Matava @ OZtEK'09

OZtEK'09
Sydney Australia
March 2009

Matava @ OZtEK'09

Underwater Festival Prizes » Byron Underwater Festival - Byron Bay

Detailed prizes for the 2009 Festival are still subject to change - in 2009 they are even more exciting than the $20,000 prize bonanza from the 2008 Festival with close to $30,000 worth of prizes.

Photo & Video Shootout Competition

All photographs and video to be taken between 29th of April and 2nd of May 2009. Please visit the shootout page for rules and entry conditions.

2009 prizes below

Best Festival Portfolio - 5 images

• 1st prize - Full Beuchat SCUBA package including first and second stage regulators, occy & BCD
• 2nd prize - aunoc 3TEN Dive Light
• 3rd prize - Beuchat fins + mask

Best Festival Photograph - SLR camera

• 1st prize - a dive holiday for TWO at Matava in Fiji - includes meals and taxes - *flights not included
• 2nd prize - 10 dive voucher at Sundive Byron Bay inc gear hire if needed
• 3rd prize - a massive 1200mm x 800mm canvas print of your winning image by Retrospect

Best Festival Video

• 1st prize - Light & Motion LED Sunray-1000 Video light
• 2nd prize - Beuchat full wetsuit
• 3rd prize - Pair of ESCLAPEZ Fins

Best Festival Photograph - Compact camera

• 1st prize - Choice of Ikelite SLR housing (inc port) / video housing or DS-160 deluxe strobe package
• 2nd prize - 3 night/4 dive Dive/Accommodation package at PLANULA Divers Retreat/Byron Bay Dive Centre for TWO PEOPLE
• 3rd prize - a huge 900mm x 600mm canvas print of your winning image by Retrospect

Best Festival Photograph - Novice & Sealife Camera Try Outs

• 1st prize - Sealife DC800 camera
• 2nd prize - Pair of ESCLAPEZ Fins
• 3rd prize - Essential & Advanced Guide to Underwater Photography

Best Festival Photograph - Freediving & Snorkelling

• 1st prize - Beuchat freediving 2 piece wetsuit in new pacific cammo
• 2nd prize - Pair of ESCLAPEZ Fins
• 3rd prize - aunoc 1CR Dive Light

Neville Coleman Awards

Most interesting critter find during the Underwater Festival

• 1st prize - autographed copy of Neville Coleman’s latest book - Nudibranch Encyclopedia
• 2nd prize - autographed copy of Neville Coleman’s Underwater Naturalist
• 3rd prize - autographed Neville Coleman Wildlife Guide

Thank you all sponsors!

The Byron Underwater Festival would like to say a huge thank you to all the prize sponsors - without you, this festival would be only half as much fun.

Underwater Festival Prizes » Byron Underwater Festival - Byron Bay

Google Ocean

Google has launched Ocean in Google Earth, a new feature that lets you explore underwater in 3D and browse ocean-related content. The new version of Google Earth also lets you virtually travel back in time through archival satellite and aerial imagery.

Ocean in Google Earth combines sea floor terrain and expert content to provide you with an opportunity to explore some of the most difficult-to-reach parts of the world. Virtual travellers to Hawaii, for example, can examine underwater volcanoes, see videos about the marine life of the region, read about nearby shipwrecks and contribute photos and videos of favorite surf spots.

"With this latest version of Google Earth you can not only zoom into whatever part of our planet’s surface you wish to examine in closer detail, you can now dive into the world’s oceans that cover almost three-quarters of the planet and discover new wonders that had not been accessible in previous versions of this magical experience," said Al Gore at the launch event in San Francisco. "Moreover, with the new historical imagery feature, you can look back in time and see for yourself the unprecedented pace of change taking place on the Earth — largely because of human influences. For example, you can watch the melting of the largest glacier in Glacier National Park—the Grinnell Glacier—image by image, for the last decade."

To find the new Google Ocean go to http://earth.google.com/ocean/.

Google Earth

X-RAY MAG #28 | X-Ray International Dive Magazine

The 28th edition of X-Ray mag gives you this;

Maldives Sea Safari: An In Depth Guide by Michael Aw.

Whale Shark Park Maldives.

Gifts for Sea Lovers.

Profile: Jim Bram NAUI President.

Barents Sea, Russia by Andrey Bizyukin.

Rebreather for Cave Diving by ...…

X-RAY MAG #28 | X-Ray International Dive Magazine

Fiji Diving Report...

Author: Richard Salkin
Location: Fiji
Date: 5/27/2008 1:23:00 PM

Some concepts just elude me. Like the International Date Line. Sure, I can grasp its significance at some levels but still cant quite wrap my brain around it completely. If you look at a map, one thing is clear: the people who decided where the IDL should go wanted to give the island nation of Fiji a break. If not for a deliberate shift to the east and back again, parts of Fiji would be in the future while other parts would be in the past. Which still just blows my circuitry.

On June 27, with this conundrum weighing on my mind, I boarded a 56-minute flight from Jacksonville to Atlanta, the first leg on a 20,000-mile journey to Fiji and back...

Our grand arrival at Makogai

Along the way there would be whole operas to listen to, whole books to read, whole bowls of kava to drink and underwater colors I hadn't seen since my psychedelic college days. On June 30, on the other side of the planet, with one day unaccounted for, after crossing both the IDL and the equator, I joined 8 of my bestest dive buddies plus a new guy who would quickly take his place among a pantheon of cool dive friends. We met up at the Tradewinds hotel just outside the capital city of Suva.