High Tide Aquatics

Some photos of Belize Hol Chan Marine Reserve using an Olympus 1030SW

mike1962

mike1962

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Hi All,

Just returned from a trip to Belize. It was my first time there and had a great time. For the trip I bought an Olympus 1030SW point and shoot camera for about $280 to take underwater pics. It worked great up until it decided that the battery door was open and promptly died. Thing was, the battery door wasn't open as far as I could tell. At any rate, here's a few pictures of Hol Chan Marine Reserve from a snorkelers prospective. Hope you enjoy.

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And yes, I did use photoshop to bring back the color by adding in the red spectrum that is filtered out by sea water. Here's an example of a before and after shot.
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This is non-photoshoped
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Same image with the red added back in, some leveling, and sharpening.
 
Great pictures!

My mom told me stories of those needle nosed fish (don't know if it is the same species but it reminded me of this) jumping out of the water and stabbing fishermen/people looking over the boat in the eye. She worked in the opthalmology dept.
 
Very nice pictures! What exactly happened with the camera? I just received the same model I ordered and was planning on using it for snorkling when we go to the Bahamas next month. Did it just turn off once or is it not working at all anymore?
I have been wanting to try it first in my tank to take some underwater pictures of my corals but I am kind of hesitant to do it now.
 
Belize was great. My girlfriend and I were there for 8 days which really wasn't long enough. I'm completely ready to go back again for a longer stay. I found the people of Belize to be easy going and laid back and helpful when help was needed. The only place that wasn't quite as friendly was Belize City, but that is to be somewhat expected given it's big city status. We stayed on the island Caye Caulker in house there with a couple friends and it ended up being cheaper than a trip to Hawaii. Caye Caulker is small, there aren't paved roads (just hard-packed reef sand), and people get around via golfcarts, bicycling or walking. Hol Chan Marine Reserve was about half an hour from Caye Caulker via boat with a guide. I was happy to see that Hol Chan is patrolled by the government, and while we were there a boat came up to ours and made sure that the guide had paid all the entry fees and that everything was in order. I was later told by one of the locals on Caye Caulker that the marine reserve just 5 minuted out,off Caye Caulker, wasn't so protected and this was confirmed when we took a half day trip out there. The large schools of fish, and larger fish just weren't there like they were at Hol Chan. The local told me that fisherman go out a night and fish the reef and then sell to the local restaurants to feed the tourists. Another thing that I noticed is that at a number of restaurants they were serving Lobsters that were way undersized. There apparently is fishing co-op that regulates the size, but nothing prevents the fisherman from selling directly to a restaurant and bypassing the co-op. Tourism was down significantly while we were there, and from the fishes perspective I thought this might give a small small window for the populations to recover somewhat.
 
Lyn,

The guide said that the Needle mouthed fish eat the sea grass. He plucked some of the grass, threw it to the surface, and sure enough they went right for it.

Alve,

Now that I know what I know, I recommend turning on the camera before entering the water. If the door isn't closed it will tell you then, and you won't have to worry about having it get wet. I made the mistake of not turning it on until I was already in the water. It had worked on three occasions while snorkeling, and I actually had a skin on the camera to prevent accidental opening of the battery door. Perhaps it really wasn't completely closed, but by all appearances it looked fine. At this point the camera is toast. I'm looking into the Warranty but not holding my breath.
 
oh man those look a thousand times better than my walmart underwater camera shots... next time I'm going to the tropics I'm totally buying one of those cameras!
 
Thanks for the comments guys. Yes, totally worth getting the camera considering that it's under $300. Just make sure to turn the camera on before entering the water. Also, a little knowledge of photoshop helps bring out the colors as well. I ended up creating an Action in PS that I could use to apply to all the pics, as it's about a 12 step process otherwise. I you guys ever need the Action just ask.
 
Thanks for the warning about the camera use! I will try to take some underwater pictures of my corals tomorrow and see how it goes.
 
Yeah, my Maui Ocean Center pics everything is over saturated blue, kind of like taking a picture of your tank with only blue bulbs on, and there were a LOT of pictures, so did the actions to get rid of it, they loaded all 100 or so pictures (yeah my computer was going kind of slow :D) then repeat on all pictures and wammo!
 
Very cool pictures. I love that Olympus Camera. I first saw one being used by Dr. Le over at Aquatic Gallary taking pictures and video with the camera in the water. I was so impressed I picked up one the next day from best buy. I have heard though that if you use it in water a lot to expect to ruin it at one point so get the service agreement. I look forward to taking some great shots to post as I get my SPS tank up and running.
 
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