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CPEX 91 by Brian Pitkin Reproduced from in focus 40. Mar.1991 Page 3 - PRESENTERS John Bantin left school early during the mid-sixties because he was sure that he wanted to be a photographer. After
working for a top advertising photographer and gaining a certain
amount of experience of the world, he eventually started working
for himself in 1972 and in the following eighteen years produced
and photographed many well known advertising campaigns, some of
which are preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museuml Always
seeking to extend his experience of life (after all this is not
a dress rehearsall) and as a spin-off from advertising campaigns,
he also had experience of directing, producing and even lighting
award winning television commercials. Once, whilst waiting for weather on a Caribbean island location, he foolishly learned to scuba-dive, and has wasted much of his time, not to mention money, sincel Berated
once for not being a BS-AC member, he joined a club, jumped through
the appropriate hoops, and instantly became an Advanced Instructor. He knows enough about photography to know he knows precious little about it. He knows even less about diving - but does plenty of both! This doesn't stop him inflicting his lack of knowledge on you from time to time through the pages of DIVER magazine. His wife and family want to know when he's going to start to take life seriously. John will be at CPEX '91 to take us behind the scenes in the making of the Diver Video 2 - Adventurous Diving. After a magic childhood in Dalkey rowing coracles and clinker skiffs, rock fishing and trolling for mackerel and pollock, Simon Cotton went onto University where he took up sailing at Dunlaoghaire. He enjoyed inter-varsity racing with Oxford and Cambridge, the 1947 Fastnet and two trips to the North Sea, one into the Baltic on an Albert Strange yawl based on the Norfolk Broads. At University he pursued medicine, a lucky second choice as he had studied at school to go to Dartmouth Naval College but was turned down by poor eyesight. He qualified in Dublin in 1952. Simon comments that 'Like most Irish, I never learned to swim properly but was very much at home in the water.' He finally learned to swim 10 years ago - 'all men are equal in flippers'. After a year in Stevens Hospital by the Guiness Brewery, he married Susan Gatenby, the Profs daughter and joined the colonial service going to Fiji and Tonga. They moved to New Zealand for medical reasons and settled inland. Simon soon found the coast of the Coramandel Peninsula rich with sea food and exciting marine life. He snorkelled actively for ten years, starting out wearing a jersey and a home-made weight-belt. At the time he despised lung divers but on moving to Auckland in 1965 found that, due to the pressure of diving, marine life had been pushed deeper. He took a Scuba course! In Auckland the family, now increased by the addition of six children, built a 32 ft launch and dived the coast from Auckland to White Is. In 1975 he took a six month sabbatical leave and decided to give up plundering the sea and try to record the diminishing marine life on film. He bought a Bolex 16 mm camera and reading all the books, worked for TV New Zealand on a marine adventure series in Tonga and N.Z. He worked with Sir Edmund Hilary on a jet boat film and filmed increasingly in Fiji and on Australia's Great Barrier Reef. Location work was done whilst on leave, his general practice being very busy and paramount. As a family the Cottons concentrated on getting stock footage from their launch, his five daughters being the pushers and shovers whilst his wife Susan, a hopeless sea sick case, held the fort at home and provided tremendous support. Their first film was about diving in Taveuni, Fiji; the next about the island volcano, White Is. They often met Orca whilst cruising and became so fascinated by them that, with help from the N.Z. Broadcasting Corporation, Simon produced the first film ever of them in the wild, KILLER WHALE. With two companions, Simon followed and studied the whales on the east coast of the North Is. Later they were drawn to Fjordland and made two expeditions there both on a shoestring budget. The inaccessible Dusky Sound with steep glacier valleys now