Underwater Video Services for your next scuba diving vacation in Fort Lauderdale, Miami, Pompano Beach, Deerfield Beach, Boynton Beach, Hollywood, the Florida Keys and the Caribbean.
On September 23rd, the second episode of our new web-based reality series, “Dive Charter: A Day in the Life of a Dive Boat” aired on the web. The second episode deals with the craziness of the 2-day South Florida Lobster Mini-Season, introduces a new dive boat captain and divemaster, and captures a confrontation over a dive site between two charter boats! The second episode runs @17 minutes long and can be seen at DiveCharter.tv.
For advertising rates or to suggest ideas for upcoming episodes, EMAIL US HERE
On August 6th, Video Dude Productions premiered the first episode of our new web-based reality series, “Dive Charter: A Day in the Life of a Dive Boat”. The pilot episode introduces the dive boat and crew, the staff from a local dive shop, and follows a student diver (Pam Dino) as she goes through her certification process. The pilot episode runs @13 minutes long and can be seen at DiveCharter.tv.
Episode 2 “Mini-Season Madness” will be premiering in September and deals with the craziness of the 2-day South Florida Lobster Mini-Season. Location shooting has already been completed and this episode is in it’s final production stages.
For advertising rates or to suggest ideas for upcoming episodes, EMAIL US HERE
After a bit of an absence, I returned to Blue Heron Bridge with the “Ultra-Faboo” Joanie and photo/video protege Jeanette to see what we could find. Since every time we go we see great things, we all decided to just go real slow and look carefully at our usual dive areas. We were rewarded several times with some seahorses, a batfish, an upside-down jellyfish, yellow stingrays, hermit crabs and an octopus.
A relaxing, very near two-hour dive and great fun with great friends.
Doug the “Video Dude”
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
We were hired by the South Florida Spearfishing Club to shoot video documentation of their Pompano Beach (FL) Pier and Reef cleanup efforts. What started out as a rainy day, quickly turned to sunshine as the divers and myself headed out aboard Pompano Dive Center‘s “Sea Dog Diver” to head for a mooring spot at the end of the pier.
Once we were moored in the right spot, SFSC vice-president Heather and I jumped in the water so I could shoot some pre-cleanup shots of the reef and pier. Then, as the other divers got in the water, I followed them around, shooting video of their clean-up activities. When the divers had a full bucket of debris, it was brought to the surface and handed over to a waiting member of the Kayuba Dive Club, who stowed the buckets on their kayaks and brought them over to the pier to be hoisted up and sorted. After everyone was done, I went back in and shot video of the cleaned areas.
While the work the SFSC did today was very important, it was just a drop in the overall amount of stuff on the reefs and under the pier. Please, everyone, be aware of the impact your activities on or under the water can have!
Another great video project we are proud to be a part of!
Doug the “Video Dude”.
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Once again we traveled to the magical dive spot known as Blue Heron Bridge to capture more mystical underwater moments. Joanie and I met up with Sandra and Bob and headed out on our tour of the dive site. Critter sightings for today were: Seahorse, Eagle Ray, Southern Stingray, Nudibranchs, Cushion Sea Stars, Octopi, Flounder, Decorator Crab and Box Crab. It was an awesome dive and a chance to meet new dive friends.
Shooting video here in Paradise,
Doug, The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Thursday, March 24th I was hired by a family to videotape the placement of their loved one on the Neptune Memorial Reef, just off of Key Biscayne in Miami Beach, FL. The Neptune Society has established this Memorial Reef so that loved ones who had an affinity with the ocean in some fashion, could have their ashes buried amongst the Atlantis-like structures on the ocean floor.
The day was sunny and bright with ocean conditions calm as Jim Hutslar of the Neptune Reef Project and I motored our way out to the dive site. Conditions underwater were great also with 60ft+ visibility and a mild current. I have been on the site several times in the past few years, and am happy to see lots of coral growth and fish life of all types. As it says on the memorial reef site, “the reef is a reaffirmation of life after life”.
For more information on the Neptune Society, CLICK HERE
For more information on the Neptune Memorial Reef, CLICK HERE
I never know what video jobs may come my way, but that’s what makes my job so interesting!
Doug “the Video Dude”
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Join SCUBA Network and Video Dude Productions on a once-in-a-lifetime adventure as we head out to Guadalupe Island to cage dive with Great White Sharks!
DATE: August 19-25, 2011.
