Over the years, Steve has been in demand as a writer for the diving press. He was technical editor of the book UK Divers' Source and the magazine Dive International. He was in the field for Dive International, co-designing and running equipment testing programmes which enlisted members of the general diving public for that real-world element. Steve has an impressive publication list in his areas of real personal interest: dive safety and dive education. His articles have appeared in Dive, Diver, Scuba World, Historical Diving Times, Australian Freediving and UWP Magazine, as well as on the internet. His skills as an underwater photographer have also been in demand; most notably, he provided much of the imagary for the Phil Smith and Darren Fa book Underwater Gibraltar: A Guide to the Rock's Submerged Sites.
Steve has owned Ocean Optics, the underwater photography specialists, since 1994, and organises the Visions in the Sea underwater photography festival annually. Optics Clients include wildlife photographer, Steve Bloom; professional underwater photography coach, Martin Edge; author, Constantinos Petrinos; and the British Antarctic Survey.
Steve is exceptionally well connected and has been quietly involved in helping many projects and individuals within diving achieve success. For the magazine Dive International, he located many author/photographers who contributed their work to the journal. Many of Steve's Ocean Optics clients got their first publishing break in Dive International at his suggestion and the magazine achieved a stunning level of quality in return. Now the house magazine of the BSAC and retitled Dive, the magazine still benefits from Steve's uncanny ability to find the right people for the job. Both the editor and Big Shot columnist were introduced to the publisher by him. At Visions in the Sea, the UK's premier underwater photography event, Steve has been able to attract stellar presenters drawn from the international elite. Included are National Geographic's David Doubilet, adventure photographer Amos Nachoum, award winning photographer, environmentalist and writer, Michael Aw, and the Scuba Zoo film team known for Great Ocean Adventures. Steve has been a safety diver on the TV show Taggart and trained and acted as safety diver for the band The Escape Club. In 2007 Steve worked behind the scenes with the Underwater Channel, recommending the presenters who were ultimately selected to host the show: broadcaster and writer Amanda Ursell and Mavericks' own Andrew Pugsley. And if you watched the Red Sea sequences from Blue Planet, Steve's team were on the shoot by invitation.
Steve is a true diving enthusiast. He saw in the Millennium from under the Atlantic Ocean off Gibraltar watching celebratory fireworks while standing on the seabed. He regularly makes two and a half hour night dives finishing at three a.m.; and won't miss his annual pilgrimmage to the birthplace of sport diving: Antibes, where he'll dive with the old-fashioned way and bring in like-minded enthusiasts.
Steve has an impressive collection of historical, or vintage, items of diving equipment. This ranges from twin-hose regulators to a brass diving helmet, from capillary depth gauges to mechanical dive computers and from tadpole triple sets to a Dacor automatic buoyancy compensator. Much of the collection has been donated by early pioneers who, more than anything else, love that their once prized possessions will be in the care of an enthusiast who will appreciate the history that comes with them. Some of Steve's collection is on display at the Mavericks showroom. Other items are regularly dived by himself and his buddies.
Latest:- 2009 March - Mavericks Diving, together with Diver magazine, organised a Buoyancy Challenge competition. It was held in the 6 m deep tank of Action Underwater Studios over a weekend. The event was attended by in excess of 50 participants, of all levels of qualification and experience. Steve organised the event, then spent the weekend guiding divers around the underwater obstacle course. 3 weeks later, Steve was a speaker at the London International Dive Show, giving presentations on Inon underwater photography, and on buoyancy control and safety. The full article has been published in the June edition of Diver magazine.
2009 July-August - Steve has been freediving in the Straits of Gibraltar, capturing video imagery of pilot whales, dolphins and tuna underwater. Steve's footage will be used for an upcoming documentary by the Gibraltar Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), for whom Steve has provided underwater video in the past.
Read more about Steve:
Mavericks Courses: Instructors: Steve
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Mark initially won a role at Ocean Optics/Mavericks Diving Ltd. as a part-time position while he maintained a career in customer care for CPW. He was asked to consider a career change to bring his qualities to Optics/Mavericks shortly after. He has assisted the British Freediving Association by shooting promotional stills for their annual competition, sponsored in 2006 by Mavericks.
Shark Day, held at the London Aquarium, fed the passions of the whole team and very many visitors, and it was Mark that made it happen. The day was an enormous success and fun was had by all. The Sharks Trust managed to sign up new members and promote awareness to the public. Visitors were able to speak to Gail and Mark Addisson, and Tom Peshack as well as the other speakers: Grant Bates, Stuart Nicholls and Gavin Parsons. Children visiting the aquarium were entertained by playing Bruces & Nemos (noughts & crosses) through the glass of the atlantic tank with divers Steve Warren and Andrew Pugsley---also raising awareness and money for the Sharks Trust.
Mark's elasmobranch enthusiasm further inspired him to organise the inaugral Mavericks Diving safari: a two week expedition in the Maldives for clients to go and search out, photograph and learn about whale sharks and manta rays in particular. For this ambitious project he has enlisted renowned manta researcher, and four-times british women's freediving champion, Anne-Marie Kitchen-Wheeler. Her expertise will greatly increase the chances of successful encounters, maximse opportunites once found, and provide detailed insights to background and behaviour.
