Underwater Shooting Info

When I entered the underwater industry, information seemed scattered/limited and leveling up took a lot of time and research. Nowadays, I’m always happy to share info with anyone interested in U/W work. After a while of hearing the same reasonable questions over and over, I figured I should start compiling some of the answers. So I put together this unlisted “Underwater 101” page with things I’ve learned along the way.

Here’s a porthole into the fantastical underwater world!

Where I Started

As I finished my last year of college, I began freelancing in the Boston industry. This was before a lot of the larger blockbusters and shows came into town, and I would jump at any job that got me on set including grip, script sup, and wedding photo gigs. I’d always had a special interest in underwater cinematography; it was rare in Boston but I was determined to learn. For my thesis I got permits to shoot at a YMCA pool, found a fireman to give me a scuba crash course, and bought a low-end housing for the school’s C300 (think ‘ziploc with a logo’). Despite the small scale, I did my research and did most things right. Insurance, lifeguards, a safety diver, a medic, 4 experienced grip divers and lots of margin in the schedule. Overall it was a great learning experience despite some cloudy pool water, low light and slow communication without a speaker system.

Around the time I moved to LA and joined local 600, I got scuba certified and took a Hydroflex class through the SOC. That class gave me the knowhow and confidence to start accepting formal underwater AC gigs. Word got around that I specialized in underwater and I found myself prepping at Hydroflex more and more often. More on that later. Nowadays, I co-teach the Hydroflex workshops and get called for lots of underwater unit work! (some of which is listed on my cluttered IMDB page)

PSA on Wireless Technology, Underwater:

It doesn’t work.

Film industry-standard wireless equipment can’t transmit through water. That includes prestons, WCUs, teradeks, and arri wifi control. We run cables for power, BNC and lens control, and an ethernet camera control connection if you can get it. If you’re using an app for camera control, you’ll have to lift the 90lb housing physically above the water’s surface for your phone to connect to change settings.

Underwater Housing Brands

The most common housings on my union sets are from Hydroflex, so this webpage is tailored to that system. There are other brands like Gates, EWA-Marine and Nauticam, but I don’t see those as often and many are aimed at independent ocean divers and prosumers.

I’ll include a section on my personally-owned AirSeaLand T-Bag to give some info about softshell housings, which can be used for shots at and near the water’s surface.

Flat and Dome Ports

I’ll get more into all the sections of a hydroflex housing shortly, but first I want to introduce you to the “port” - the front element made of strong, high clarity glass. Ports should be cleaned gently and protected, like lenses.

Flat ports are commonly used for surface-level work, because water is able to fall off cleanly. Because of underwater magnification, when using a flat port focus is cheated 25% closer and objects will appear 33% larger. That’s the reason for the “pinhead” effect where people’s bodies look massive. Another key use for a flat port is putting it on in place of the dome, which is a fast way of simulating a longer lens without making a time-consuming swap.

Dome ports are curved to cancel out the magnification, so a 21mm will look like a 21mm. However, the glass becomes an additional lens element almost like a diopter, and focus will read as somewhere between 12-20” for most shots. Speaking of, if your lenses can’t focus to around 12”, you’ll need to tape or clamp diopters onto the front in order to focus with a dome.

If you work on underwater 16 & 35mm film jobs like I sometimes do, focus pulling gets complicated because you can’t trust your monitor OR distance marks. Back in the old days they used to schedule a day just for calibrating lenses underwater. I’ve never been lucky enough to get that, even on high budget U/W film jobs, but it’s helpful to talk with production, the DP and the op about setting aside a few minutes for monitor marks, and being communicative if you need a moment to rehearse a shot and check sharps. One of my ops has focus stars on his fins for grabbing reference marks in a pinch.

Wide lenses 15-18mm work well because of the 25% magnification caused by flat ports, and regardless of the port the texture of the water will make your footage hazy if there's too much space between the camera and subject.

If you’re a nerd and want to know more, Hydroflex has more info on ports here.

Pre-pro Details

Here are some common underwater crew and expenses.

• An additional prep day for the underwater package. A hydroflex takes around 6 hours to thoroughly prep, so it’s not feasible for one person to also prep a complete camera package in one day.

• Lifeguard/medic

• Marine coordinator, safety divers, lifeguards, underwater G&E/rigging, operator, 1st and 2nd ACs who stay on land

• Scuba gear (Around $75 per person per day)

• Underwater insurance; many standard plans don’t cover submerging gear so that’s an add-on.

• Underwater expendables:

  • Rain-X. For coating the ports. The easiest way to spot an amateur underwater shoot is crazy water droplets in the foreground. (See Exhibit A.) When you put Rain-X on, the idea is to buff it clear with a lens tissue without wiping it all off; leave as much of a coating as you can.

