Wishing you a lovely Christmas and New Year

I really can't believe that another year has passed so quickly ... where on earth did it go to? So here is a special, special thank you to all my guests and to those who I have met travelling this year who have made it such a special year. I still can't believe how well my course guests have done with winning prizes, and another well done to Dave Baker, Dave Martin, Libby, Lin Henson, Ian Palmer, Alan Thomas and Daniel Norwood for doing such a sterling job! Wishing you all and your families a beautiful Christmas, a wonderful New Year and may 2012 bring you all you wish for and much, much more .... Can't wait to hear of all of your photo adventures already, so don't forget to look me up on Facebook and share them! See you in 2012!

Printing Your Photos On Canvas

So in amongst the craziness of moving belongings from London to Yorkshire, ploughing through paperwork, sending out DVDs and books I also picked up a my beloved large format printer again so that I could get back to printing guests' photos onto canvas! And it didn't disappoint with a gorgeous dazzling 12 ink colour system to really bring out the vibrancy of my guests photos. Here are a few of the prints which I have made for guests as Christmas gifts .... And here is the comment from Graeme Lockwood on receiving his! "Maria, received my canvas prints of the zebra lionfish and the wonderpus and they are fantastic! I am delighted with the way they have turned out especially considering the 'quality' of my original pics, lol, many thanks" I've really loved making these and am looking forward to getting back into the studio to finish making Lisa's order all ready for the New Year!

Alan Thomas wins Sport Diver Photo of the Month

I found this out on exactly the same day as my book started its journey across the pond to California! Alan Thomas wrote me a lovely email to say thank you for the advice which he picked up from my talk at the Dive Show at the Birmingham NEC in October and that it had helped him to win Sport Diver's Photo of the Month competition, taking it to Guest Number 6 and my third one this year! Unbelievable .... I will be posting the winning photograph of an octopus together with the letter that he wrote. Really am super touched and what a beautiful Christmas Gift ..... Thanks so much Alan for doing so amazingly well!

Underwater Photography Book heads to the USA

Tuesday 13th December is also a day that I will never forget! Backscatter in Monterey, California, whom I met at DEMA, the Dive Industry's largest trade show in the world a few weeks earlier, called me to ask if I could send them 20 copies of my book urgently as they had sold out! That night was spent personally signing every copy for my new american friends across the pond and as good as gold, my UPS friends came the next day to take my bubble-wrapped box on its merry way to the USA in time for Christmas .... I also had a really exciting call from a dive magazine over there ... so looks like more will be happening on that horizon very soon! Can't wait to hear what is thought of my book over there! I'll keep you posted! :)

My DVD is finally ready for shipping!

Friday 9th December will be a day that I will never forget! Not only was it the day that all my things were leaving Bromley in Kent to begin their long trek up to Yorkshire, but 100 copies of my DVD "Underwater Photography Made Easy for Compact Camera Users" had finally arrived! This project really touched me, it was super hard work writing, producing and filming it all in a matter of a few weeks, but Scubazoo really went flat out to help and do the very best that they could and despite all manner of things going wrong, it was really touching to receive this comment from Graham Bazley yesterday ... "Love the DVD. I suspect that i will wear the DVD out over the next 6 months. All your hard work has really paid off. I wish that I had this before my last Liveaboard. You have a really great natural presenting style that makes it so easy to watch. Thanks." Over £100 has already been raised for The School of Hope and the SEAS Project in Mabul ... and that has made me really happy! And one was sold on Christmas Day ... super touching to see that!

Underwater Photography Talk with Ocean Divers, Caterham, Surrey

So the following week took me to see the lovely club of Ocean Divers at Warlingham, Surrey, where they meet at a gorgeous Spanish Restaurant called "La Bodegita". The place was packed and there were plenty of divers in amongst them upstairs waiting for me! I was really touched, lots of compact camera users and gorgeous Spanish food which I love ... the photos will be coming very soon. We ran a photo competition and Kate won with a gorgeous photograph of a cave with rays of light shining through it. I really love giving talks to Dive Clubs and can't wait for the next scheduled talk which will be nearer my home in Sheffield with Diveworld Sheffield on 29th January! A special thank you goes to Paul Davies, Matt Wright and all the lovely members of the club for making me feel so welcome. I'll be running an underwater photography course with them on 3rd March in Caterham, so if you are interested, just let me know!

Underwater Photography Course in Leeds at Gomersal Park Hotel

So after another busy week catching up with paperwork and of course driving back from Wiltshire, it was time to help Ian and Paul with their underwater photography back in my Yorkshire home. And another new venue was on the menu today, the Gomersal Park Hotel! Paul Dobson was a returning guest, as so many guests this year have been. He brought with him a lovely Sony NEX-5 camera with a Fantasea Remora Strobe and got some fabulous results with it! Ian had with him a Canon Ixus and we had an absolute blast. The pool session was held at Robin Hood Watersports nearby and I bumped into my previous course guests who I had helped in London there! What a lovely surprise! Another really super day. Paul has already sent me some photos from his holiday to tell me how he has got on and I nearly fell off my chair when I saw them! I will post them on here as soon as I catch up with this blog!