Cost is $3400 per person (diver or non-diver) and INCLUDES:
- 1 night hotel (dbl occ) in departure port of San Diego
- 5-6 day live-aboard Shark Expedition (dbl occ)
- Food, wine, beer and soft drinks onboard
- National Park shark cage diving permits
- Wetsuits, Weights and Surface-supplied air
- Airport to Hotel transfers
- Shark Expedition DVD and T-Shirt
- Great White Shark Specialty certification
- Instructor Escort
DOES NOT INCLUDE:
- Round-trip airfare to San Diego
- $80 boat fuel surcharge
- Meals in San Diego
- Returning night Hotel stay in San Diego
ADD-ONS:
- Open Water Discover Scuba – $75
- Single Room Hotel Upgrade – $125
- Single Room Liveaboard Upgrade – $149
SPACES ARE LIMITED – RESERVE YOUR SPOT TODAY! $500 Non-refundable Deposit required. Call Scuba Network at 954.422.9982.
Make sure you mention VIDEO DUDE PRODUCTIONS when making your reservation to make sure you get on the correct trip!
For the second year in a row, Video Dude Productions traveled with a group from SCUBA Network in Deerfield Beach, FL to Crystal River to snorkel with the manatees. A much larger group this time around, we ended up with two dive boats and 16 people. It was a gorgeous day weather-wise as we set out for Three Sisters Springs where the manatees take advantage of the warmer water of the springs during the winter. Lots of boats were there, checking out the manatees in the sanctuary and the springs, as we swam around trying to get a glimpse for ourselves. It was a great day all around, and the group had several personal up-close encounters throughout the day.
Having a blast in the water,
The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Ultra-Faboo dive buddy Joanie and I are back at Blue Heron Bridge to shoot more documentary video and see what cool and amazing things we can see. Unfortunately, visibility was about 6ft, so we switched our focus and looked for the small stuff in the muck. After about 15 minutes, Joanie – “Old Eagle Eyes” – makes the find of the day, a Lined Seahorse sitting in on a pile of algae! We spend close to 15 minutes shooting video on 2 different cameras, still photos and just plain old watching. Be sure to look at the bottom of the algae pile for a Hermit Crab!
Hope you enjoy the video clip! The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Hello everyone.
Once again I took a step out of the water, at the request of my friends at Artistic Productions, to shoot video of one of their events – “Art Night Pompano”. The 4th installment of “Art Night Pompano”, one of a series of “Vacant Spaces Projects”, was held at Pompano Citi Centre in Pompano Beach, FL, where local artists were able to showcase their works to a background of various live music from DJ One Star and the live performance of Alex Nelson and his band. The “Vacant Spaces Project” uses empty retail spaces for art events in an effort to bring people to a retail area that has been affected by the economic turn-down. An Artistic Productions event co-sponsored by Pompano Citi Centre.
Wanna have YOUR next event saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
My Ultra-Faboo dive buddy Joanie and I were back at Blue Heron Bridge today to “see what we can see”. She has predicted a manatee sighting today, so we are anxious to get into the water. Today, we are joined by Michelle and Josh, a couple of people from Scubaboard who have never been diving at the bridge before.
After getting geared-up, we head into the water and, almost immediately we see a manatee cruising by! I kick over on an intercept course and was able to get the manatee on video. It seemed to be in a bit of a hurry and didn’t want to hang around too much, but the video came out nice anyway.
After our manatee encounter, we see a Southern Stingray with a stubby tail, then head over to the bridge pilings where the visibility got really milky and made it hard for seeing things from a distance. So we all switched to close-up mode and started looking for smaller critters. We ended up seeing several small Spotted Eels, Banded Shrimps, Arrow Crabs, Sea Cucumbers, Lobsters, Juvenile Angelfish, Spadefish, Juvenile Filefish and a couple of small Yellow Stingrays. Overall, it was a great dive and Joanie and I got to see the excitement in the eyes of Michelle and Josh as they got their first experience at the bridge.
Yes, we dive here in January!
The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
As was posted back in May 2010, I did some underwater video work for National Geographic’s “Border Wars”, a reality show dealing with the Customs & Border Patrol and Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers protecting our borders. The video I shot aired on November 3rd as part of 4 segments in the program. Some still frames are posted above and a YouTube version of the segment can be seen HERE
The currents were tough that day and the viz wasn’t the best, but the shots were interesting and revealed the kind of effort that the officers put in to try and curb the flow of drugs into our country. Hope you enjoy.