  • Electrical tape. Doesn’t fall off like paper or gaff. Useful for taping together looms of the 100’ power and SDI cables, and for taping filters to the lens.

  • Zip ties and empty water bottles to act as buoys on the long cable. This won’t be needed for every shoot, it’s up to operator preference.

  • Rags and towels for drying the housing and tools

  • Rubber mats for the pool edge

  • A detailed spreadsheet of underwater and general expendables can be found here.

Prepping a Hydroflex

I can’t completely prepare you to prep a hydroflex, but I can give you an idea of the layout and what accessories to rent. The techs are used to walking ACs through the process and it’s a pleasant surprise for them if you already know the basics. Pete Romano, Hydroflex founder and underwater DP on Man of Steel, Inception, Minority Report, the list goes on, will often stop by your bay to chat. You’ll be in good hands!

Hydroflex advantages: Modular system, makes lens and camera adjustments fast when teched by an experienced AC. Cable options include direct SDI, as well as ethernet for constant camera settings control while underwater. Streamlined and customizable weight system, and time-tested/trusted by countless industry leaders.

See the lefthand photo with rectangles around each section.

YELLOW: The underwater monitor. Usually a SmallHD inside its own sealed case. Mounted to the green section with an ultralite. Cables go from this monitor into a port in the green section, and this is the one accessory that’s powered by an onboard gold mount inside the rig.

BLUE: You’re an expert on front ports by now! Each segment has four latches that should be fastened diagonally from each other, two at a time. And this isn’t the only time I’ll say this, but check the O ring in between each port every time you fasten latches. It should be clean and not cracked or dried out, and positioned neatly in the groove. Forget this once and the ship goes down.

GREEN: The main sled that holds the MDR, camera body and battery. See the photo on the right. This is the segment that mounts to the onboard monitor, and has ports for long power, camera control and SDI cables. There are also two water alarms that beep when in contact with water. You can test them by wetting your finger and touching the contact points.

ORANGE: The shell has no cable ports or “smart” tech, and it slides on as a last step in sealing the housing. There are four handle slots on this shell, as well as weight and cheeseplate options for rigging. There’s a phillips head screw in the top that opens a hole to release pressure after the housings are shipped. Make sure the screw is tight before it goes in the water.

• Here’s a basic Hydroflex order I sent in recently:

  • Alexa Mini housing

  • 4 handles (most ops use 4 handles instead of the standard 2)

  • Large flat and dome ports (extra charge, but work with far more lenses with no vignetting)

  • Large bright monitor (extra charge, but 20,000 leagues better than the older dim models)

  • Ethernet+SDI loom (ideally 2, but if only 1 is available I’ll gladly take it)

  • That one remaining 7-pin motor with a rotating lemo port, if available

  • Underwater speaker system, preferably with two mics (one for video village, one for me)

  • Preston FIZ system (my own, but Hydroflex does rent out FIZ systems)

  • Surface float

  • 3 VCLX batteries (can be sourced from camera rental house if that’s preferred, but they’re absolutely needed to run a hydroflex system.)

• And these are the items I’ll have production deliver to Hydroflex from the camera rental house. This is assuming that I’m prepping an underwater unit, not an entire camera package.

  • Alexa Mini body

  • Lenses (if not all are available for my U/W prep, I’ll at least need the two widest ones around 15-18mm)

  • 4 gold mount batteries (for the waterproof monitor, and my monitor)

  • 3 VCLX batteries (if not renting them from Hydroflex)

  • Clip-on 4.5 filter tray (for film cameras and others with no internal ND. Can be adapted for diopters on lenses with longer close focus)

  • AC monitor for testing signal, mapping lenses. (usually my own)

  • A scaling decimator like this one. SmallHD monitors and other video accessories sometimes dislike the feed coming out of the hydroflex ports (sometimes alternates between 1920x1080 and 1920x1079). If you hard line through the housing, it may be impossible without a decimator if you have smallHDs.

• For me, positioning the lens motors is always the hardest part of a hydroflex build. It’s a tight fit, but I make the most of the space with a motor on the top and bottom. To calibrate a Preston you have to reach far back inside to press the MDR button, as opposed to using a WCU which can trigger calibration from the hand unit. But since I’m team Preston, I’m happy to spend 30 more seconds calibrating.

• We “trim” for neutral buoyancy by adding weights to various points on the outside of the housing. This is especially crucial for sub-surface shoots; the operator doesn’t want to drag the housing up or down or fight against tilting. I’m not going to go into too much detail on trimming; it’s a hands-on thing. Hydroflex has a water tank and technicians happy to show you how.

• Cocoa, one of the shop dogs at Hydroflex, prefers butt scratches to head scratches.