flooded by the sea is one of the wettest regions in the world and provides the setting for FJORDLAND. It is isolated by mountain ranges and the tempestuous Southern Ocean and few divers have penetrated its depths. With his daughters and friends, Simon attempts to find and film the world's oldest surviving animal, a shell fish that 600 million years ago was the dominant species on earth. The expeditions discovers the world's largest known resource of black and red coral in shallow water beneath breathtakingly beautiful snow capped cliffs. The expedition also swims with the now protected seals. Internationally known underwater archaeologist Kelly Tarlton joins the expedition in the search for two cannons lost by accident two hundred years ago. His success establishes the identity of New Zealand's first European shipwreck. The film is a tribute to Kelly Tarlton who died shortly after its completion. Simon now lives in a house he built overlooking the Cavalli islands off the Bay of Islands, New Zealand, which is a diver's paradise. He will not be present at CPEX '91 but 'like all film makers cannot resist an audience' and was happy to loan prints of two of his films to BSoUP. MARK DEEBLE and VICTORIA STONE Few people achieve their greatest ambition, but Mark and Victoria proved by their sheer hard work and dedication that dreams can become a reality. They had always wanted to make an underwater film about the Fal estuary. Unable to convince the television companies that they could succeed, they borrowed money and purchased their own cine camera and underwater housing and began shooting film. Mark was studying gobies at Swansea University and working as a commercial fisherman to pay back the loan, whilst Victoria worked in London to pay for the film. They showed their first attempts to Survival and were offered a year's contract to finish the film. Following the success of VALLEY BENEATH THE SEA they were involved in a film about Lundy at the time this was being recognised as a voluntary marine reserve. Their next assignments were with the BBC filming underwater sequences for the LIVING ISLES and ATLANTIC REALM. Moving away from the underwater world they were offered a three year contract to film in Serengeti, but this series fell through and they spent a year filming crocodiles instead. More recently they completed a film on leopards and cheetahs and DEVILFISH for BBC Wildlife on One. An article on Mark and Victoria's adventures filming Octopus was published in January's DIVER magazine. They are now back in East Africa to spend 18 months filming in Tanzania and where they hope to make a film about Lake Tanganyika. They are also involved in production and are planning a film on jellyfish. Although unable to be at CPEX '91 Mark and Victoria have kindly made video copies of their films available through the BBC Wildlife on One and Survival Anglia to BSoUP. 'We made our masks from old gas masks, fins were obtained from ex 'frogmen' surplus equipment. For suits we used woollen long-john underwear. In water of 80C they didn't help muchl' This was Scotland in the early fifties. Those are the memories of Wait Deas, casting his mind back to the pioneering days of diving when he used ex-Navy oxygen rebreathers. Today he is a successful film maker, author and stills photographer. He has been freelancing as an underwater cameraman since 1969. He
started diving in 1950 and was a founder member of the first dive
club in Scotland (the second in the U.K.) His wife, Jean, started
diving in 1955. In 1956 he published THE NEW WORLD - an introduction to underwater exploration and sport, which must count as one of the earliest manuals on sports diving published in the U.K. In 1970 he and Clarrie Lawler produced BENEATH AUSTRALIAN SEAS. This
book was followed by Walt's AUSTRALIAN FISHES IN COLOUR and SEASHELLS
OF AUSTRALIA and in 1973 Jean and Walt collaborated on THE NATURAL
LIFE OF THE BARRIER REEF. Walt also contributed to the TIME/LIFE
volume THE GREAT BARRIER REEF 0 984) and many other publications.
Walt and Richard Rice produced UNDERWATER PHOTOGRAPHY in 1977. In
recent years Wait's interests have turned very heavily to underwater
filming. Walt was one of the underwater cinematographers for the
smash series LIFE ON EARTH and THE LIVING PLANET with David Attenborough.
