Burn test

Even with two TillyTec LED 2000 light-heads connected, it looks like I can still get more than two hours out of my TT 3 battery-pack, though not quite at 100% towards the end. I actually just turned off the lights after 130' in order not to deep-drain and possibly damage the battery.

	Flexi II	TT 3
2x LED 2000	-NA-	>100'

LED it shine

TillyTec's fairly unique offer to upgrade almost any of its light-heads or battery-packs to a newer more powerful one is quite a clever business proposal and in my case an irresistible temptation deal.

I seriously considered upgrading both my HID 35 & LED 1000 to a LED 2000 SPOT & VIDEO resp., as suggested by Tilly at Boot 2010. Besides 50% more output, this new combination would not only improve my technical setup as needed for cave dives but also result in a better video lighting solution, the latter being my main reason to upgrade.

Better but not quite optimal yet. Which is why I chose to keep my LED 1000 both for recreational & technical diving purposes and only exchange my outdated-technology HID 35, not just for one, but for two LED 2000 VIDEO heads, i.e. one as upgrade and one new.

Thereby gaining a dedicated dual video lighting solution that, at least on paper, should provide well-balanced hotspot-free illumination. My only slight concern being whether twice 175W of halogen equivalent 110° diffused output will indeed be bright enough for my needs...

As I have no cave diving scheduled yet for the near future, I refrained from: (1) swapping my primary LED 1000 for a LED 2000 SPOT, (2) upgrading my backup LED W30 to a W40 and (3) getting a new second backup. Preferring to wait for the LED 3000 to come out this summer and see whether maybe a W50 comes out later this year, before already gearing up once again for another trip to Mexico.

However... TillyTec's LED 2000 VIDEO are currently on back-order and me having a recreational dive trip coming up soon, I was sent only one LED 2000 VIDEO and one LED 2000 SPOT with diffuser in stead.

While not quite what I'd finally decided upon after long deliberation, at least I'll have the chance to try out both versions of the LED 2000 with the option to keep or exchange which ever one I please later on.

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UPDATE: Sent back my LED 2000 SPOT last week in exchange for a second LED 2000 VIDEO as originally requested and got it promptly delivered today, no questions asked.

I did not get to test the LED 2000 SPOT as a focus light, but for my videography purposes, it has too much of an hotspot, especially at close range, even with diffuser. The LED 2000 VIDEO on the other hand is just perfect for my needs, without any noticeable hotspot.

→ close-up videography of critters illuminated by one LED 2000 VIDEO

Olympus PEN E-PL1

Olympus just announced an new µ4:3 system camera: the PEN E-PL1, together with a polycarbonate housing rated to -40m, making this its first MFT model worth considering (housed set for about 1250€ RRP).

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UPDATE: Onderwaterhuis.nl has a pretty good deal for only 999€, incl. PEN E-PL1 camera with standard 14-42mm zoom and PT-EP01 housing with flat-port & PPZR-EP1 zoom ring. And, for those like me who'd rather take down Olympus' M.Zuiko Digital ED 9-18mm F4-5.6 zoom, Zen Underwater has made a wide-angle befitting dome-port for 490€.


Note that though the PT-EP01 housing officially has a fixed flat port, it can be replaced fairly easily, as demonstrated by Zen Underwater and soon also by Athena, with several ports for various MFT lenses.

boot 2010: TillyTec

There's nothing like seeing and handling things one-self, so once again I pilgrimed to the huge boot fair in Düsseldorf. Primary target this year being TillyTec's LED 2000 and newly announced LED 3000 heads.

The standard LED 2000 has a 175W halogen equivalent 10° beam ideal for tec diving. Of particular interest for me though is the non-focussed version with a more diffused 110° wide beam meant for videography.

So now I'm seriously considering upgrading both my HID 35 and LED 1000, to resp. a LED 2000 SPOT (with additional pop-on diffuser) and LED 2000 VIDEO, as suggested by Tilly.


Whereas the LED 2000 has seven LEDs, the LED 3000 will use only one super-power LED with 250W halogen equivalent output! Plenty of light indeed, but alas way too focussed for use as video light.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1

Still on the lookout for a new underwater photo & video solution, there's currently only one option that kind of fulfills my handful of requirements without costing a fortune: Panasonic's µ4:3 Lumix DMC-GF1 in a 10Bar housing rated to -60m (housed set for 1490€).


Micro-Four-Thirds system cameras have interchangeable lenses and relatively large sensors in fairly compact mirror-less bodies. That is, near DSLR image quality and HD video in a relatively small casing.

So far however, only Panasonic & Olympus have presented µ4:3 cameras & lenses. Meaning the selection's still rather limited, though slowly expanding and quite promising.


Most importantly, several third party manufacturers have already started developing housings, e.g. 10Bar, Athena, Nautilus & Seatool.