Underwater Workflow

Here are some on-set best practices.

Pool Conditions / Staging

• Cold water is a fast way to cut your day short. Talent will shiver and go blue, and even operators in wetsuits can’t stay nimble in frigid water forever. The ideal I usually hear is between 88-90 degrees. Some operators will reasonably discuss a stunt adjustment for working in cold water.

• Anything that shouldn't get wet should be further than splash distance from the pool. Each monitor stand should be at least its height distance away from the edge so if someone kicks it over, it won't land in the pool.

• No one should go swimming who doesn’t strictly need to, it’ll get cloudy. Discourage G&E from dropping non-underwater sandbags in (and if they do, LEAVE THEM THERE until the shoot is wrapped. picking them up can release a cloud of mud).

• G&E should have GFCIs on all distro. Ground Fault Circuit Interrupters will shut off the power if they detect water and prevent anyone in the pool from being electrocuted if a light falls in. This has happened with varying degrees of severity to almost every underwater op I know.

• A teradek transmitter outside the pool is a great way to run video village to feel the most similar to what everyone's used to. Just put it on a stand instead of on the camera, and run the hydroflex SDI cable to it.

Communication

• You’re probably getting the picture that shooting underwater is slower, or at least more involved. If the DP changes their mind on a lens, pulling the housing out of the water and swapping can take a solid 5 minutes, whereas on a dry shoot it might have been done in 30 seconds. Production needs to plan for this, and communication between departments is crucial.

• Speaking of, if the operator’s head is underwater you need a speaker system to communicate with the op. Without it, the shoot will slow to molasses pace because the operator has to resurface for every small instruction. Hydroflex rents U/W speakers for a reasonable rate. They are gold mount battery-powered and easy to use.

• I’ve seen either the AD or the DP take the lead on talking into the speaker. Either way works, as long as it’s not too many voices at once. If the above-the-liners wander off to talk about the next shot, I’ll take the mic and let the submerged operator know what’s happening.

• With a speaker system, if someone asks a question to the underwater op they can answer by “nodding” or “shaking” the camera up/down or side-to-side. (I.e. DP: “Let’s do a take framed wider. Are you set?” Operator: Nods the camera. DP: “Great, she’ll be diving again in 3…2…1…”)

• If the operator is underwater and makes a pinching gesture in front of the lens, that means roll the camera (scissors motion to cut). There are usually some wildcard charades involved at some point, as the operator tries to sign that they need a mark, want the volume louder, or enjoy salsa dancing (that’s my best guess from one series of gestures from the op on my last job…?).

• As the 1st AC on the surface, we’re the op’s eyes and ears (and voice). Most of the underwater speakers are similar to walkies in quality; you have to keep it simple and talk loudly into the mic. Directors will sometimes get carried away talking about their artistic vision on the com system, and need to be respectfully asked to rephrase their message into one clear sentence.

• When the operator surfaces, they sometimes like to hear things I’ve observed from my above-water vantage point. For example, “There were oohs and ahhs when we grabbed that 50/50 of the bubbles, they might like more of that” or “I heard the DP say he wants a tighter version, in case you want to suggest switching ports.”

Pool Handoffs

• Always dummy check. Test that the ports are secure, cables watertight, safeties safetied. If your 2nd AC or even the op helpfully closes a latch, let them know you’d rather take care of that. You don’t want your brain to peripherally be ok with only closing three latches. Check that there’s an O ring between each section. Make sure the pressure screw is tight.

• An alexa mini in a standard hydroflex housing weighs 80-90 pounds. Carrying it is a two-person job, and so is handing it down from the edge of the pool. No exceptions. Otherwise you risk scraping the housing, dropping the rig on your operator, and hurting your back. And let’s be real your back is already not doing too hot.

• Hand the rig down glass port first to avoid bumping the element on the pool edge.

• Between carrying the housing, hoisting it in and out of the pool, and appreciative bear hugs from your cam op, you will definitely get wet. I swear by my waterproof socks and bring a change of clothes for the drive home.

• Before opening a housing after it’s been swimming, make sure to towel off the outside and make sure the monitor isn’t saving a little stash of water to dump on the camera.

Other Notes

• If you have a basic working knowledge of scuba equipment, you might be able to assist the operator with small things like changing tanks and dummy-checking their gear.

• It’s easy to get dehydrated when scuba diving. I usually line up some water bottles along the side of the pool.

• People on the crew who are new to underwater work will often make comments like "oh man this is nerve wracking, all that expensive gear underwater??” It's our job to inspire trust and confidence at all times. "All in a day's work" mentality. If you show nerves or uncertainty, it will spread.

My Set Work Station

I like to have a tarp designated as the "splash zone" near my camera cases, where I can store wet towels, floats, weights, and anything that’s not actively needed on set.

