It’s the final day of the lionfish research cruise.

The last dive starts early in the morning in darkness, making it difficult to find last year's survey site. The scientists and our underwater cinematographer, Norb, discover, however, a new site that has, according to Norb, “a ton of lionfish.” Norb captures some engaging shots of the lionfish hunting in groups of three and four. The team’s persistence…and patience has paid off.

“Patience is one of the best attributes a wildlife or underwater cinematographer can have,” says Susan Sember, EISF President. “Cinematographers wait for the right light; they wait for the selected species to appear; they wait for the desired animal behavior to occur; they wait for inclimate weather to pass; they wait for the hours to pass when they can make their next dive; and they wait for the often delayed planes and lost baggage to show up.”

Yet, there is that element of surprise, intuition and a passion to make things happen that is also coupled with intense preparation and research, discipline, artistic vision and technical expertise that all factor in with that patience, as well.

As the last EISF member remaining on the cruise, Norb arrives with Paula Whitfield and her scientific team back to Morehead City, via the NOAA ship, the R/V Nancy Foster. He then must wait 24 hours, due to diver decompression limitations, after his last dive to fly home to California. There is the reward and satisfaction of new discoveries, new collaborations, new areas of research and a job well done.

Meanwhile, Curtis Callaway, our topside cinematographer is already home in Texas, reviewing the topside tapes and still photographs he shot.

He reflects, “Our writer, Betsy, a real trooper, and I were running non-stop from 0545 to 2300 with very few breaks between except for the “mandatory meal times”, which were usually brief with discussions of our next shot. The days were really long but with all of the excitement and enthusiasm from the scientists we never even noticed. Interviews, topside dive ops, shipboard activities, work in both wet and dry labs, macro photography, production stills, ship shots and much more were all critical components that had to be covered. The ship was continually filled with activity and everyone had their focused tasks and responsibilities."

It was non-stop shooting to get all of the scientists’ and divers’ activities, along with the ship’s personnel’s activities and then, our entire behind the scenes.” “It was truly satisfying to see how much these scientists recognized the power of imagery for both research and outreach purposes. When we weren’t knocking off our “shot list” and capturing all of the activities, the scientists were shouting, like excited kids, to shoot this or that. It was wonderful! They also got the “high definition fever”, too, seeing, immediately, the benefits of the format’s high resolution, low light capabilities and immersive nature.”

Curtis, also an underwater cinematographer, as well as a topside cameraperson, spent many years diving in the Indo-Pacific around the native lionfish but said, before this trip, “I knew very little about them other than they are great subjects to photograph, they are venomous and you don’t touch! This trip was such a thrill to be a part of since it was what the scientists refer to as ‘working on the edge.’ Instead of following the work of other scientists, you have a chance to break new ground and discover new things that have never been seen before. This is critically important research these people are doing and the invasive species issue is one that most of our country is unaware of and the need for education, outreach and research is huge.”

But the work on our invasive lionfish project is only beginning. There will be additional production, editing and post-production, further writing, and creation of the lionfish educational and outreach products and continuing partnerships with the scientists.

Dr. Bud Cross, Scientific Advisor to EISF, also notes, that “the scientists will be able to review and utilize the high definition footage from this trip for their research purposes, as well. The high definition video, still photographs and audio will be reviewed, logged, transcribed and annotated for "A" clips of interesting lionfish identification and behavior, habitat review, scientific interviews and more, all correlated to location, through EISF’s Media Bank."

Dan Powell, EISF Web Master and Director of Marine Operations, will also be integrating the GIS (geo-interspatial) components of the Media Bank with this lionfish imagery for additional use in the future.

“So, although today marks the end of one chapter of the lionfish project, it also marks the beginning of another: bringing these extraordinary high definition images and messages to people across the nation," says Susan Sember, “and we are very pleased to be in partnership with the NOAA Beaufort Lab to do so”!

[Editor's note: Photos by Curtis Callaway. Also check out the NOAA mission logs of the R/V Nancy Foster at "2006 Lionfish Cruise Logs".]