In the Loupe at RF4

What’s it like to be the official photographer at a dive event like Rebreather Forum 4? Seasoned shutter bug Jason Brown recounts his experiences capturing the biggest event in rebreather diving for a decade...

Key Information

Author:

Jason Brown

Publication Date:

October 2023

Publication:

Original

Feature catagory:

Industry Events

Photo Gallery #1:

Rebreather Forum 4.0

Photo Gallery #2:

Malta + Gozo

This feature and all images are copyright © Jason Brown and may not be republished, reproduced or copied in any form without the express written permission of the author. This feature and all images are available to licence.

Of course, event photography isn't all sore feet and 80s synth pop - shooting an uber cool diving event like Rebreather Forum 4 is also happens to be a whole lot of fun. Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to get the call on more than a few occasions. I’ve shot multiple EUROTEK Advanced Diving Conferences, the first TEKDive USA held in Miami back in 2014, the award-winning TEKCamp masterclass diving event in the UK, a Baltictech in Poland and I’m still the regular official shooter at the UK’s biggest - and sole surviving – consumer dive event, the Go Diving Show. Each has its own unique challenges but they all share one thing in common – shooting them is a real buzz.

In all my years shooting diving events, the one that had always eluded me was Rebreather Forum. The irony is that I’d been involved as a designer on Rebreather Forum 3.0 in Orlando, Florida back in 2012 but never got the call to photograph it, despite my image of an Inspiration rebreather diver gracing the front cover of the post-event published proceedings. All that was set to change when, back in November of 2022, InDepth’s former Editor-in-Chief and tech pioneer Michael Menduno sent me a WhatsApp message inviting me to join the team in Malta for the event’s fourth incarnation. A super-cool diving event on a beautiful sun-drenched Mediterranean island, you say? Sign me up, Michael.

Checklists are cool, right?

With flights booked and doggy house-sitting arrangements made (the most challenging part of my life these days), the preparations began. We all know that checklists are cool for ensuring the correct function of our rebreathers but they’re also a jolly useful tool for photographers. Whenever I travel anywhere with my camera equipment, I draw up a checklist of all the equipment I’ll need. Not just the obvious stuff like camera bodies and lenses but also the essentials that keep everything working – chargers, power and data leads, adaptors and so on. There’s nothing worse than flying to another country only to discover you’ve forgotten a data lead for backing up the RAW files from a day’s shooting. Checklists help to avoid this.

Camera wise, I’d be travelling reasonably light. I’d packed two DSLR camera bodies – my trusty Nikon D4 (still a seriously great camera for low-light shooting) and a Nikon D850 as a backup. Complimenting these would be a range of lens to cover the focus lengths I’d likely need to cover all angles (so to speak) – a Nikon 16-35mm (great for those ultra-wide shots), a Nikon 24-70mm (the work horse of any event photographer) and, for longer reach, a Nikon 70-200mm.

Various flash guns were packed too – a couple of Godox V1 speed lights (I always carry a second just in case) and a Godox AD200 Pro 200w remote flash for those moments when I need a bit more off-camera power. A couple of radio flash triggers (again, redundancy) to trigger them came along for the ride also.

"Getting a brief detailing the client’s expectations is essential – you need to understand what they’re hoping to get from the shoot, right?"

Getting a shooting brief detailing the client’s expectations is essential – after all, you need to understand what they’re hoping to get from the shoot, right? For Rebreather Forum 4, M2 and I divided my time into five days. The first day would be spent on a boat shooting images of rebreather divers enjoying Malta’s amazing wreck diving whilst day two would see me shooting rebreather try dives at Malta’s Olympic-sized National Pool located at the Tal-Qroqq Sports Complex near Valletta.

Plan the shoot, shoot the plan...

For the remaining three days, I’d be running around the Valletta campus of the University of Malta shooting the main event – Rebreather Forum 4. Each day would bring its own unique challenges which all had to be accounted for by taking the right kit for the job – extra lighting, reflectors and so on. Those checklists certainly came in handy to ensure everything was packed.

In a somewhat fortunate twist of fate, I wouldn’t be travelling to Malta alone. My wife Georgina had been actively involved in many of the same diving events I’d worked on and had become a bit of a dab-hand at keeping such events from descending into logistical chaos.

She was a key member of the EUROTEK team (the so-called ‘Minions’ as we affectionately called them) and is also a regular face manning the front desk at the Go Diving Show here in the UK. Understanding that a steady and reliable pair of hands is a valuable asset at any event, M2 had cunningly drafted her in to join the event’s happy band of willing volunteers.

