Posts tagged video
Some Grand Cayman Diving
Nov 5th
Last month my wife, Crystal, and I took a whirlwind vacation with some of our extended family to several great diving destinations including Cayman, Roatan, Belize, Cozumel and Ft. Lauderdale. I’ve got a lot of video footage and some still photos from the trip, so I put together a little sample from Grand Cayman. More to follow.
We dove with Casey from Neptune Divers and it was fabulous. No big animals on our two dives this time, but the terrain on the wall was amazing, and the life around the wreck and reef we did on the second dive was fantastic. My sister, Brenda, shown here in this video a few times, was on her first dive as a certified scuba diver (see her using her arms? 
). Her husband, David, is featured here too, along with Crystal and I.
I’ll also have a review/recap of our trip shortly. For now, here is a quick view into the underwater world of Grand Cayman, featuring their world class wall that dives into the abyss just off shore. Enjoy.
Daily Flip 5 – SGTRI
May 14th
Well, I did another triathlon last weekend, the SGTRI. Actually, while a different race, it was the same venue from my first full tri which got cancelled due to weather after the swim. This time wind and waves got the swim start delayed, and then cancelled as well. I’m not having good luck at this venue. So, the race organizers turned it into a run-bike-run event. It turns out this was a really hard course, both the bike an the run. They were much harder than I had expected. I bombed on the last run, but finished, so I guess that’s something.
I did the tri with my friend, Matt, and my brother, Cory. Matt lives here in Mesa and Cory lives in Park City, UT. Matt and I had planned on having me fly us up to St. George, UT, where the event was. That would turn an 8 or so hour drive into a 2 hour flight. Then my brother asked if I could come pick him up near Park City…so of course, I agreed. After dropping Matt and our gear off at St. George Airport (KSGU), I got back in the plane and flew up to Provo, UT (KPVU) and picked up my brother. Then we both flew back to Hurricane, UT (1L8) where our rental home was as well as the actual triathlon (Hurricane is about a 20 minute drive from St. George). Matt and I got to fly over the western edge of the Grand Canyon both ways. Here are a couple of pics from that.
We stayed in a great house that was only a couple of miles from the start of the race, so we were able to ride our bikes in on the morning of the tri…no parking or waiting in long car lines necessary. It was great! My friend, Jen, from high school and her husband, Marcello, drove up from their home in Las Vegas to cheer us on and take some great photos.
We had a great time. I wasn’t happy with my performance, but that just gives me some additional motivations in my training…I’ll improve for next time. Even so, I got to hang out with a lot of great people, got to race in a triathlon, and got to do a lot of flying! A great weekend, indeed, despite Sandy Hill.
I dedicated a daily flip video to the experience. It’s a little long for a daily flip, but I hope you enjoy it.
Goliath Grouper Video
May 21st
Last summer my wife and I dove off of Fort Lauderdale, FL, and this is a bit of the video that I took. This shows a very large grouper (one of two in the area) on a wreck just offshore. Big fish.
Video: Goliath Grouper in Ft. Lauderdale
Testing my Amphibico Underwater Housing
May 20th
I picked up a used underwater housing last year that wasn’t really for my Sony HDR-HC1, but for a much older TRV analog model…but I figured mine would fit with some modification to the camera plate, and the LANC controller should work with my newer model Sony camera. Because I like to marry my love of Photography and Videography with my love for scuba diving, I couldn’t resist. Well, I finally modified the camera plate this week, ripped out the LANC electronics (which never did work correctly for my camera), and made it a completely manual shell housing. I tried it out in the pool yesterday with my family swimming…and here are the results. All I have to do now is rig up some linkages to allow some mechanical control of the camera while at depth.
A New York Slice
Apr 13th
Todd, after spending a decade and a half away from New York City, needs an authentic pizza pie and chooses a local favorite. No more intro is needed…although if you are a fan of the TV show, “The Office”, you may see some parallels to an episode. Enjoy.