Advanced Underwater Photography Seminars

By Bertrand CHAUVEL

• You own an advanced underwater photography equipment and would like to use it at its best ?
• You would like to improve your diving skills so as to bring stunning pictures of the amazing underwater world ?
• You want to learn how to handle complex and expensive equipment without spending hours a day in getting it ready ?
• You would like to spice-up your diving holidays with a very self rewarding activity that will build-up your best travel souvenirs ?

Frenchman Bertrand has been diving the South Asia seas for the last 25 years while taking tens of thousands of pictures using high-end housed camera systems and strobes. Besides publishing many of them in coffee table books, newspapers and diving magazines, he also partnered with major diving operators in Indonesia to provide them with professional advertisement materials such as brochures, postcards and fine art web photo galleries. As a PADI Diving Instructor, he conducts photography seminars to help avid photographers to get the best of their complex camera setups, while spending a relaxed time on the best diving places of the world.

"From the Caribbean to the Celebes Seas, from Paris' wet streets to Nepal's scattered landscapes, photography and journalism gave me the invaluable chance to reach some of the most exquisite places in the world. While focusing on Asia's extremely fine underwater realm, I found an unlimited source of colored textures and patterns to fill-in thousands of emotional compositions, helped by the curiosity and expression of the marine inhabitants. While I first started 25 years ago by shooting about 900 rolls of film over 10 years, I subsequently surfed the wave of the digital world by staying constantly in-tune with modern technologies, high end camera systems and digital image processing. While being constantly active in the internet diving advertisement field, I had the privilege of exploring the Asian underwater world, helping to create awareness and to share the wonders of the last few sanctuaries on our Earth’s most glorious places."

Enrollment prerequisites

PADI Advanced Open Water certification or equivalent Recommened minimum of 50 logged dives Preliminary practice of underwater photography with own equipment You have already tried once your own equiment underwater and you are confident that averything works fine Advanced housed digital camera with macro capabilities (recommended minimum resolution of 20 Mpx): DSLR or mirrorless with lens 105 mm macro (full frame sensor) or 85 mm macro (APS sensor) or Expert compact camera with manual mode (M) eg. access to speed and aperture setting Olympus TG series are welcome but will fall short to the depth of the course due to their lack of definition and “M” mode. Twin strobe system (preferably both the same) with arms and tray Brand new high-capacity batteries (> 2500 mAh for AA) would definitely help for shorter strobe recycling times Laptop computer with at least 50 Gb free storage space and digital imaging software installed (ideally Adobe Lightroom) Additional external drive to backup your photo footage is highly recommended

Course schedule

The seminars typically last 5 days, starting with a "day 0" evening introduction breifing to getting to now each other and do a camera equipment review. The next five days are slipt between 2 daily dives focused on underwater photography, where Bertrand is around around to show you "how to do" and to answer any questions on the spot. Back to the resort come the evening thematic theory classes, lasting about one hour, comfortably seated in the resort living room area and sipping a drink, where we also review and comment the pictures taken during the day on a big TV screen.

The seminar entitles for a PADI Digital Underwater Photographer specialty certification

A few samples of Bertrand’s works

And many more on our Home page :)