1400 at $499 and the Intova HD Edge X at $299 cameras with integral housings and have these features. There are too many camera and housing configurations to list, but suffice to say, for enough money, virtually any camera can be placed in an external housing. For example, an underwater housing for a Nikon CoolPix S6300 will cost around $300, plus another $200 for the camera. A high-end SLR camera case can run as much as $1,800 plus the cost of the camera.Post-production software is an important part of the equation as well. At right, is a photo I recently took on a dive trip to Fiji. The phot was taken without a strobe using the Intova HD Edge X camera:

Notice how the photo detail is crisp but washed out, the colors flat and lifeless. Observe also how there is extraneous detail that is incidental and unimportant to the subject.

Now look at the photo below. The useless detail has been cropped, and the underlying colors have been enhanced:

We'll discuss the software end of photo and video photography in a future article. For now, just be aware that image enhancing software is an integral part of underwater photography.

Capturing photos is an exciting aspect and addition to the underwater world and one that will enhance your enjoyment of the sport. Even your mind's eye's most vivid memory pales and distorts compared to the simplest underwater photo you can ever record of the dive. Your photos create a diary that you can view and review, share, publish, and even validate what, when, and where the images you think you saw where actially seen.

Next month month we'll discuss natural lighting, strobes, and movie lights and how recorded images in the underwater environment are affected.

Scorpionfish

Florida's coral reefs are home to a fish that you don't want to mess with: scorpionfish. As a close relative of lionfish, they also have venomous spines that can inflict a painful wound. Scorpionfish (also referred to as stonefish in the Pacific) are bottom dwellers and like to hide in cracks and crevasses but are sometimes found in the open near a reef. They eat other fish by opening their large mouths and sucking in any smaller fish that happen by. Scorpionfish camouflage themselves by appearing to be part of the reef or looking like a rock on the bottom. They should not be provoked, stepped on or otherwise bothered to avoid receiving a painful sting from one of its dorsal spines.

Diving Writers (and Writing Divers) Wanted
--by Roy Wasson

Have you ever written a letter to a friend describing your favorite dive at a certain destination? Have you ever written complaint or a complement to a dive equipment manufacturer about something you liked or disliked about a piece of Scuba gear? At the very least, you may have jotted down a recipe for your favorite seafood dish, haven’t you?

All of us have probably expressed an interest in writing about our sport and hobby, but most of us do not have the opportunity to share that creative expression of writing to a large audience of underwater enthusiasts. Now, the opportunity to write articles for publication in the Active Divers Association’s newsletter, The Mouthpiece is available to our readers.

We are always on the lookout for fresh ideas and content for our monthly newsletter and social media publications, so send your submission for review by our editorial staff and you just may see your name in print. Whether you write about a dive you suggest the Club arrange, a sea creature you’ve encountered in the depths, a tip for making diving more enjoyable and safer, or any other topic of interest to our club, you can share your story with others.

Submit your articles to the WebMaster at dmbaeza@bellsouth.net. By submitting an article, you give us the non-exclusive right to edit and/or publish it in a future issue of our newsletter or social media. Be sure to include a phone number with your submittal so that we can contact you if we have questions.

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