Adventure Archives - Page 17 of 23 - Books by Eric Douglas

Making a Diveheart training program

November 18, 2013 By Eric Douglas

From 1998 to present day, I’ve developed adult education training programs, mostly for the recreational dive industry. I’ve participated in photo and video shoots, and written scripts to teach people to use everything from AEDs to Dry Suits and a lot of stuff in between. Working with Diveheart to produce training videos to teach Adaptive Dive Buddies and Adaptive Scuba Instructors how to work with divers with disabilities was definitely a new one for me, though.

Probably the most important skill a prospective Adaptive Dive Buddy learns is empathy. It takes an amazing amount of nerve for an adaptive diver to trust her Adaptive Dive Buddies to care for her underwater. Day-to-day, a person who uses a wheel chair might rely on others for help, but failure to receive that help does not result in the person drowning. Or suffering through the pain and trauma of a burst ear drum. Or any number of other potential problems.

The second most important skill is handling task loading and stress in the water. As an Adaptive Dive Buddy for a disabled diver, you have to be ready to take care of your own buoyancy and equalization, while handling buoyancy and equalization for the Adaptive Diver as well. With the Diveheart system, you’re never alone in the water with an Adaptive Diver, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to be prepared for emergency situations.

To simulate the potential challenges Adaptive Dive Buddies will face, we filmed (above and below water) divers with blacked out masks or with their legs strapped together and their arms immobilized. There is nothing that will teach empathy more effectively than taking a diver underwater without any ability to swim, control his own situation or even pinch his own nose to equalize. Once you’ve lived through that once, you will forever have a healthy respect for what an Adaptive Diver does every dive.

To capture the video and still images we need for the manuals and online training, we brought in two industry experts. There is practically no one better at shooting video in the Florida Keys than Frazier Nivens. He has years and years of experience shooting in the local waters, equally distributed between shooting critters and divers. Ken Berry worked for 15 years as the Executive Producer at PADI and then a few years at DAN and now for himself at LivingWater Media. No one in the dive industry knows more about producing training videos and organizing divers to perform, and repeat, skills above and below water.

We shot video for a week in the Keys, including a day and a half on dive boats provided by DJ Wood at Rainbow Reef. The staff there was great and really in tune with the needs of Diveheart and Adaptive Divers. Every time you see three divers on the screen, there are at least five people in the water including the three divers, the director and the camera man. Often, there were seven or eight to make sure everything was done correctly and to capture behind the scenes photographs and video at the same time.

One of the most amazing parts of this process was that the on-camera divers were all volunteers. They were all Diveheart Instructors and Adaptive Dive Buddies who donated their time to polish up their skills at a dress-rehearsal and then even more time to spend time underwater being put through the proverbial dive-ringer to perform and repeat skills underwater. They had to do skills over and over, allowing the camera to capture “establishing shots” (wide angle) and then the same scene from medium and then close up to allow for “cut-aways”.

Often, when you are teaching, if you sit back and pay attention, you can get more than you give. This was one of those situations for me. I learned so much from the divers who gave their time to volunteer for this unique organization it was incredible. And I realize just how much every day.

This is the second of three blog posts about Diveheart and the development of a ground-breaking set of training materials to train adaptive divers and adaptive dive buddies and instructors to learn to scuba dive. The first installment Diveheart: Imagine the Possibilities (November 13), discussed the idea of taking Adaptive Divers diving. The third installment (November 25) will include lessons I’ve learned from working with Elliot and some of the Adaptive Divers I’ve met through Diveheart.

On November 25, I’ll also be releasing a new Jackson Pauley/Withrow Key short story with a character inspired by Diveheart. The story is called Caesar’s Gold..

Diveheart: Imagine the Possibilities

November 13, 2013 By Eric Douglas

Jim Elliott’s mantra is “Imagine the Possibilities.” He doesn’t just say it over and over, though. He lives it.

