dave’s blog

network’s capt. kidd previewed online

Sun, 9 Nov 2008 21:20:58 -0500

Video clip, pictures, and other info on Indiana University’s Capt. Kidd expedition are now available online. Preview what is coming Nov. 18 on the National Geographic Channel! A year in the making!

And don’t forget the live presentation on the project by its expedition leaders the night before on the IU campus in Bloomington, Nov. 17. Details in my last entry...

researchers plan pre-tv presentation

Tue, 4 Nov 2008 19:21:03 -0500

It’s election day in USA! Don’t know the outcome, yet. But I have learned that the research team is going to present details of their work on the Quedagh Merchant site, location of Capt. Kidd’s last ship. If you’re in the Bloomington, Indiana area on November 17th, you should make your way to Mathers Museum, on the northwest side of the Indiana University campus. There’s a map down below. Expedition director Charles Beeker, and the project’s archaeologist, Geoffrey Conrad, will be leading the discussion. Charlie has decades of diving experience in the Caribbean and is head of IU’s Office of Underwater Science. Geoffrey is Associate VP of Research at IU and Director of Mathers Museum. He specializes in the anthropology of Central America, including the Caribbean islands. These guys know their stuff and are more than willing to share!

The presentation takes place one day before “Shipwreck! Capt. Kidd!” airs on the National Geographic Channel. I was fortunate to join the expedition and was a contributing videographer...so I’m excited to see what kind of story the producers created with it. But I’m especially looking forward to the Nov. 17th presentation.

training never stops

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 23:45:34 -0400

That’s right. When I dive, my mind is kept quite busy managing simple tasks like maintaining buoyancy, keeping consistent depth, looking after my buddy, and understanding hand-signals. Add the burden of taking underwater notes, compass bearings, and measurements, and I almost get overwhelmed. (and, yes, I normally use the mask and keep the reg in my mouth...but I can’t resist mugging for a pic).

Why am I a klutz beneath the surface? After all, I thought I was a smart guy!

The reason is that being smart doesn’t replace experience. I’ve got maybe 50 hours of underwater time under my weight belt. My instructors have hundreds of hours logged. Some of my skills have not become second-nature, yet.

Now I am a terrific videographer and producer. Why do I believe this? I’ve produced hundreds of hours of finished programming for broadcast networks and local stations over the past thirty years. For many of those years I was producing three finished news features every day, calmly and under deadline pressure.

I’m also not a bad pilot, either. Both plane and body are still in one piece after making over 500 takeoff and landings over the past six years.

Smarts, training, and repetitive experience is what makes a great SCUBA diver.

That’s why I’ve signed up for advanced diving training. It’s time to refine what I know and apply it over and over again. I want to be as confident in diving as I am in my videographer skills. That way I can focus on the fun part...making good TV!

is this really capt. kidd?

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 17:07:59 -0400

We sure see this image a lot. I used it to portray Kidd’s ghost on my last post. So I figured I should learn more about the picture. Maybe it was drawn by a member of Capt. Kidd’s crew! Or, could this be the work of a court illustrator during his trial back in England?

Well, not exactly. Howard Pyle is the artist. He was one of the best illustrators in the business during the industrial revolution. He worked in about any medium and could reproduce any moment of the human condition. I guarantee you that you’d recognize lots of his other images...they’ve become icons. But Pyle’s drawings of pirates had a special quality. He illustrated a 1890 piece by John D. Champlin, Jr. called “The True Capt. Kidd” and submitted this now-famous image.

Champlin’s written account is actually thought to be historically accurate. But Pyle’s colored-pencil-with-watercolor drawing seem to emphasize Kidd’s craven side.

Of course, the captain was indeed desperate. He was a legal pirate, called privateer, licensed by the English to annoy the French fleet. Yet, after a year, he hadn’t acquired enough wealth to pay his crew...and they were getting understandably restless. Maybe that’s why Pyle chose a moment when the Captain is taking in a bit of whiskey and a smoke! The 17th century equivalent of Valium! Oh, wait a minute, that’d be opium. But I digress...

Nevertheless, this image was drawn 189 years after Kidd appointment at the gallows. As far as I can tell, it contains visual details that were described in historical texts...but there were few previous realistic portrayals of Kidd while captain and, of course, no photographs to guide Howard Pyle.

Great overview of Pyle’s work and influence at giam.typepad.com.

(detail of Pyle’s pencil work - love the bloodshot eyes!)

capt. kidd on national network nov. 18th

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 00:45:25 -0400

The producers documenting IU’s work on the Quedagh Merchant tell me they are wrapping up the program and that the National Geographic Channel will air the topic within a new program series starting next month. The dive team can’t wait. This is the first NGC project for me, too...and I’m excited to see how they use our footage.

Charlie cuts quite the image, doesn’t he? The graphic starts with this great pic that Doug Robinson shot on our first trip to the Quedagh Merchant (we never saw the sea that calm again). You can see him in Charlie’s sunglasses if you look closely.

I spend evening time in Photoshop for the same reasons others play solitaire...it’s relaxing. I made this graphic tonight, excited after an afternoon of advanced underwater training. We practiced with full-mask communicators while cruising about the depths with Sea-Doo Seascooters. Not a bad day!

just in: US-AID to help IU/DR dive projects

Tue, 7 Oct 2008 23:19:45 -0400

Dropped by the lab today and found Charlie reviewing a letter from the US Agency for International Development confirming it will make a major investment in IU’s partnership with the Dominican Republic! The Agency is impressed by the dive team’s model for underwater finds:

Help the host country preserve and protect sites.
Share research findings with everyone.
Insure the host country retains claim to the site and any “treasure.”
Finish up underwater projects by converting sites to underwater parks.
Boost the local economy by attracting dive tourists from all over the world.

Congratulations to Charlie Beeker, the Office of Underwater Science crew, and IU’s School of HPER!