As a professional wildlife cinematographer, I have spent thousands of hours underwater, freediving, on SCUBA (Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus) and using Rebreathers.
I started my diving career as a spearfisherman and freediving was the technique of choice.
It was silent, exhilarating, and repeatable, perfect for stalking fish all day.
SCUBA, on the other hand, was noisy, bulky and slow, and lacked the elitist appeal of freediving. Not for me.
At first I thought Closed Circuit Rebreathers (CCR) rebreathers would be the holy grail. Rebreathers are silent, you can stay down forever, and you feel like you are Jacques Cousteau.
As I assisted on more shoots, I experienced the limitations of CCR first hand. More complex, electronics that would fail, harder to get in and out of the water.
And so I embraced SCUBA, experimented with ways to keep my backpack as simple and as streamlined as ever, and developed a style of diving that was ideal for natural history cinematography
What I love about SCUBA is that it's the most versatile of all three techniques, its the least likely to kill you, it gives you mass and stability underwater if you are wearing a decent-sized tank, especially near the surface, and it gets the job done.
Each has its pros and cons when it comes to underwater filming
If you are interested in learning these three diving techniques with the goal of one day filming underwater, my advice is as follows:
Start swimming in a pool or ideally in the sea. Being able to swim non-stop for 1000m will build your confidence for open water diving immensely.
Develop your Freediving skills first, through a recognized freediving school.
Freediving is a great skill to learn and will give you so much more confidence when you tackle your SCUBA training,
Then focus on getting your SCUBA qualifications to Rescue and Nitrox Diver level as a bare minimum.
Do your SCUBA training with the best school you can afford and commit two years to diving as regularly as you can. Qualifications are rare just a licence to start learning.
CCR Training Agencies recommend anything from between twenty to fifty open water dives, AND between fifty to one hundred hours of bottom time. I would double that to 100 open-water dives and 200 hours of bottom time, in a wide variety of conditions.
Rebreathers will kill you if you don't pay attention.
If you have to pick one technique, then go SCUBA.
It's the Toyota Hilux of Diving Techniques.
It will get you places.