In 2001, Elliott founded Diveheart as a volunteer, nonprofit organization to help people with disabilities learn to scuba dive. Diveheart began in Chicago, but Elliott has taught classes in more than 200 cities in the United States and even more around the world. Diveheart has served as a conduit for thousands of people with disabilities to learn to dive, or divers and dive instructors to be adaptive dive buddies and instructors.

About a year ago, Elliott contacted me about creating new training materials for Diveheart Adaptive Scuba Instructors and Adaptive Dive Buddies to use to train Adaptive Divers. Adaptation is what it is all about. Adaptive Divers adapt to their individual situations and adapt standard scuba skills to their own abilities. If they can perform those standard skills with adaptations, they become certified scuba divers. If they need assistance with skills such as ear clearing, swimming or regulator recovery and clearing, for example, they will earn a Diveheart Adaptive Diver certification and will dive with two Adaptive Dive Buddies.

For Elliott, the magic comes when he takes someone from their wheelchair and gets them in the water. It doesn’t have to be an amazing reef or some mysterious shipwreck. Life-changing experiences happen every day in a pool. Adaptive Divers experience weightlessness and freedom in the water and then start thinking about all the other things they can do. Diveheart also works with disabled veterans. Often, these veterans are depressed and have feelings of loss following amputations. In the water, these men and women feel “whole” and realize they can do anything. Elliott says he often sees changes happen after a single session.

The project has included hundreds of hours of editing, revision and discussion. It took two trips to Florida for me to understand exactly what it takes for Adaptive Divers to dive. The hardest part for me was comprehending the level of bravery and trust. Imagine trusting your dive buddies so much that you will jump in the water and make a dive without the ability to swim on your own, or pinch your own nose to clear your ears. There are blind divers who experience the thrill of being weightless, but have to trust their buddies enough to willingly step out and fall into the water. The fear of drowning could be overwhelming, but these divers do it anyway; for the adventure and for the opportunity to have new experiences.

In May, we spent a week in Key Largo shooting training video segments at the Jacobs Aquatics Center and on a dive boat donated for our efforts by Rainbow Reef Dive Center. The staff and boat crew from Rainbow Reef, under the direction of owner DJ Wood, provided tremendous service and joined in on the shoot, holding reflectors and serving as on-screen talent.

Rather than being exclusive or proprietary with these materials, Elliott plans to make them available to the entire dive industry for use as reference tools for any dive instructor or buddy who works with Adaptive Divers and wants to learn from Diveheart, and Elliott’s, experience. The project is in its final stages. Some last minute edits and the Adaptive Diver and Adaptive Scuba Instructor and Dive Buddy manuals will soon be available, along with an online training system for use by adaptive dive buddies and instructors. Last week, I joined Elliott, Wilhelmina Stanton and a few volunteers at the Diveheart booth at the DEMA Show in Orlando, Florida to announce the program and begin talking to the dive industry about the new program and materials. The response was overwhelmingly positive.

This is the first of three blog posts about Diveheart and the development of a ground-breaking set of training materials to train adaptive divers and adaptive dive buddies and instructors to learn to scuba dive. Next week (November 18), I’ll talk about the video shoot process for filming training materials and the third installment (November 25) will include lessons I’ve learned from working with Elliott and some of the Adaptive Divers I’ve met through Diveheart.

I’ll also be releasing a new Jackson Pauley/Withrow Key short story with a character inspired by Diveheart. The story is called Caesar’s Gold..

Visiting the Manassas battlefields

October 27, 2013 By Eric Douglas

The civil war was a truly terrible time in American history. A young nation nearly tore itself apart, brother fighting against brother and father against son. We should never forget those who died on both sides and the sacrifices made to keep this country whole.

I thought it was interesting that after the battle, most of the dead were buried in shallow graves on site. After the war, most of the Union soldiers were transferred to Arlington National Cemetery and the Confederate dead were buried in a local cemetery.

