When watching underwater films it’s easy to be swept up into the amazing beauty of the images on the screen. I am not sure I ever fully appreciated the expertise of the world’s best professionals whose craft and skill bring us these images. Truth is, every bit of it is way harder than it looks! Compose the shot. Pick your shot. Buoyancy with your camera. Cooperative subject. Buoyancy with your camera. Lighting or no. Buoyancy with your camera. Correct light. Holding still while swimming. Shoot, shoot, change!  I’m excited to start watching TV with the sound off simply to watch the masters at work. Yet, everyone has to start somewhere.

The last several days I’ve been learning to shoot underwater video hosted by cinematographer and Women’s Diver Hall of Fame inductee Annie Crawley. Annie has great energy and a huge variety of experience. As I’m completely green to shooting video, we had so much to talk about! The Pacific Northwest is an amazingly beautiful area and warm sunshine with great sunsets made for a perfect start to my 25th year. Thank you to Annie and Terry Keffler for taking me out for a delicious birthday dinner. A huge thank you from this experience goes to Underwater Sports Seattle  for supporting my diving. Their excellent staff gave me a fantastic drysuit refresher for my new TLS 350 suit from DUI. I enjoyed bobbing around in the Underwater Sports pool learning with my camera and getting the hang of all my new Aqualung gear. If you’re ever in the Pacific Northwest, you must get out for a dive with Underwater Sports and meet all the helpful folks working at any of their six locations.

This trip was also my reunion with cold water! After a three year break in Hawaii, I was excited to be back in the Puget Sound where I had trained for many of my certifications. The dive community of Edmonds, Washington has built the Bruce Higgins Underwater Park. a grid of led-lines and sunken features which draws divers from all around the country. The site is huge with tons to discover and its long history makes it home to tons of marine life. There are huge Pacific anemones, bundles of tube worms, lingcod hiding in eelgrass beds and huge bug-eyed cabazon fish guarding broods of eggs. I met the park’s namesake Mr. Bruce Higgins down at the dive site and got to learn more about how divers (all volunteers) have safely moved huge metal beams and concrete features throughout the park. I wish I had the dive time to explore the whole park. Thank you to Fourth Element for keeping me completely cozy in the 51 degree water layered in my Arctic and Endotherm undergarments. I was really happy that my body temperature was not even on my mind as I worked to master the video housing.  The unseasonably warm weather has caused an algae bloom in the Sound bringing diving visibility down to 2 or 3 feet. Not to be deterred, poor visibility just reinforced the number one rule of shooting video- get closer! When you think you’re close, get closer. Then get closer again!

In addition to shooting in the field Annie ran a tips and theory session on video basics as well as shared experiences from her own development and business creation. Her company Dive Into Your Imagination, is creating educational guides for K-3 teachers and classrooms promoting ocean literacy in our next generation.  This work struck close to home for me, as it was my first grade teacher whose inspired teaching sparked my ocean interest. All these years later I can specifically thank Mrs. Teri Doell for putting me on the path that brought me to this career and to the OW-USS Scholarship. It’s my hope that every kid around the nation would have the wonder of the ocean and a set of these materials in their classroom. I am definitely going to make sure my 1st grade stomping grounds, Pioneer Elementary, gets a copy!

I learned so much this trip and perhaps most importantly recognized the amount of talent and practice it takes to be one of the best.  I’m looking forward to shooting on new projects, building skills and learn LOTS from hosts and experiences. Thanks for joining me on this 2012 North American Rolex Scholar adventure! I would love to hear from you on Facebook or follow me on Twitter @MeganCook33 or comment of the blogs below. Best fishes and happy bubbling!

Here’s my very first underwater video!  Please disregard that there’s no sound. 🙂 This early in the scholarship year I’m still working out some software availability issues.