Last weekend was my first trip to the Poling in 2014. Originally I had hoped to create some compositions from a series of photos taken along the deck. In water, I ultimately ditched those plans because of some logistical issues. First being that there were 13 divers in the water and visibility was not great. Also, I was working much harder than I like to underwater, possibly due to the amount of donuts I ate earlier in the week. I made the decision to hang by the stern (stern of the stern) and work on some natural light photos. 

I was very pleased to recreate Dave Stillman's iconic stern photo, almost 20 years later (shown above). Surface interval be damned, Chuck and I jumped in for a second dive before the rest of the gang arrived. I had a a few minutes to set up this shot. With some Lightroom magic I was able to buy myself a bit more visibility than there was in real life. I've been trying to get this shot for a while now.

No matter how many times I see the poling, I can always seem to entertain myself. And for the photo buffs... black and white is almost essential to capture the depth and contrast of the wrecks in New England. These were shot with a 15mm prime lens, f2.8, 1/100, ISO 4000ish. As always, a million thanks to the Cape Ann Divers crew, I could not get these shots without their help!

We dove this weekend on the wreck of the Pug, a first for me. I'm fairly certain the linked info is the correct site, but there does seem to be some confusion over the name.
The weather was beautiful and Virgil sent us off in good spirits. Pug's fairly deep, about 130' in the sand. It's also a clean and simple wreck. It rests upright and there are a few places to peek in at the guts of the wreck 

The deck of the wreck sits at 115' and we burned through our 10 minutes of bottom time before we knew it. I only explored the immediate area around the mooring line as I was mostly fiddling with my camera, but here are some shots of the site. 

After the Pug, we steamed to Halfway Rock. Weather was on our side and we were able to anchor on the sheer wall of the rock. The wall is great because virtually no swimming is required, just sink and ascend, my type of dive!

That's that...I'll try to keep you all posted.

I'm pleased to announce that we will be presenting some photography as well as the latest episode of Green Diver at the Boston SCUBA show on Saturday, February 23rd! The show runs from 10am-3pm at the Marlboro Holiday Inn, Marlboro, MA. Tickets are $20 at the door. There will be several speakers and presenters during the day including Fred Calhoun, Matt Marcoux, Janet MacCausland, Deb Greenhalgh, LeRoy French and more. Hope to see you there!