Underwater Photography Course in Wiltshire

So after teaching Hannah on Saturday in London, it was time to head straight down the M4 and teach the owner of a children's swim school how to get to grips with his Sealife 1200 Elite System. This camera can do an amazing job on auto mode just by itself, and he showed me some fabulous photographs taken with the camera's wide angle lens and strobe. I helped him to get to grips with the camera's manual settings and a lot of fun was had. So much fun in fact that I almost drowned trying to pose graciously underwater! I have a feeling that his business will be absolutely roaring after just a few hours helping him with his underwater photography. Check out these pictures!

Underwater Photography Course in London, November with Hannah and Tom

So finally, I am getting time to catch up with my blog and what an amazing few weeks it has been since DEMA and finishing the DVD with Scubazoo in Malaysia. As soon as I got back it was time to head back down the M1 again to London to help Hannah get to grips with her Canon G12 Powershot. I had met Hannah at the Birmingham Dive Show and she was celebrating her 18th birthday. We had a lovely day with her father Tom at Amphibian Sports Dive Shop with the lovely team of James, Dee and Jody there in a newly decorated shop! We headed off to a private pool which is a less than 5 minute drive away and Hannah came back with these pictures on her first ever shoot just using the camera's built-in flash! I was really proud to see what she achieved in just a day and am looking forward to hearing how Hannah gets on in the future. Well done Hannah!

DVD Underwater Photography Made Easy for Compact Camera Users Update

So after DEMA it was time to head straight back to Mabul and Sipidan to grab the final shots needed to complete the DVD. It was the longest journey ever in over 10 years of my passion of travelling the world's oceans. I flew back to London, drove up to Bradford some 6 hours with a sleep stop on the way. 20 mins to pack, 20 more minutes to get presents for the staff at Borneo Divers and then time to drive to Manchester airport before taking a flight to KL via Dubai .... Phew ....

It was a crazy 3 days but the weather was definitely on my side and we had absolutely flat calm conditions for the time I was there. Absolutely amazing! More photos of this will be on their way soon, or don't forget to check out my Facebook page.

It was then time to head back to KK to put the finishing touches to the DVD with the Scubazoo Team before heading back with the Master Copy (which sadly broke) on the way back .... :( .... so I am just waiting now for a new one via DHL.

A very, very special thank you to Borneo Divers and all of the staff there for their help in the project since the start. The DVD should be ready at the end of the first week in December with plenty of time to pop it in your Christmas Stocking!

DEMA - Orlando, Florida

Then it was time to head off to DEMA with my booth. Phew was I nervous but it was really lovely to receive Clement Lee's message on Facebook when I arrived at Orlando airport that evening and really great to see Tourism Malaysia the following day. I moved into the Imaging Zone and it was great being able to help my friends over the pond master the art of their compact cameras too.

I bumped into lots of friends, course guests from my recent trip to Key Largo as well as attending an amazing Wetpixel/DivePhotoGuide party and seeing many friends from the UK dive industry.

New online courses were launched the overseas trips with Borneo Divers as well as courses at Dive Centres proved popular too.

I'm already looking forward to the next one.

Thanks to everyone who made me feel so welcome :)

Underwater Photography Course at Amphibian Sports - London

A day later crazily designing promotion material for DEMA it was time to take the plastic fish for their monthly outing to Amphibian Sports at Crystal Palace in London to help Sharon master the art of her compact camera. It was really great seeing Dee and the team there again and bumped into Paul from Ocean Divers too ...

Don't forget that I can run underwater photography courses at your own club, so if you are interested, just let me know.

Evening Talk at Portsmouth Adventure Club

This must have been the longest UK drive of my life - over 10 hours to get from Bradford to Portsmouth and no, I wasn't driving Thomas either ... Simba my beloved Golden Retriever was very poorly sick and had to keep stopping to look after him.

But we finally got there and it was amazing to see how many patient budding underwater photographers were waiting to hear my presentation. It was a fabulous night and we raised over £70 for Sea Shepherd.

If you would like me to come along and give a talk to your club to raise money for you favourite charity, just get in touch. All I need is a place to stay and I will be there.

A very special thank you to Graham for inviting me down there and to Claire and her parents for letting me and Simba stay that night.

Looking forward to seeing them all again next year for a diving adventure.

Dive Show NEC 2011

Phew, it has been an absolutely crazy few months and finally today is my first day to be able to update my blog. Since returning from Key Largo I headed straight to Borneo Divers in Mabul, Malaysia to start work turning my award winning book into a DVD.

Then it was straight from there to the Dive Show in Birmingham where I took Thomas my new photo bus for his first outing to the show itself. It was an incredible weekend, and a very special thanks are due to Naomi, Dave, Rachel, Andreea and Sally for helping out. It was packed, four packed seminars and so much interest in Thomas himself.