And unfortunate shade of pale...

Having my wife along for the event did present a useful opportunity to have a lighting assistant join me on my first day of shooting at sea. Hosted on board the Galaxy Charters hardboard ably skippered by popular local skipper Kevin J Vella, the boat was the perfect platform for what we had planned. Amongst the divers joining us at sea was GUE CCR diver and RF4 team member Ashley who had somewhat foolishly agreed to model for the shoot, foregoing the opportunity to join the divers on perhaps Malta’s most iconic wreck dive – Le Polynesian. Sat on the deck of a boat sweating in a drysuit when you could be diving one of the world’s most breath-taking wrecks? Now that’s what I call dedication to the cause.

Early-season weather in Malta can be a little unpredictable and our day proved to be no exception. Whilst the sunshine was very welcome, the wind had picked up causing the sea conditions to become a little lumpy. Not a problem for a skipper as competent and experienced as Kevin but a little more challenging for myself, my lighting assistant and, of course, my model. Once all the divers had thrown themselves off the back of the boat, we turned our attention to the topside shoot but it was clear that this wasn’t going to be as straight-forward as I’d hoped. With the boat dancing from side to side, my lighting assistant had already turned an unfortunate shade of green and looked close to the point of hurling. Clearly my able lighting assistant wasn’t going to be quite so able to assist after all.

Ashley wasn’t feeling the love for the sea conditions either but bravely kitted up and soldiered on. Framing shots on a rocking boat isn’t the easiest thing to do, especially when you’re also trying to maintain your own balance, but we got there – day one’s shooting was in the bag with no casualties (human or equipment) to report and, more importantly, everyone kept their lunch down.

"...one taxi driver went to great lengths to tell me about how Malta was very popular with scuba divers. Who knew, eh?"

Making a splash...

Day two saw me up at the crack of dawn to head over to the Tal-Qroqq Sports Complex on the outskirts of Valletta to shoot images of the rebreather try dives. One of the great joys of travelling around Malta is the local taxi service. Malta really has embraced the wonders of smart phones with its own Uber-esque app-driven taxi services. Just fire up Bolt or eCabs, type in where you want to go and a cab will be with you in a matter of minutes. It’s all jolly convenient and makes jumping between shooting locations a real joy. Oh and you get the pleasure of chin-wagging with a local for a few minutes – one taxi driver went to great lengths to tell me about how Malta was very popular with scuba divers. Who knew, eh?

Arriving at the Sports Complex pool, try dives were already in full swing with many of the rebreather manufacturers giving Forum attendees the opportunity to take their units for a dive in the Olympic-sized swimming pool. In retrospect, I should probably have dressed in something more water-proof as it became immediately obvious that my biggest challenge would simply be staying dry. My camera gear was fine – it’s used to the abuse - but anything below the knees soon got very wet.

The lighting conditions were quite challenging too – the strong Maltese sun created harsh shadows which I’d normally overcome with either a reflector or an ND filter combined with high-speed fill-flash but the lack of a lighting assistant made this tricky. Georgina had already been press-ganged into the far more urgent task of helping to set up the registration desk for the start of the event. After her experience on the boat the day before, I could understand why she wanted to stay away from water for at least one day.

Getting your back up!

The end of the second day of shooting followed a familiar pattern that would be repeated each day. Back in the sanctuary of our room at the Grand Excelsior Hotel, the first task was always the same – the transfer of the day’s images from camera memory cards to something far less likely to be lost or lose data. After many painful experiences shooting images on location, I’ve developed a healthy mistrust of technology so I religiously transfer all the shots from the day onto a pair of high-speed external SSD drives which contain mirror copies of the same data.

Likewise, modern digital cameras can generate very big RAW files so it pays to do this as you’re going along so that it doesn’t become too much of a chore. You can generate some serious data on a five day shoot – Rebreather Forum 4 alone amounted to over 300 gigabytes of RAW image file data! Processing all that data post-event was going to be fun – Adobe Lightroom was going to be working overtime for at least a couple of weeks post-event.

"The first concern of any event photographer is always the lighting in the room. Fortunately, I’d been able to liaise with the venue."

Now the fun really begins...

With the first two days of shooting in the bag, day one of Rebreather Forum 4 had finally arrived. Unlike other diving events I’d covered, Rebreather Forum 4 had one thing going for it that would make my life a whole lot easier – all the presentations would take place in just one room.

