Through a lens, blotchily.

I've been commissioned to write a piece for Scuba Magazine about Montrose SAC's club trip to Northern Ireland later this year.  To get the best quality underwater photos I'll need an wide-angled lens (there's a lot of stuff in the water that causes blotches in the photos, called "back-scatter"; with a wide-angled lens you can get in closer to the subject and therefore reduce the amount of water between you and it, thus reducing back-scatter.)

So I've been trying to locate a wide-angle lens I can use with my Intova underwater camera set-up. (If you're not yet into underwater photography, it's important to know that cameras typically have to go inside a watertight housing, onto which you screw accessories like lenses and lights; the cameras - apart from a few very expensive ones, perhaps - aren't themselves watertight.  Each type of camera has its own housing, so you have to get the right one for your camera.)  

I know Intova make a lens that you can fit and remove during a dive.  I know who imports it into this country - but they don't sell direct to the public, so I've been trawling the internet to find a retailer.

Intova IC12 camera
(photos courtesy of
Intova's website)

The same, in its
underwater housing.

According to the importer's website the nearest agency is Aberdeen Watersports, so I checked their website: no mention of any lenses.  Same for the agencies in Burntisland, Edinburgh and Glasgow - in fact most of them didn't even mention Intova. 

So I searched e-Bay, where I eventually found a lens after trying 2-3 different keyword phrases ("scuba diving cameras", "underwater cameras", that sort of thing).  But all it said by way of identification was "46mm thread".  As I have no idea what size thread my housing has that wasn't very helpful.  Intova make several housings.  Which one does this lens fit?  At around £130 a pop I'm not going to buy one on spec.

Why are retailers so coy about their products?  If you're writing for/to consumers you can't expect them all to be experts on everything they want to buy.  I know I need the lens that fits my specific housing and I know which housing I've got.  I haven't a clue what the thread size is, and I doubt there's any mention of it in the handbook as that only covers the camera iself.  Why can't they say "fits xyz housing(s)" or something really simple like that?

It's all very well saying "come and visit our shop" but their shop's in Liverpool and I'm between Dundee and Aberdeen.  That's not exactly a 10-minute jaunt; the diesel would double the price of the lens.  And while I'm sure it's a lovely shop, full of all sorts of delightful bits and bobs that I never knew I didn't need, I'm not going to waste the better part of two days getting there and back.

Thank heavens for email.  With a bit of luck I'll get replies from 5 separate retailers saying "we've got just the thing for you, and it'll only cost £100 all in".  A girl can dream...

Good news!

Yesterday was a day of excellent news, one to stay in the memory for some time (given my age, I can't really hope for more than that!).

As my regular reader(s) will know, I started scuba training in November 2009.  I qualified as an Ocean Diver the following summer and started Sports Diver training in November 2010, completing it last summer - by the skin of my teeth: I got the last exercise signed off on the last dive of the year.  Last November I started the Dive Leader theory training.

And yesterday I took the exam.  And passed.  Yeehaah!

Slightly unexpected, that.  I looked at the paper and saw two questions on the Dive Tables that we had covered in the revision lesson - and I couldn't remember how to work them out.  My brain does that in exams.  I moved on to other questions, came back to the Dive Table ones at the end, and managed to get some sort of answer for those two, and a third one which we hadn't covered.  I have to admit they were all wrong, but I still passed [big smiley face!].

I never dive using the tables.  Who does, now that we all rely on computers?  But if I want to do the Instructor course (and I do, all in good time) I'm obviously going to have to re-learn how to use them.

I got home, after the statutory celebration (sorry: de-brief) in the pub, to find the latest issue of Scuba magazine waiting for me - and my second piece of good news.

I'd got in touch with the publisher of Scuba, BSAC's new house mag, shortly after it was launched (this is the third issue) because they were looking for a female diver to write a regular column.  I didn't get that job, but he suggested I write a couple of pieces on spec for two regular columns; so I did.  And one of them was published as a two-page spread this month [another big smiley face!!].

I know: you were expecting my usual rant.  But even I can't be a grumpy old woman with that sort of thing going on [really smiley face!!!].

Life's good.  And I'm due to go diving on Saturday (fingers crossed for the weather).  Aahhh.

If you want to find out more about my writing, go to http://greatcopy.info/sampler.