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UPDATE: Inon's X-2 housing can now also waterproof the GF1 to -75m.

TillyTec demos

Being pretty happy with my TillyTec lights, I gladly obliged when Tilly asked whether I could make some clips showing his lights in action.

The main demo, featuring TillyTec's HID 35 & LED 1000 and starring yours truly, has been on YouTube for about a week now and as of today you can also watch it on TillyTec's own website!

More specifically, the diver being filmed (a.k.a. yours truly) is using a TillyTec HID 35 with flood reflector, and the cameraman (a.k.a. Miguel) is using a TillyTec LED 1000 with diffuser. Whereas a bright focussed beam is better for long-range illumination and signaling, for videography a wider softer beam is preferred in order to avoid any hotspots, which is why both a flood reflector and diffuser were used.

Note that ideally the cameraman would have two bright lights (of at least 100W halogen equivalent), both fitted with flood reflector and diffuser, and the diver being filmed would have one powerful light (of more than 100W halogen equivalent) with or without flood reflector depending on the scene to be recorded.

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Embedded here is a 30" demo of TillyTec's LED W30 back-up light:

Feedback wanted!

Read this blog? Saw the videos on YouTube? Watched the DVD? If so, I'd really like to get some feedback, preferably in your native tongue, as long as it's positively formulated in a language I understand :o)

Videoclips: Into Darkness

Both my pseudo documentaries being way too large to be released online, and world-wide DVD distribution being beyond my limited means, I chopped down the two main features into YouTube sized videos for instant viewing anytime anywhere:

— Part 1 : Cave Diving
— Part 2 : Underwater Speleology

UPDATE: Both videoclips were removed from YouTube due to possible soundtrack copyright issues (even though I purchased the songs).

Director's cut

Done! My first movie project is at last ready to be released for viewing by a selected few, that is, the first DVDs await distribution :o)

It sure took a while, but after nearly six weeks of editing, I finally got two cave diving documentaries strung together, as well as some extra videos, good for about 70' of wonderful submersion into darkness.

Into Darkness
•• Part 1 : Cave Diving (±35')
•• Part 2 : Underwater Speleology (±21')

Extras
•• Dos Pisos - A Walk In The Park (±4')
•• Temple of Doom - The Downfall (±33")
•• Cenotes - Another Look (±9')

For the record: Together, these five MPEG4 source videos only take up about 1.5GB, however, after having been processed & encoded by iDVD, they just barely fit onto a 4.7GB DVD?

Soundtrack

Got the first of two documentaries clipped together, with titles, soundtrack and credits, good for nearly 35' of infotainment!

To set the mood, I've chosen popular Mexican bolero-ranchera songs by Javier Solís and ancient Mayan music by Xavier Quijas Yxayotl.


For the record: Generating the actual documentary from my 24MB iMovie project took nearly one hour, resulting in a MPEG4 video file of 720MB with an interpolated resolution of 720x540 pixels.

Underground movies

So far, selecting the best takes from more than a dozen shootings in various cenotes, I've lined up a 38' sequence of otherworldly scenes for the first of two documentaries, showing what cave diving around Tulum looks like. Again, this being just a quick draft, some serious post editing is still needed, besides getting the sound on track.


As I only started to get a clumsy feeling for underwater videography after my high resolution camcorder flooded, most of my best footage was shot in low resolution with my three year old back-up camera. Meaning the two underground movies I intend to produce will be rather grainy. For a more detailed feel, I plan to release a separate wanna B movie clipped together from some of my initial shootings.

Wanna B movie

After sifting through several gigabytes of raw material various times, discarding useless footage and marking some of the better sequences, I've now roughly cut & pasted a pseudo-high-res wanna B movie of 12', which of course still needs reviewing, remixing and trimming, not to mention an appropriately dark soundtrack, before being released.

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UPDATE: Re-cut some of my cave diving footage for public viewing:

→ Cave diving in Yucatan's cenotes [03/2008]

Slideshow: Cenotes

Some snapshots to look at while you wait for more...

… removed …

Screening

Importing the 8GB of high-res* footage taken with my defunct Sanyo Xacti VPC-HD1000 on its first and only six cave dives took over 90'... but now I've got about 90' of MPEG4 source material neatly stored in my iPhoto library and ready to be edited into a wanna B movie with iMovie 08 on my iMac. That is, screening is in progress!

Since mixing high and low resolution footage within one movie is a really bad idea, I'll import the 14GB of low-res* footage taken with my Sea&Sea DX8000G later on, as soon as I've got an external HDD.

thin air - Sonthofen

Typical uncomfortable flight through various mind unsetting time zones, loosing seven hours of sleep along the way, but miraculously emerging in another world where a new day's already half-way through. 12:00+15' (German time), Touch-down. 12:35, Thorough but expedient German immigration control. 13:00, Got both my bags, but where are my two dangerous looking lights? After a while most people have gotten their stuff and have left. Only a couple of lone unwanted bags keep turning around on the luggage belt. I'm about to search for a lost baggage counter when I suddenly notice a small pack lying all by itself on the floor at the far side of the belt. My precious torches!

