Field School: Transects and Mapping

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The Albanian Center for Marine Research's main objective is to train divers (consisting of students, grad students and phd students) in the art of scientific and archeological diving. This includes learning how to transect and map underwater fields. Making a list of acurate measurements is hard enough on land let alone underwater. The students did an amazing job with their diving even with the added stress of collecting data.

Practice practice practice...that's really the only way you can master this technique.

The students here have gotten spoiled with great diving conditions. Can you imagine trying to measure / map an area when you cannot see more that 2 feet in front of you? or if there is a 3 knot current pushing you off the bottom? It is difficult to simulate those conditions in Albania because the diving conditions are so good! I wish the scuba tourism boards understood the richness of the Albanian coast. Maybe in 10 years they'll set something up for divers to experience this beautiful coastline!

My experience here as a photographer / videographer has a pretty neat perspective. I have gotten to watch the students grow each day and perfect their skills not only as divers, but as underwater academics. Each student has narrowed their interests and skill set and I think the field school is giving them a great idea of what direction they want to take their career. Maybe one day I'll read their published material on ancient finds! The other cool thing is that diving in Albania is not set up for the general public, so all the reefs are still in tact, the shipwrecks haven't been looted, and there's not a crowd of divers at every site. It is really cool that I've gotten the chance to experience the untouched Albanian coastline.

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