MikeBrum.com

I’m amazed at how much easier it was to pack everything up for the return than it was for the arrival. I guess I have all the experience of having done it once before to help it along, whereas the first packing was a bit of a learning experience.

One thing that has come out of this trip is that I’m absolutely convinced that we need bigger/better luggage. With two full sets of scuba gear and my underwater photo equipment, we have a lot of “non-essentials” (e.g., “not clothes”) that have to come with us. I paid for extra baggage fees on the way down and will have to do the same for the return. Blech. I’m confident that I can cut out an entire bag by replacing one of the ones with a slightly larger bag. Most of what we checked was all significantly under weight, so that’s all missed opportunity. With few exceptions (mostly on the extremes), checked luggage is only concerned with weight, not its actual volume.

It’s just a pain in the ass that will get sorted before our next trip.

Much of the photo editing was done last night before bed. I still have a bunch more from the shark feed to do. There’s just a lot of “almost great” greats that I need to do some final culling of. It was just such a chaotic event that I wasn’t properly prepared for. Should I do another, I’ll be much better suited than this time. I think I can say that of underwater wide angle shooting in general. In just 5 days, the quality of images taken improved dramatically. It feels good to not only say that, but to have the photo record of it as well to go back and analyze when I have a bit more time. I probably won’t be shooting much wide angle at home given the lack of good subjects and the fact that visibility kinda sucks.

I know that for the next trip where I’ll be shooting underwater wide angle that I’m going to need to get a second strobe and longer strobe arms. The second strobe is to better-manage my light and have the ability to fully cover the area that I can shoot with the wide angle lens. The longer strobe arms are to get the strobes further away from the dome port and further minimize backscatter, which is evident in some of the photos that I took (it’ll be rather trivial to clone it out, but it’s still time I’d rather spend doing anything else).

I could definitely handle another week’s worth of diving in the Caribbean, but I’ll have to just take what I got and enjoy it.