13:22, Airport train to Munich's main station. 14:21, Regional train to Buchloe, where I only have 4' to catch a connecting train departing from another track. To make matters worse I misunderstand the loudspeaker info and find myself on the wrong track... For your information: Rushing with 50-something kilo feels like running in slow motion but getting exhausted as when sprinting up a steep mountain! Nonetheless I just manage to step onto the train, using the controller's still open door before he closes it :o) After that I slowly wheeze my way back to Sonthofen, where at 16:33 Petra picks me up and drives me home. Door to door a 22 hour time & space challenging journey.

Tulum - thin air

12:15, Señora Lourdes drives me to Tulum's bus station, where I wait in vain for my 12:40 bus to Playa del Carmen. Luckily I'm allowed to hop on the 13:00 ADO bus in stead (44 Pesos), arriving in Playa around 14:10, just in time to catch a Riviera bus to Cancun's airport (80 Pesos), another 70' ride. Having been dropped off in terminal 1, I take a free shuttle bus to terminal 3, only a short, as in 1', distance away.

15:35, LTU's counters are manned but they're totally ignoring the waiting queue of early passengers until 15:50, i.e. exactly three hours before departure. After that it goes pretty fast, leaving me enough time for an overpriced Starbucks coffee, before heading to security.

As expected I'm required to open my backpack and show them my dive lights, as these inevitably get the X-ray machine to black out, a sure way to get a lot of attention from paranoid security people. In this case however they are unwilling to let me through and, not wanting to take any responsibility, actually send me back to check-in, as it's apparently not allowed to carry suspicious batteries on board? Thing is, I wouldn't have tried to do so, if LTU hadn't specifically told me to.

18:40, Boarded. 18:50+25', Take-off into thin air as the night falls, enveloping everything into darkness...

Less is more

Tulum beach... endless & timeless. My project though is coming to an end and it's time for me to repack all my stuff for the journey home.


After having missed the first two flybys I just managed to get my camera in time for the third airborne flight of pelicans gliding by.

Cenotes

Millions of years ago, Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula was to be found below the waves, where it accumulated as much as thousand meters of sediment. Later, uplifting land masses and receding sea levels combined to expose this vast limestone platform to the elements.

Precipitation, already slightly acidic due to atmospheric carbon dioxide, upon contact with the ground also absorbs tannic acid from vegetation before percolating through the porous surface, irresistibly seeking its way back to the sea through fractures and cracks. On its course, the acidified rainwater reacts with the limestone, dissolving it and, over time, creating ever larger conduits and longer passages.

Ever so slowly, amazing tunnels and caves were hollowed out from the underground, giving dripping water and howling wind unimaginable artistic freedom to lazily form speleothems of wonderful beauty.

Then, about eighteen thousand years ago, as the last glacial period declined, sea levels began to rise again, thereby also lifting the freshwater table and causing Yucatan's fabulous underworld to flood.


Cenotes refer to locations where the groundwater is accessible from the surface, typically where a section of cave has collapsed under its own weight during a period of drought. Having been filtered on its way down through the porous limestone, cenote water is usually crystal clear and, being sheltered, has a relatively constant temperature of about 24-25°C (up to 26 below the halocline).

The word cenote is derived from the Mayan word "dzonot" meaning "sacred well", as these waterholes were of life sustaining importance to them, there being next to no open waterways on the peninsula.

For the Maya, these mysterious water filled sinkholes were also believed to be gateways to the other world, which explains why some of them were offered valuable objects and even human sacrifices, in order to appease the gods, e.g. the rain deity Chaac.

Besides the natural cave decorations, prehistory can still be observed today in many cenotes in the form of petrified layers containing bits of corals and fossilized shells, traces of charcoal fires, ancient bones of long dead animals and humans, and even intact pottery.

→ Quintana Roo Speleological Survey
→ Wikipedia: Cenotes

Tux Kupaxa

Another 2h long enjoyable dive, in the cave of the mastodon, past fabulous formations, left at the T, till the few remaining bones, then slowly back again. A perfect last dive, till I can come back for more.

Kalimba

What can I say... yet another dive in Kalimba indeed. Longer and further than ever before, meaning I had to restrain myself from shooting so as to be able to reach our target area, a fantastic 45' swim away from the entrance, allowing for about 5' of sightseeing before having to turn around again. Total bottom time: 2h. Remaining air pressure: 55bar (from 210). Raw footage: 894MB.