Thank you to everyone for coming to see me there, you made the weekend very, very special and one that I will never forget.

Weekend Photo Workshop in Key Largo, Florida - 16-18 September

I'm so excited at going back to Key Largo in Florida next month to join Christopher Parsons run his Nauticam Photography Weekend Workshop from Friday 16th to Sunday 18th September. Suitable for complete beginners with point and shoot cameras to those looking to develop their advanced skills using either housed compacts or SLR rigs, there will be something for absolutely everyone. Chris will be giving a series of lectures as well as talks on Lightroom and much, much more! I'll be there to help out from Thursday evening where we will meet for an informal briefing until Saturday afternoon, so if this is tickling your underwater tastebuds, then just get in touch with Chris at Nauticam USA. Check out the schedule on his website here



Have a great weekend and hope to see some of you there! It's gonna be a lot of fun :)

Lembeh Straits - Critter Paradise Underwater

Please forgive me for the quietness on my blog the past week, after such a crazy year or few, I finally realised that I needed a little rest. So off I headed to Lembeh Straits to continue playing with Canon Powershot's S95. I knew that I was well on the way to falling in love with this camera whilst in Nuweiba during my recent photo workshop, but how would it cope with the really small stuff here in Critter Paradise.

Well, I absolutely loved it even more and for the first time there was no need to use my INON Close-Up Lens. The camera focused quickly and sharply on all the subjects shown here and apart from a little cropping, none of the attached images have been photoshopped.

I used the camera's underwater mode to capture the photograph of the mimic octopus, I was lucky enough to see 4 of these in just two days there. Lembeh Straits really is an amazing place for any underwater photographer to go and sample macro heaven and get those photos ticked off the wish list!

I'll be continuing to play with my INON close-up lens as well as stacking them this coming week, so stay tuned for more news.

Have a lovely weekend :)

Underwater Photography Talk with ProDiveScuba to raise money for RNLI in Hull, Yorkshire

I have to say that it felt mighty strange going up the M62 to give a talk, but found something very familiar right at the end of it - a huge bridge that looked very similar to Dartfords! The talk was held in an amazing venue, none other than Home Farm's Premier Inn and I must say the food looked extremely lush!

There was a great turnout of around 60 guests, all keen beavers wondering which buttons to press to get fabulous results with their compacts. First we watched a fabulous video on the Farnes with the seals, and then ProDiveScuba's guests were presented with their achievements.

After my talk there was an absolutely brilliant game of Rock and Roll Bingo followed by prizes up for grabs by Beaver and Oceanic as well as a Chinese Meal for Two with all funds raised going towards the RNLI.

It really was a cracking night, and I'll definitely be back for another game of Rock and Roll Bingo and a cheeky dive too! Let's just hope that the M62 doesn't close at nighttime again like it did on the way home, it took me over 2 hours to get back .... A long drive home, but very well worth it :)

For more photos, do join my page on Facebook. Here is what Kim Rowan, the owner of ProDiveScuba said today. Thanks so much Kim, David, Dane, Sean and Steve for giving me such a lovely welcome and making me chuckle. Hope to see you soon! :)

Hi Maria, it was so lovely to meet you, and I would like to think you are now part of our diving family. As to the talk we found it to be a very informative and entertaining presentation, we have had extremely positive feedback from people all day and also mass disappointment from people who couldn't make it! We are very grateful to you to take the time to visit us at Pro-Dive Scuba in Hull and would strongly recommend you to any other club that is interested in learning more on DUP, you were so approachable and helpful to everyone.

Course Guests Try Out My New Studio in Shipley, Yorkshire!

So today was the first day of opening the doors of my new studio in sunny Shipley in Yorkshire to welcome Colin Bannerman and his Olympus MJU 850 with his nano strobe from Lincolnshire. The sun was indeed out, not that it mattered too much as the pool is now below the studio, making everything lovely and easy. The kettle was on when Colin arrived, lots of time was spent reviewing his past photo memories, playing with settings before tucking into a homemade lunch! I have really missed making these the past 2 months whilst being on the road between homes :)

It was then time to meet the pool below. Phew, it was like walking into the warmest sauna you can imagine. The air temperature was a balmy tropical 37 degrees and the water temp was at least 32. No need for wetsuits at all here!

Colin had a fabulous time practicing with his camera. He came asking for advice about an upgrade as he wasn't getting great results using the camera's "auto" mode, but a few tweaks of the settings and he was soon taking beautiful, punchy, sharp photographs full of colour. The beauty of this location is that the pool on Sunday afternoon is there completely for guests, no danger of getting cold and lots of things to practice on including our resident crocodile called "Snappy!" Don't worry, he's not real!

The day was finished reviewing all the photographs and then it was time for cupcakes before Colin headed back to sunny Lincolnshire.

A really wonderful start to my new home base and can't wait to welcome Sue and her husband next Sunday for more of the same! :)

Just shows that simple waterproof cameras such as this one can take some really cracking shots!