What am I missing from an UW Photo Expedition?

Hello there,

I've never been on those planned UW Photo Expeditions or Holidays with other uw photographers so I don't know what I am missing.

But would like to know how is it different from your typical photo diving experience (i.e. drive to the beach or boat to a dive site, dive and take photos, go home).

Wanting to know what is it like? what activities you do during the trips? amenities typically provided? are there like workshops or sharing? during the dive planning are there photo specific briefs? Whats the diving like are you all together or spread across the reef? Are UW photographers typically friendly or serious? etc.

I usually plan and go to the same places they go to on my own. So I see their expedition boats pull up to these locations full of UW Photographers with trained staff helping them in and out of the water. So was wondering what am I missing and what are the added benefits I would get in joining these expeditions -- given that I am already able to go there on my own.

Thank you

Earlier this year, I went on one such trip organized by @alextyrrell, on The Smiling Seahorse liveaboard, run by Franck and @camille Fogarolo. Compared to my previous liveaboard trips, it was a different experience.

Regular liveaboard cruises tend to be structured in such a way that the divers cover as much ground as possible - you zip through a reef, come up, the boat goes to the next island over, and so on. Here we just parked at Richelieu Rock for two days straight, diving the same location, morning, day and dusk, catching different opportunities every time - like shooting little macro critters during the day, then swapping to wide-angle to catch the fish schools feeding before sunset. One the third day we went to Koh Bon and Koh Tachai, and on the last day, we dived Richelieu Rock again.

During the dives, the the overall dynamic also felt quite different - instead of a chain of divers following the guide, we tended to descend and spread out, each photographer doing their own thing more or less independently, having plenty of time to set up, frame, and take the shots that we wanted, coming together only to move between locations.

We also did two blackwater dives, which is not something that comes up often. In fact, I'm going again next week, on a blackwater-focused trip, where the schedule is to do two daytime dives and two blackwater dives per day, rather than the regular 3 daytime dives plus one sunset/night dive.

One potential downside is that with the multitude of large camera rigs onboard, rinse tank space is limited, but on the other hand, The Smiling Seahorse has the best camera room that I've encountered thus far on a liveaboard (granted, my experience is pretty limited), and it would stand to reason that photography-focused trips tend to gravitate towards appropriately equipped boats.

53 minutes ago, Barmaglot said:

Earlier this year, I went on one such trip organized by @alextyrrell, on The Smiling Seahorse liveaboard, run by Franck and @camille Fogarolo. Compared to my previous liveaboard trips, it was a different experience.

Regular liveaboard cruises tend to be structured in such a way that the divers cover as much ground as possible - you zip through a reef, come up, the boat goes to the next island over, and so on. Here we just parked at Richelieu Rock for two days straight, diving the same location, morning, day and dusk, catching different opportunities every time - like shooting little macro critters during the day, then swapping to wide-angle to catch the fish schools feeding before sunset. One the third day we went to Koh Bon and Koh Tachai, and on the last day, we dived Richelieu Rock again.

During the dives, the the overall dynamic also felt quite different - instead of a chain of divers following the guide, we tended to descend and spread out, each photographer doing their own thing more or less independently, having plenty of time to set up, frame, and take the shots that we wanted, coming together only to move between locations.

We also did two blackwater dives, which is not something that comes up often. In fact, I'm going again next week, on a blackwater-focused trip, where the schedule is to do two daytime dives and two blackwater dives per day, rather than the regular 3 daytime dives plus one sunset/night dive.

One potential downside is that with the multitude of large camera rigs onboard, rinse tank space is limited, but on the other hand, The Smiling Seahorse has the best camera room that I've encountered thus far on a liveaboard (granted, my experience is pretty limited), and it would stand to reason that photography-focused trips tend to gravitate towards appropriately equipped boats.

Thank you! I like what I am hearing about what happens on the dives, I typically linger on a dive site for typically 2 days as well. Day 1 is just taking photos and getting a feel for what happens on the reef throughout the day. So you see all the opportunities when and where the fish typically feed, what behaviors they do. Then on Day 2 you can sort of plan or anticipate what you'd specifically like to go back and capture. 

For the out of water stuff. Do they have like photo briefs before going down? Does the dive boat get very crowded and chaotic getting in and out of the boat? Do you guys socialize or do people share stuff, or is it more like everyone is too busy maintaining their gear and backing up images to bother talking with people? Or does it depend on the crowd? Was hoping to get learnings from others being on the expedition.

Photo briefs - some, yes, but most of the people on the trip I was on didn't need much in the way of hand-holding.

Crowded and chaotic - no more than usual, the groups were staggered in order to keep things orderly.

Socializing - I'd say about the usual for liveaboards, although I'm not particularly social myself, so I'm not really the right person to ask.

I should reiterate that this is based off me taking one photography liveaboard and three other 'normal' ones, so my experience is by no means extensive.

Read the fine print of the activities - liveaboards tend to cover more ground and perhaps have the experience you identify.  I've done land based trips for example to Diver's lodge Lembeh and that lodge has a one guide to 2 divers policy so there you follow the guide as he finds subjects - while you are shooting he moves off to find the next critter so you are not rushed.  You might have 2-3 groups of 2 people on each boat and you can target the critters that interest you. 

On that trip I also went to their lodge in Halmahera and that was a group of 3-4 per guide - they took you down to deeper sections of the wall and found a few interesting subjects then we slowly drifted up into the shallows to finish the dive on the reeftop again if you had enough in your group to fill the boat you would have a chance to ask for what you wanted otherwise you are probably stuck with their standard offering of a different reef each day.  So a lot will depend on if you have enough people to fill a boat of like minded people.  The other alternative is go somewhere with a house reef where you can do your own thing.

Depending on the location one thing you can count on is the divers on a photography trip will have better buoyance and will silt out the dive site A LOT LESS.  I really with I would have taken the photo of my last dive outing where a guy was literally sticking his whole fin under the sand to try to remain stable and never looked back to see me and the nudi I was trying to photograph covered in sand. needless to say the whole area was silted out and unusable.  It sucks when you try so hard to keep you area "clean" for your photos and then some jack-wagon comes through and dusts you out.