Walt and Jean directed and filmed WHERE THE FISH ARE FRIENDLY which
when shown in the U.K. had the highest audience ever for a natural
history film, peaking at just under 14.9 million viewers. Walt also
worked on other B.B.C. productions including ANIMAL MAGIC, ZOO 2000,
and the DISCOVERY OF ANIMAL BEHAVIOUR. With credits on the A.B.C's
THE DIVING DOCTOR, AKIN TO THE SEA, THE TURNING TIDE, Film Australia's
CORAL AND COMPANY, GALAXY BENEATH THE SEA and the following - THE
GREATEST REEF, THE UNFOUND LAND, TWO ISLANDS, THE REEF BUILDERS,
A TIME FOR RECKONING and H.M.S. PANDORA, These have kept WALT and
Jean very busy over the years. Walt is currently working on THE FRIGATE DARTMOUTH and has just completed his own production THE BASKING SHARK. Principal filming took place in the lower Clyde, with basking sharks tracked from Tarbert to Girvan and Arran, but the documentary also includes footage from California, France and Canada. Although screened by Scottish TV and Grampian TV, the film has not yet been seen in the south. Walt will not be present at CPEX '91 but has very kindly made a video copy available to BSoUP for your enjoyment. Howard Hall is a wildlife film producer specialising in underwater films. He has been the recipient of four cinematography Emmys for such shows as SPIRIT OF ADVENTURE and TIM McCARVERS WORLD OF ADVENTURE. He was primary cameraman for the National Geographic Society SHARKS, which remains the highest rated PBS documentary ever screened, and director of underwater cinematography for the CBS Special DOLPHINS, WHALES AND US. Howard is presently in production on films for clients that include the PBS series NATURE, National Geographic Television and ABC. Howard's articles on underwater photographic technique have appeared in numerous magazines and he was commissioned in 1982 to write a book, HOWARD HALL'S GUIDE TO SUCCESSFUL UNDERWATER PHOTOGRAPHY, which has become a best seller within the sport diving community and is now in its third printing. Howard holds a degree in zoology from the San Diego State University. His interest in marine wildlife has led him to write numerous articles about the animals he has photographed. IN 1984 he was asked to join the masthead of INTERNATIONAL WILDLIFE Magazine as a contributing editor, where his articles and photographs regularly appear. He is also associate editor for OCEAN REALM Magazine. Howard's most recent production, SEASONS IN THE SEA, which he also directed, was judged best of show at Wildscreen90 and received the Golden Panda Award, the most prestigious award in natural history film making. The film was shot in the giant kelp forests off the coast of California and includes remarkable footage of marine life including seals and Blue Whale. Howard will not be present at CPEX '91 but has very kindly made a copy of SEASONS IN THE SEA available to BSoUP for the weekend. Explorer, mountaineer, diver, photographer, lecturer and author, Jack Jackson has travelled the remoter parts of Asia and Africa since 1967, both on his own account and as leader of scientific, cultural and tourist expeditions. Originally an industrial chemist working in the oil and photographic film industries, Jack found the call of adventure and his love for mountains too strong. So he gave it all up for expeditions in the Himalayas, making a living from lecturing and photography. This in turn led to wider fields of adventure. Driving
various four wheel drive vehicles, Jack has made some 23 expeditions
in the Sahara Desert plus more than 130 expeditions in the deserts
and mountains of 24 different countries in Asia and north Africa.
A specialist in adventurous overland travel, Jack is the author
of three books on off road four wheel drive vehicles. Les Kemp is an amateur underwater stills photographer. He won the Silver Medal at Brighton '87 for his audio-visual RE-INVASION, which tells in vivid detail the tale of the sinking and recolonisation of a wreck in the English Channel. The clever use of sound effects attests to Les' mastery of the tape deck and these effects combine well with excellent underwater images. At BSoUP's 21 st Anniversary Splash-in, Les won the BSoUP Trophy for the Best Contrived Shot with an outstanding picture of a Diver underwater holding a Birthday cake - complete with 21 candies, all alightlIn 1989 Les made a promotional audio-visual for the Curacao Tourist Board called UNDERWATER CURACAO, which shows the delights of this Caribbean island both above and below water. In contrast OCTOPUSSY is on a humorous theme and was premiered at last year's festival. More
recently Les was chosen with Mark Webster to represent Britain at
the CMAS World Championship of Underwater Photography in Sicily.