For West Virginians, this is the battlefield where native son “Stonewall” Jackson earned his nickname.

Queen Conch short story features Mike Scott

October 14, 2013 By Eric Douglas

The fifth story in the Withrow Key series of short story adventures has two guest characters and sets the stage, in terms of character development, for the novel Wreck of the Huron.

Mike Scott, the hero of all four of my dive adventure novels is passing through Withrow Key and decides to drop in on his old friend Jackson Pauley. Everything is going fine until Sarah shows up. She is an environmentalist with a story that both men have trouble believing, but something about her convinces Mike to help her out and check out the story she is telling. From there, things really get interesting.

Without spoiling the story, Sarah shows up in Wreck of the Huron as a researcher on board a university research vessel with mysteries of its own.

Queen Conch

Queen Conch is a protected species in the United States, but smugglers are catching them close to Withrow Key for restaurants in Miami. In the process, they are tearing up the coral reefs and creating an environmental disaster. It is up to Jackson Pauley and Randy Littlebear to determine if this is simply an illegal fishing operation or if there is something bigger going on. Is someone making a land grab to build condos on Withrow Key?

This is the fifth Withrow Key adventure short story. Set on a bypassed key in the Florida Keys, life moves a little slower and a little weirder.

Each story in the Withrow Key adventure short story series features scuba diving, adventure, boats, the ocean and mystery along with beautiful locations and scenery. Jackson Pauley and Randy Littlebear get a visit from Mike Scott, international news photographer and the main character from the Mike Scott adventure series.

Queen Conch is available as a FREE Kindle download October 14 and 15. Get your copy today while the offer lasts!.

Capture life around you

September 18, 2013 By Eric Douglas

Street photography makes a comeback

street photo 1 — This barely qualifies as street photography and is not in the same category as Maier or others like her.

If you’ve never heard of Vivian Maier, and you are even remotely interested in photography, do yourself a favor and Google her. No, she isn’t some star photographer or celebrity who takes “selfies” and posts them all over the web. She actually died before she was ever discovered.

Maier was, by all accounts, a very solitary woman. She worked most of her adult life as a nanny in Chicago. In her off time, she walked the streets taking photographs of people and places. She didn’t do it for a publication or fame. She did it for the love of the art. In the process, she captured historic landmarks and events in time that were thought lost.

Earlier this year, the Chicago Sun-Times fired its entire photographic staff with plans to teach their reporters the basics of iPhone photography. Many television stations air video footage from accidents taken by bystanders with their phones. The cameras in our smart phones are surprisingly good. And they are everywhere. Most people don’t even notice them anymore.

Adequate resolution does not make for a quality photograph, however. It is about framing, it is about composition and lighting. Photography is about capturing the moment. That takes practice, diligence and patience. One of my favorite quotes is from Henri Cartier-Bresson, a French photographer considered by many to be the father of photojournalism. “Your first 10,000 photographs are your worst.” (I’ve probably shot more than 50,000 photographs and some days I still wonder what I’m doing.)

In some ways, the internet and digital cameras have cheapened the way we look at photography. Images are so ubiquitous they are disregarded. Digital photography also makes it easy to delete images we don’t like, erasing a record of awkward moments. Maier was discovered when collector John Maloof bought a container of negatives at auction after she died. Now that Maloof has reconstructed approximately 90 percent of her work, Maier’s “work is part of a renaissance in interest in the art of street photography.”

Good images and good photography will always have a place. Whatever tool you use, be it a DSLR, a mirrorless digital or a camera phone, street photography is about capturing unposed moments in people’s lives. It isn’t about embarrassing or exploiting, but honoring those lives with photography.

Out in the world, where everyone you meet has character and a story to tell, more street photographers need to be out like Maier. Local celebrities and the politicians get photographed regularly, but the average person on the street is much more interesting. There are street scenes and faces in every little town begging to be photographed. Doing so, you capture a little bit of local history.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to charge my camera battery..