Something a little different from the norm … The carbon tax launch by the Australian Government last Sunday was the catalyst for a visit to the outer Great Barrier Reef at the request of the pic editor at the Australian newspaper.
The requested image – an underwater reefscape – was to accompany a story on the carbon tax and the reef conundrum – the reef desperately needs measures like carbon tax to put a halt to global warming and ensure it’s survival … but any tax may make the reef more expensive for reef tourism operators and therefore less accessible to reef visitors. The jobs of crew and dive staff may also be in jeopardy in the future.
The full story penned by journo Sarah Elks – and the image (also below) – can be found here in the Australian on-line edition.
I travelled to the outer reef with Tusa Dive on their vessel Tusa5. Their relatively young and enthusiastic crew and staff were extremely professional and amazingly helpful and my ‘wishlist’ was attended to very efficiently.
Special mention must go to my long suffering dive buddy/instructor/sitter – Lindy – who showed amazing patience with a wayward non-certified diver!
For anyone interested in such things, the image was made on a Nikon D3S with lens focal length at about 20mm … and the kit nestled rather worryingly inside my German made Ewa-Marine U-BXP10 (flexible) housing. No idea now of exposure settings although they would be in the EXIF data. (actually looked it up … 640asa, 250 @ 5.6, bit of fill flash)
Image © Brian Cassey 2011
