Nichole the white shark
Charles Maxwell Underwater video

Nichole is a white shark that was tagged in South Africa with a satellite tag and made an amazing journey from South Africa to Australia and back again, covering a total distance of 20,000 kms in only 9 months. During this period Nichole reached a maximum depth of 980 metres and endured water temperatures as low as 3.4 deg C.

Firstly we could only work with female sharks on the wide shots. Then we needed long shots of white sharks swimming in a straight line. Not an easy task as one must use bait to bring the sharks to the camera but stop them from swimming in circles. Using my RIB, we rigged a bait on a pole with an Iconix HD polecam. Recording at 50P we could stretch the shots out on playback. This worked well but we has some nervous moments when the shark showed more interest in the RIB's inflated pontoons than in the bait.

I also used my in-house developed towcam with a Sony V1 camera purchased from Visual Impact in Cape Town. This was the easiest way to keep the sharks in frame for a longer time as no bait was required, only a shark sufficiently inquisitive to give chase.

To supplement the HD footage I shot white sharks on both a Sony F900r and a Panasonic Varicam, both from Visual Impact. My HD housing, while large is well balanced underwater but very hard work in a gyrating shark cage. To stabilise my custom built shark cage, it was lowered to mid water.

Title: Shark Nichole

Producer: Rory McGuinness
Underwater Cameraman: Charles Maxwell
Production Company: Natural History, New Zealand

www.underwatervideo.co.za