Night Colors Explode Bonaire's Salt Pier (HDR version) ep. 38 | A Diver's Life

Have you have dove Bonaire's Salt Pier. What to know where to look to see the cool stuff and where all the colors are. Well, the time to do that is at night. This episode we take you to Bonaire's Salt Pier (also called the Cargill Salt Pier) at night and we show you where to see all the cool stuff. You need really good lights and you need to look places where you would not normally look. The result is a color explosion that is off the charts. In this episode you will see work done to reattach colorful sponges to the rig, see what creatures are living in and around them, you will see a light show in the water column as well,. You will see green turtles, squid, a comb jelly, slipper lobsters, a honeycomb cowfish and our resident buoyancy control supervisor, Charlie, that swims underneath you to make sure your buoyancy is just right. The episode is packed with color and much more.
(This upload supports High Dynamic Range. The original upload had a glitch that prevented HDR from running on all supporting devices)
Salt Pier Sponge reattachment video “We Be Sponge’n”
• We Be Sponge'n
=== Chapters ====
0:00 Monologue
2:32 A Diver's Life Intro 2023
3:34 Opening Coming up On the Pier
3:59 Swim up the Pilings
4:44: A Light Show in the Water Column
5:13 The top of the Platform
5:23 The Sea Floor
7:35 Life within the Scattered Pore Rope Sponges
9:42 Checking out the Sponge Attachments
10:35 Time to head in
11:16 Tarpon and Silverside Invasion
=====
Music:
Blue - Eklo feat. Jordin Laine (RFM youtube)
Everergreem Fields - Tape Machine (Epidemic Sound)
Maps - August Wilhelmsson (Epidemic Sound)
Rainbow Fall - Lama House (Epidemic Sound)
Ocean Air - Aerian (Epidemic Sound)
The Village Welcoming - Adrriel Fair (Epidemic Sound)
Sound Effects. - Epidemic Sound
Video equipment:
Sony A7sIII camera
Sony A7siii
Nauticam housing
Sony FE 28-60 F/4.5.6 lens
Sony FE 90mm F 2.8 Macro G OSS Lens
Nauticam Nauticam Wet Wide Lens 1B (WWL-1B)
Atomos Ninja V+ Big Blue 15000 Lumen Lights
IPhone 12 Pro Max
Cinematography, Photography, Monolog, Script, Narration, Post Production - Rich Schwerdtfeger
Divers:
Doreen Schwerdtfeger
#bonairediving #oceanconservation #adiverslife

[@crockwave]

Beautiful video and beautiful people 😉

[@ADiversLife]

Thank you and back at you Curtis. We had a wonderful time with both of you. Good luck with your new place!

[@frankscarabino3597]

Hey Doreen and Rich: Up here in Alaska. Missed Bonaire this year but back soon. Beautiful colors. We too have found Salt Pier with the most vibrant colors anywhere in Bonaire. Nice Boat. Thanks to both for replanting the coral and helping keeping Bonaire healthy. What's with the bleaching? Frank and Elisabeth

[@ADiversLife]

Hi Frank, Alaska? Cool! Thank you so much!bleaching is only minor right now. We do expect bleaching to pick up with this year’s super El Niño. We miss you guys!

[@frankscarabino3597]

OK Elisabeth said the sponges 😂

[@ADiversLife]

Yes the sponges. :-) Although Doreen does clean the coral trees reef here for reef restoration.

[@johnmontgomery2735]

Great video as always Rich. Everybody raves about Salt Pier being a great must do dive. However Ive dive there 6 times 2 of wich were night dives and never found anything that interesting. Your video certainly contradicts that. Maybe I just need to slow down and look around a bit.

[@ADiversLife]

Hi John, Thank you. You know I am in a constant state of learning myself. The thing I am doing more of is learning marine life behavior. This effects when, where, and how Doreen and I approach marine life. For example, my friend Steve (the photographer in the intro who gives me the look about not notifying him about the shark) was following a barjack that had changed its color to black. It did this for camouflage as it was following a hunting octopus leaving it scraps. Follow the barjack and find an octopus. Seahorses like to hide in rope sponges as they can grab on with their tail and so on. They also don’t like bright lights. Eagle rays don’t like lights at all so if you want to film them shut them off and learn to film in the ambient light.

[@bobherrick4927]

I also enjoyed the video, Rich. Is this your first HDR video? If yes, I see an opportunity for another good "tech video", on learnings from taking and editing HDR content...:-) - Bob

[@ADiversLife]

Hi Bob, it is and it is not. This version of this episode was released due to a glitch in the video editing software where it failed to generate an HDR version that would render the full dynamic range in a browser. Our first HDR video was released a year ago when we released Bonaire’s Red Slave Rays. Yet, although it was released in HDR, the intro (left the corporate world … ) was not. You may have noticed the new intro being significantly sharper and with far better color. The big challenge has been editing HDR content as Adobe Premier Pro ( my video editor) has had ongoing problems working with it over the last year, especially on Apple silicon due to extent of the tools needed to edit underwater content. Consequently, I have been working with Premier Pro beta versions and their tech support team the whole last year uncovering bugs the tech team was not aware of. So, your suggestion makes sense but I would like to get a more stable production release of Premier Pro before I take viewers on the HDR path. I have a tech background as a former CTO at IBM and am used to dealing with beta software instabilities. I realized over a year ago that HDR was the way to go as Apple and Google mobile devices were heading there as were OLED TVs. Also, KZbin supports it. You need to start with a camera that will shoot it - Apple Pro level IPhones, my Sony A7siii camera and so on. The good thing for viewers of this channel will experience videos that just keep getting better and better. Thank you for your comments and suggestions. We need to hear them.

[@bobherrick4927]

@@ADiversLife Thanks, Rich. I just got a MacBook Pro with with an XDR display, so I'm looking forward to re-watching with higher dynamic range. On a different note, I had two other questions: 1) What lumen level do you use for filming at night? It's something you touch on in the narration of the video, and I was wondering about even before you mentioned it. 2) I know you bought your new boat to be able to go to Curacao, although I was taken aback by how much filling it up at the dock cost when you first got the boat. I assume this is one consideration keeping you closer to home? (Maybe not too much difference in marine life over there being a second consideration?). Just curious what your latest plans are for longer trips with the new boat.

[@ADiversLife]

@@bobherrick4927 Hi Bob, so I have 15,000 lumen lights but I run them on the lowest setting which is around 5000 lumen and move them way out. These lights have a 160 degree range so think about the angle of your lights when setting their position. Farther out also eliminates backscatter. I also try to get as close to the subject as is possible. If the lumens are too high marine also does not like it. It is always a tightrope to walk. Now If I want to illuminate a wreck then I kick up the intensity depending on the marine life around and water clarity. As for the boat, remember that you have to drain your tanks to 1/4 full before shipping so the first fill is insane. Odyssey has two 150 gallon tanks (one per engine). Fuel here is insanely high. Yes this is a consideration but also are the sea levels. You want to go to Curacao in the fall when the winds are down as the waves coming back to Bonaire can be quite high. Right now I am working logistics to take our boat out to the east coast. There are no moorings and the winds are driven in from the east. You need a second captain on the boat. Bonaire's east coast is actually better than Curacao. So, this is my first consideration. Also, I am quite busy. I am working on a documentary for someone as well as a submittal to a dive show in the US. We hope to pull the boat out in the next month for service as well.