It ’s hard employment essay to pigeonholeAndré Musgrove . As an subaquatic cinematographer , photographer , Ocean Photography Awardsjudge , professional freediver , and submerged stunt performer , to say his career is wide-ranging would be an understatement . Born and raised in the Bahamas , where he is still free-base today , his experience and knowledge have see him work on projection with Discovery Channel , National Geographic , GoPro , Canon , Rolex , and World Wildlife Fund ( WWF ) . Here , he tells us how he came to be so at nursing home in the water and what it take to plug the consummate shot when grappling with the sea and its wildlife .
From submerged stunt performer to tv set donor , you have a very wide-ranging calling – which would you say is your dominant persona ?
I would say my most dominant career is underwater photography and motion-picture photography .
You of late judged theOcean Photography Awards , what do you look for when assay to select and unassailable laurels - winning nip ?
For me when I ’m take my own gibe I ’m appear for composition , people of colour ( because colouring material is usually lost underwater very easily so when it ’s really there it really stand out ) and basically just how unique or difficult the shot may be to get based on what the photographer or model have to do . These are the things I would use when I shoot my own work and when judging other work also .
What did it take to get here ?
I was born and raised in Nassau , Bahamas , and a portion of my free time was spent freediving and spearfishing out with my pop on the gravy boat on the weekends . And most of my Friend and mass around my years never really did what I did . So , I ’d have to evidence them stories after the adventures were finished . So that promote me to pick up a television camera to share those experiences with my supporter who were n’t able to actually call them or who did n’t have an interest in that yet until I show them the video .
And that was basically my introduction to my underwater photography / underwater cinematography part . I start just with a little GoPro natural process camera . Took it everywhere I go when I was freediving , spearfishing , then I got scuba certified and I develop into that . Then once I graduated in high spirits schoolhouse , I began working at a local dive store that had an underwater photography science laboratory .
It was kind of a training ground for me for the stuff and nonsense that I do now . I learned a mountain more about high lineament equipment and shooting different things for production caller , cultivate with shark , doing a heap of scuba diving , working with tourist scuba diver also . I worked there for two years , and then I give up to freelance and do my own thing as [ an ] underwater lensman and cameraman , puzzle out as [ a ] private dive usher when I had time .
What are some vernacular misconceptions about your line of work ?
I think some masses think it ’s very simple and loose to get into which it is not , especially if you ’re shooting in the sea . Shooting in a kitty or just with a piffling waterproof headphone is completely different than being in the ocean and make to work with and read wildlife in a direction that makes it possible to enamour those moment . Also , whether you ’re doing aqualung diving event or freediving makes a big difference . On top of that , the equipment itself is moderately expensive because not only are you buying the camera , but you also have to purchase the underwater components to make trusted everything ’s good .
From your portfolio , would you say there ’s one photograph that really stands out for you ?
Probably one of my most notable photographs was actually kind of a mistake . It ’s a photo of my friend freediving with a spotted eagle ray over a white sand path . We were pursue a school of spotted bird of Jove rays , at least 40 of them , and I ’m kind of just waiting for them to do their loop around so we could time our dive to receive them at the bottom so we do n’t spook them away , while getting some slam of them . But we never really got the shot with the big schooling . Right when we ’re about to impart , we ’re swimming back to the gravy holder and one straggler swim past . I was in reality at the surface , so I was n’t aware , but David had already dived down and he was following it from behind . I was capable to swim justly on top of it and photograph a photo straight down . And that became the figure of speech that people know today , which was not the trope that we were go for , but it was an image that turned out pretty well . That was a pretty unparalleled and odd experience .
Have you ever had any specially memorable close encounter with wildlife ?
There was an interaction with two mammoth tiger sharks in a lieu called Tiger Beach in the Bahamas , and I was shooting and working with Sea Legacy . One of the dives was me swimming between these two large [ ~4 - to-5 meter ] 14 - to-16 foot tiger sharks . And I was correct between them , almost like a sandwich .
I remember just looking into the eyes of both of the animals nearby and I could see that they recognized me and they noticed me , but they were n’t afraid of me . Nor did they think I was prey or food or anything . I just found a really freehanded sense of acceptance and coexistence between them . That moment , it almost matte like it hold out for like 10 minutes , even though it was probably only five seconds . But I just sense really , really safe at that point . I was like , these are the biggest thing in the urine around us right now , and if these two big bosses assume me then I do n’t feel like anything else can touch me . That that moment was really peculiar and just encompasses , like , we can coexist with these beast and the great unwashed do n’t always have to reverence them .
What advice would you give to someone want to follow in your footsteps ?
The first dance step would be to get as much submersed experience as they can without a television camera in their hand . So that would be learn scuba diving and building up your scuba certifications . If you have the ability to , it ’d [ be ] dandy if you may plunge in different places because different places have different thing .
There are a lot of resources online where you could determine other professional Aqua-Lung divers and learn a plenty . That ’s what I did when I first started out , I was find out every exclusive someone who had an underwateranythingout there , or who travelled across the world when I was n’t able to , just to watch as much as I could , but also learning dissimilar disciplines and diving , including freediving .
you’re able to learn to hold your hint and dive down and be comfortable in the body of water where you’re able to get a lot more close up interactions with animals than you would doing Aqua-Lung because there are n’t any bubbles to affright the animal if you ’re freediving .
I imagine that would actually be the base , I would say before you even pick up the camera make trusted that your body is well-off enough as to be effortless in the weewee so that holding the tv camera is just an added thing that does n’t move your functioning .
