I escaped the windy and rainy Netherlands to the sunny Mediterranean island of Malta, where I headed to Divewise to meet up with John Kendall, a GUE instructor with a passion for photogrammetry.  Photogrammetry is the practice of gathering information about objects using photographs and 3D modeling.  I spent the next five days practicing these skills with John, whose specialty is shipwreck photogrammetry.

We started out in the classroom by running through the basics of Agisoft, the software used to create the 3D models.  John taught me that the key to making models was 80% overlap between successive photos, which would allow the software to match up the images.  It is also important that the successive photos do not change angle too quickly or round corners too fast.  We made models of various items around the Divewise shop before heading underwater at the house reef.

What was relatively simple on land took on a different level of difficulty underwater.  Lots of practice led to a simple model of the seabed.  I spent the next few days practicing on the famous Maltese wrecks under John’s watchful eye, ultimately creating this model of the bow of the P29 wreck.

Learning photogrammetry skills was incredibly fun and challenging.  Thank you to John for hosting me, and thank you to Reef Photo & Video and Nauticam for providing the camera setup that I used on this experience!  Thank you also to Aqualung and SubGravity, as well as Rolex and OWUSS for this opportunity.  Scroll down to see some more photos from Malta…I’m off to China next!