We are underwater photographers: we go diving to picture the wonders which lie beneath the surface of oceans, seas, lakes and rivers. We realise it's a privilege to be able to visit the underwater world on a regular basis. We humbly hope that our photos will help the wider public learn more of the oceans, grow love for its inhabitants and, ultimately, willingness to protect them.
Our journey
We started diving in 2007, getting certified in Bass Point (NSW, Australia), and then spent nearly 10 years diving the Mediterranean sea (south of France), the Red Sea, South Africa and South East Asia. In 2017, we relocated in Sydney, where we now do a majority of our diving. We feel privileged to have access to 20+ shore dives, and such a diversity of marine life, all in a 5 million inhabitants city. Sydney diving never ceases to amaze us. Of course, Sydney is also a great base to enjoy the wider Australian diving scene, and a gateway to the South Pacific region.
WITH REBREATHERS
We have moved from traditional scuba gear in 2011, and have been diving rEvo rebreathers for the vast majority of our dives since then. Nicolas also uses a Mares Horizon rebreather since 2021, which is his preferred choice for travel and some of our local dives. By mid-2022, we had spent a total of 1550 hours taking photos while on a rebreather (1000 hours for Nicolas, 550 hours for Lena). Nowadays our typical dive is 3 hours long, with our bottom time rather limited by our surface obligations than by anything else :-)
All-in-one, cumulating rebreather and open-circuit diving, we have more than 2000 hours taking photos underwater.
For photography
When we dive together, we either have one camera each, to cover both wide-angle and macro subjects in the same dive, or, one of us will assist the other, searching for critters, helping with creative lighting techniques, or just modelling. Our current cameras are a Nikon D500 and a Nikon D810, both in Nauticam housings, and at present we use a combination of Retra UWT, Inon and Backscatter strobes.
With our technical diving mindset and never ending search for new ways to photograph the underwater world, we push our equipment to its limits, and as such, we have collaborated with manufacturers for field-testing of new products. In turn, we have authored deep-dive equipment reviews, which help photographers decide whether a piece of equipment is right for them.
Nicolas has been teaching underwater photography since 2020, ands will release his new underwater photography courses in early 2023.