Events like EUROTEK and the Go Diving Show tend to have multiple talks all going on at the same time, requiring me to dart between several rooms to ensure I covered them all. That, at least, is always the plan but the more talks running simultaneously, the more chance you have of missing one. The trick is to prioritise – always have a hit list agreed in advance with the client of shots that are an absolute must. For Rebreather Forum, this wasn’t going to be a problem - I could guarantee to shoot every speaker.

The first concern of any event photographer is always the lighting in the room. Fortunately, I’d been able to liaise with the venue to ensure that the lighting would allow me to capture clean, clear shots of the speakers. Some events are infinitely better at this than others – there’s nothing more challenging than shooting a speaker who is stood in front of a very bright video wall with no key lights on them. All you’re going to get is a silhouette against a very pretty video backdrop.

In these cases, you’re forced to use flash photography – something I always try to avoid as it can disturb both the speaker and the audience. Thankfully the wonderful folk at the University of Malta had this covered – the speakers would not only be illuminated throughout by a pair of lovely flagged key lights mounted on the ceiling, but they’d also be rooted in the same spot by microphones attached to the on-stage lectern.

Creative Challenges

The next big challenge was more of a creative one – how do you shoot a procession of speakers all standing in the same spot without the images all looking very similar? It’s something that I’ve worked hard to overcome but you’re always at the mercy of the speakers and their presentation slides. As an event photographer, you become surprisingly adept at watching and learning people’s body language. The best speakers are those that allow their personalities to come through when they’re presenting. They’re the speakers who clearly enjoy public speaking – they’ll use their hands to gesticulate key points and they’ll carry the audience on a journey through enthusiasm for the subject matter, humour and their own raw energy. These speakers are a real gift – I will watch them through the viewfinder of my camera and try to capture their personalities, energy and enthusiasm.

The visuals thrown up onto the screen behind a speaker can play a key part in making the photo interesting too. I’m always watching their Powerpoint slides for something that will make an interesting backdrop for a photo. Again, some speakers are a genuine gift as their visuals are a real feast for the eyes. Take Timmy Gambin’s presentation on the wrecks of Malta on day two – chock-full of amazing photogrammetry models of everything from an ancient Venetian wreck site to the remains of a WW2 German bomber, they served as a breath-taking backdrop for a great photo. Now combined with Timmy’s own exuberant energy and love for the subject, his presentation delivered the perfect recipe for some genuinely eye-catching shots.

Feet of Endurance...

Like everything in life, capturing such moments comes at a price. The reality is that shooting any event is utterly exhausting. My poor feet really paid the price for five days of frantic activity – each evening, I’d treat them to a long soak in steaming hot water.

Now I’m normally a shower type of guy but my feet demanded nothing less than a full-on soak in the closest thing I could find to a Star Wars Bacta tank – the Hotel bath. Thankfully the bath tubs in the Grand Hotel Excelsior were some of the best I’ve ever encountered in a hotel – deep, spacious and thoroughly relaxing. Whilst I sadly wasn’t diving on this trip, I suspect they’d be darned good for rinsing dive gear post trip too. Not that I ever abuse the bathing facilities in a 5-star hotel. No siree.

Pain and suffering lower extremities aside, working an event like Rebreather Forum 4 was an experience like no other. For a rebreather-diving, shutter monkey like myself, it’s the pinnacle of photo gigs – a golden ticket that I certainly won’t forget for many years to come.

Packed full of amazing moments surrounded by the great and good of all things rebreather diving on a magical Mediterranean island steeped in a deep richness of history, it’s hard not to appreciate just how great an experience it all really was. Truly great diving events don’t come along very often but Rebreather Forum 4 certainly fitted the bill. I, for one, feel truly blessed to have been part of it.

External Links

Rebreather Forum 4.0

RF 4.0 Presentations on GUE.tv

Rebreather Forum 4.0 Proceedings

InDepth Magazine - In The Loop

DAN Europe

And that's a wrap!

My favourite bits? It’s hard to know where to start. Maybe it was working alongside an amazing event team that, by the end of it all, felt more like family than colleagues. Or maybe it was the opportunity to rub shoulders with the world’s preeminent experts in rebreather diving technology and science? Or perhaps it was simply being reunited with so many great diving friends and colleagues from across the globe, many of whom I haven’t shared quality time with for so many years. For me, it was all of these and more. Roll on the next Rebreather Forum.

This feature is dedicated to the memory of my dear friend and 'brother from another mother', Michael Menduno. His boundless creativity, energy and zest for life was a gift to everyone who knew him. Michael truely was a shining light and I feel deeply honoured to have called him a friend. Rest in peace, Brother.