Here’s how I organize my U/W cart for hydroflex shoots. Top shelf: Housing with camera. Tools, kimtechs, rain-x, spare batteries and other junk. Bottom shelf: Weights for adjusting the trim. Also the bulky loom of cables, coiled to easily unwind as we walk to the pool. And the VCLX battery, which is the one thing on the bottom shelf that I’m careful not to get wet.

Specialization: Ocean Shooting

I’ll add to this section if I start working on more union ocean jobs, but so far I’ve ended up mainly 1st ACing poolside.🍹 Based on the shoreline shoots I’ve worked on so far, here are some tips:

• The smaller the better. An a7S gets battered about a LOT less than an Alexa LF, and you’ll be mobile so might get better shots anyway.

• Bring a boogie board or float to rest the housing on.

• No housing should be hit head-on by a wave. There are shots in this Finisterre spot that I assistant operated on, that were sketch for this reason.

• Neutral or only slightly positive buoyancy lets you duck under waves, rather than get smacked.

• If there’s any unpredictable surf, don’t mess with cables running from the rig. Too dangerous if anything gets swept away or dragged into the ocean.

• Most of these tips boil down to: Keep It Simple.

AirSeaLand Housing

I own a splashbag called an AirSeaLand T-Bag. I got it while I was working at AbelCine LA - they were phasing out their underwater stock and I was able to completely rebuild and customize the housing. It has fewer features than a hydroflex, but works great for many types of underwater shoots. The AirSeaLand housing is a fully-sealed case made of heavy-duty plastic, silicone and metal with a flat glass front element. It has cable ports for running long BNC to the surface, and focus and R/S can be cabled but is usually done manually by the operator via a side compartment.

The AirSeaLand housing is a good fit for surface-level and just-under-the-surface shots. . An alexa mini setup weighs ~35 lbs, compared to a hydroflex’s 90.

Arri wifi control on a tablet or phone will save lots of time opening the bag to change settings, and can often trigger run/stop for surface-level shooting.

Here’s what I usually request on the camera order. Most of these items will already be on the main package.

• Minimalist camera build on one standard baseplate (i.e. BP-9), with small to medium primes.

• Long 100’ BNC (4)

• A monitor in the housing on the smart side. Should be sharp enough for focus pulling, so 702 brights work well. If you can get a 5” that’s sharp enough for basic pulling, even better.

• Various noga / ultralite arm size options for positioning this monitor

• An extra weight belt from the scuba rental house, for trim

Q&A

Do you scuba dive / underwater camera operate?

Why yes! I’m PADI Open Water certified and I’ve racked up some underwater operating credits on narrative, commercial and documentary projects. For jobs I consider, I always spend time making sure they’re a really good fit. I don’t compromise on safety, communication and pre-pro. I avoid jobs that involve too many “run and gun” elements, risky ocean conditions, operating on my own without an AC, and ones that seem hurried or lacking in responsiveness from the production team. It’s possible to produce low budget underwater scenes, but that has to involve good planning.

Where can I see some of the stuff you’ve been working on?

Glad you asked! Here are some recent selects, followed by stills from projects I operated on.

“DFMU” Ella Mai | Music Video | 1st AC, Main and Underwater Units

“Breathe” Whoop | Commercial | 1st AC, Underwater Unit

"Lion Hearted” Finisterre | Commercial | Assistant Underwater Operator

Water Horse | Short Film | Underwater Operator

Smartfin | Short Documentary | Underwater Operator

Offcuts | Short Film | Underwater DP

My Face is Not My Own | Short Film (in post) | Underwater Operator

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe | Feature Film | 1st AC, Underwater Unit

Can you recommend exactly 7 instagram accounts that will inspire me on my underwater journey?

That’s oddly specific, but sure:

Hydroflex Official | A great way to stay updated on the latest underwater tech and the blockbusters that are using it, as well as the major players in the world of underwater operating and ACing.

Ian Takahashi | High-profile union underwater operator. Credits include Us, The Suicide Squad, Scandal, and The Neon Demon.

Bobby Settlemire | Another accomplished pro. Credits include Avatar 2 and 3, Roma, Jurassic World, and The Revenant.

Justin Lutsky | NY-based underwater photographer who is always inventing new ways to photograph models and props.

Tom Boyd | Underwater DP and operator, known for unscripted shows like Shark Week and Fear Factor.

Chad Shagren | Hydroflex tech who takes cool (/terrifying) closeup shark photos.

Ade Gorst (Busterlung) | Diver and cartoonist who posts comic strips about underwater shoots.

If you’ve made it this far, you must be pretty serious about working underwater!

Feel free to reach out with any questions. This is a lot to digest but hopefully it sheds some light on the process as you dive in!