He has made a audiovisual about the event and is now thinking about
taking up video underwater. Les will be present at CPEX '91 to introduce and project his three audio-visuals. Neil McDaniel is a self employed cinematographer and photojournalist specialising in marine and underwater subjects. He qualified as a diver in 1969 and as a NAUI instructor in 1971. He is a graduate marine biologist of the University of British Colombia where he now lives. He has dived in Micronesia, Hawaii, the Caribbean, Australia, the Sea of Cortez, in the Great Lakes, Alsaka and of course British Columbia. He is a member of the Underwater Archeological Society of British Columbia, the Artificial Reef Society of British Columbia and the Marine Life Sanctuaries Society of British Columbia. Anyone who attended the BSAC Diving Officers Conference or the meeting of the British Society of Underwater Photographers in November will undoubtedly remember Neil's talk on British Columbia, illustrated by some of his superb slides. Readers of DIVER will have seen a few of Neil's pictures in the February issue. In addition to a vast library of slides Neil also shoots cine underwater. Following the unfortunate death of Jack McKenney, Neil was invited to finish THE EMERALD SEA, a film about the marine life of British Columbia. Neil will not be present at CPEX '91 but has kindly made a video copy of this film available to BSoUP. Mike Portelly is a professional underwater stills photographer, cinematographer and film director. Whilst a dental surgeon he made his first dive with a camera in 1976 and three months later, at the BRIGHTON FESTIVAL, walked away with Gold, Silver and Bronze medals - and the Best Beginner Award to bootl In 1979 he won the Tilbrook Trophy for the Best Portfolio at BRIGHTON '79 and, with Derek Berwin, won the WORLD TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP in Sicily for Great Britain. Since then he has won many major underwater photographic awards and moved via audio-visuals into the world of cine.Mike's first full-length film was THE OCEAN'S DAUGHTER, a highly acclaimed fictional drama set in the Red Sea. It was first shown at the Brighton Festival in 1983. Since then Mike has moved into the world of advertising - directing, producing and filming some equally stunning underwater sequences. He was recently involved in shooting stills for the 'Next Directory' advertising campaign, featuring underwater fashion. A 30 minute video of the shoot called FASHION UNDERWATER plus the highly acclaimed underwater fictional drama THE OCEAN'S DAUGHTER will be shown at CPEX '91 on Saturday. Mike hopes to be present on Sunday, if he arrives back from the Galapagos Islands on time, when he will introduce video clips of some of his work, including the British Gas WATER BABIES, Next Directory FASHION UNDERWATER and OCEANS DAUGHTER. Mike started diving while on holiday in the Seychelles in 1977. Upon his return he joined a branch of the BSAC, where he became training officer, diving officer and finally Chairman. His
first underwater photographic trip abroad was to the Sudanese Red
See, where he was expedition photographer, researching damage to
the reef caused by the Crown of Thorns starfish. After the success of this film project several other films followed: RED SEA MERMAID was shot on 35 mm and bought by 20th Century Fox as a supporting feature film. Mike's experience in photography also increased and he won many prizes at various international underwater festivals, including BRIGHTON, and was asked to join the committee of BSoUP. Soon after, Mike was contacted by Nicholas Roeg, who had directed many well known feature films. Nick had at one time been a cameraman and seeing Mike's creative approach to capturing the underwater world on film, asked him to shoot the underwater sequences on the feature film CASTAWAY. The filming on location in the Seychelles took two months. After the success of Mike's work on this film he became a full time underwater cameraman and second unit director. Work on many feature films followed including LEVIATHAN and INDIANA JONES AND THE LAST CRUSADE, on which he worked with Harrison Ford and Stephen Spielberg. Mike's THE SEA GYPSY won a Palm D'Or at the Antibes underwater film festival in 1987 and more recently his THE SEA OF DREAMS, about a girl who turns into a dolphin, won the Palm D'Argent at the Antibes festival. Recently Mike has been engaged on working on several commercials, pop videos and feature films, all of which he hopes will show the public the beauty of the underwater kingdom and the way in which it can be used creatively. Last year he won the WORLD CUP at an international underwater photographic competition held in Italy. Mike has just completed a film called UNDERWATER which is soon to be presented to Sir Richard Attenborough, who will accept it on behalf of the MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE. The film will be on permanent display at the Museum. It takes people behind the scenes of the underwater film world with Mike, who reveals some of the techniques he uses to capture the excitement and beauty of the many films on which he has worked. Mike will be a CPEX '91 to present a video version of UNDERWATER and show some clips of his most recent productions. Reproduced from in focus 40. Mar.1991 |
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