Have a need for underwater video for YOUR next production? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Once in a while we get requests for video projects that don’t require us getting wet. That was the case with one of our recent videos created for Artistic Productions‘ “Vacant Spaces” Project. It was basically an evening of Art and Live Music, utilizing a vacant storefront at Pompano Citi Centre – a local mall in Pompano Beach, FL – in an attempt to bring back crowds to an otherwise economy-stressed mall. Apparently, our YouTube video post was picked up by a local events-oriented magazine called City Link and we got a nice write-up and a link to the video on their online version of the magazine. CLICK HERE to see the story.
Wanna have YOUR next event saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
The last week of September finds me off to the Bahamas and Sint Maarten to shoot some video for a client. The first stop is the Bahamas where I am reunited with my friends at Stuart Cove’s Dive Center. It was a great morning as we set out aboard the “Phoecena” with Captain Dexter and DM Jessica taking us out to the first of our locations, the wreck of the “De La Salle”. Lots of Grunts, Squirrelfish and, unfortunately, Lionfish. I think I saw at least 10 Lionfish on this one dive alone! The wreck is beautiful, though and my client is happy with the visibility and the great video that will result.
After documenting all of the Lionfish (and the other schools of fish on the wreck), it’s time to head off to the next location, known as “Lighthouse Reef” due to it’s location to the port’s lighthouse. This is an artificially-created reef created out of concrete shapes deliberately (and randomly) placed on the bottom to form a jetty to protect the port. Max depth here was about 35fsw, but it was a beautiful spot nonetheless. More Lionfish of course, but also Queen Angels, Parrotfish and Sergeant Majors all over the reef.
Our documentation completed, it’s time to head back to the dive boat and back to shore. It was a great couple of dives in super conditions and I can’t wait to go back again.
Shootin’ video in the Caribbean,
The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
This time we are off to Key Largo, FL to shoot some documentary footage for the Coral Restoration Foundation and the Florida Marine Aquarium Society as we visit the CRF coral nursery and project reef. The CRF has been working hard the past few years growing and re-introducing corals back onto damaged reefs and other areas where the corals had previously vanished. They are currently working with Staghorn and Elkhorn corals and judging from the project reef that I saw, they are really making a difference!
Corals are grown from cuttings or “frags” from other corals and “planted” in the nursery until they are large enough to either provide frags for future corals, or are placed on the project reef where the corals had previously died off. Volunteers and CRF staff tend the nursery, monitoring growth, scrubbing off algae (which inhibits coral growth), or placing new cuttings in the nursery. Several growing methods are used, including a “line nursery” which resembles a clothes line with coral pieces hanging from it. This keeps the algae off the coral and allows the coral to grow in multiple directions, resulting in larger corals.
It’s nice to see a group making our reefs a better place for fish, animals and divers! For more information on the Coral Restoration Foundation, CLICK HERE. Be sure to make a donation or adopt some coral!
Always finding new subjects to video for everyone,
The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next project documented in video? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
Once again we take our cameras up to Blue Heron Bridge for some more footage of the lesser-seen animals that hang out between the pilings of the bridge. Ultra-Faboo Dive Buddy Joanie and I arrive around 2pm and get geared up for our dive (which ended up being 2 hours long) and head out off the beach to see what we can see. We start off over by the area where the houseboats are moored, looking for Seahorses and Octopi. We didn’t run into any of those, but we did find a Batfish, an extremely friendly Juvenile Filefish (it came right up to us and played with our fingers!) and a Pipefish. We also found the “Shopping Cart Reef” and the sunken boat with the mirror on it.
After exploring that area, we head over to the west bridge and navigate our way through the pilings. We encountered another Batfish, a Southern Stingray, several Scorpionfish, Banded Shrimp, a Stone Crab, and some Spadefish. We also found a Yellow Stingray, Arrow Crabs and several Cushion Sea Stars. We made our way through the pilings and over to the small fishing bridge to check out the small rubble reef (rubble from the old bridge demolition) and finally back to the beach and our exit point. It was a fabulous, relaxing dive and always a good time checking out which critters are “home” each time we go there.
Diving the days away here in Paradise,
The Video Dude
Wanna have YOUR next dive saved on video to show all your friends? EMAIL US HERE or call us at 954.296.6449