Latest:- 2008 October - Mark and Steve have been out to Tanzania, testing camera equipment and investigating the location as a potential destination with Eco2.
2008 November - Mark and Steve have been busy with the organising and running of the second Shark Day which was held at the National Maritime Museum, London. The event brought together shark enthusiasts, photographers, conservationists, researchers and divers with thought-provoking and inspiring presentations, as well as display stands, and the chance to meet and mingle.
2009 March - Mark has been working behind the scenes at the Diver Buoyancy Challenge, efforts without which the event could not run.
2009 July - Mark has been freediving in the Straits of Gibraltar, capturing stunning images of pilot whales and dolphins in this unique environment.
E-mail Mark:
As an 18 year old student, AJ joined Ocean Optics on a part-time basis, taking clients through underwater camera systems. He had taken his first proper underwater photographs at the age of 14 with a Nikonos V, and previously had only used point-and-shoot and disposable underwater cameras. In order to bring him up to speed with the housed SLR systems, Ocean Optics took him to Aliwal Shoal, South Africa, to photograph ragged-tooth sharks. Photographs from this trip were published in Dive Magazine, on the Thomas Cook website, and in the Monty Halls book Dive - The Ultimate Guide to 60 of the World's Top Dive Locations.
Since then, he has returned to South Africa twice, to the Western Cape, to photograph great white sharks. In 2002 AJ became one of probably fewer than 50 people in the world, and possibly the youngest person, to deliberately swim outside of a cage free with great white sharks. In the same year, he was awarded the first European Our World Underwater Scholarship Society photography prize, presented at the Festival Mondial de l'Image Sous-Marine at Antibes, France for a close-up photograph of the head of a great white shark. He has had photographs published in a number of periodicals, including: 2excess, Dive, Diver, Families in the South-East, Gibraltar Magazine, London Diver, Maxim, Maxim (Czech Republic) and UWP Magazine.
He has dived in a range of conditions for a range or reasons from a garden pond to wrecks in the English Channel, and from recovering equimpent lost overboard in dock to playing tic-tac-toe with kids through the glass at the London Aquarium. Like Steve, AJ has crossed over to NAUI in order to provide NAUI training to Mavericks Clients.
Latest:- 2009 March - Mavericks Diving, together with Diver magazine, organised a Buoyancy Challenge competition. It was held in the 6 m deep tank of Action Underwater Studios over a weekend. The event was attended by in excess of 50 participants, of all levels of qualification and experience. AJ co-organised the event, then spent the weekend guiding divers around the underwater obstacle course. 3 weeks later, AJ was a speaker at the London International Dive Show, presenting the Diver Buoyancy challenge and results. The full article has been published in the June edition of Diver magazine.
2009 July - AJ has been freediving in the Straits of Gibraltar, capturing underwater video of pilot whates, dolphins, tuna and orca. His footage will be used in an upcoming documentary by the Gibraltar Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), by whom AJ has been interviewed in the past.
Read more about AJ:
Rediscovering The Adventure Of Diving From Years Gone By,
The UnderwaterChannel.tv.
Mavericks Courses: Instructors: AJ
E-mail AJ:
Brought up in Africa, she's become very much a world traveller. Sue's globetrotting satisfies another passion---her love of animals. In British waters she's to be found dancing with grey seals off the Lundy or framing a tiny Blenny through her viewfinder beneath Swanage Pier. Her travels to South Africa's Atlantic and Indian Oceans have brought her face to face with the power and majesty of the great white and the delicate grace of a tiny nudibranch. In the northern reaches of the Red Sea she's explored the wreck of the Thistlegorm, discovered by Cousteau. Off Port Sudan Sue has swum with grey reef sharks beside the remains of Cousteau's Pre-Continent underwater laboratories. It's here that Sue dives the wreck of the Umbria, the ship that was made famous by that other legendary underwater explorer, Hans Hass. She's marvelled at manta rays under the Sea of Cortez.
Sue has also made the Mavericks pilgrimage to the London Aquarium Atlantic Tank to be decked out in the traditional helmet of past times, as a guest of the Historical Diving Society. And she has taken to the even chillier waters of Norway to dive under the ice.
Sue's love of underwater exploration and photography and her appreciation for its wonders are shared with her three sons. Dean is a marine biologist and accomplished underwater stills photographer. James has been working in shark research with Sam Guber in Bimini. He is an expert underwater videographer. Simon has just started university and, like Dean, is an enthusiastic stills photographer. The family bonding and social side of diving is, to Sue, indivisible, from diving itself. It's part of the pleasure she gets.
Sue is a people person: AJ and Steve have asked her to train with them to become a NAUI Divemaster to bring her people skills and huge experience to the Mavericks dive school. We're delighted that she has accepted.
Latest:- 2009 March - Sue has worked behind the scenes at the Diver Buoyancy Challenge together with Sean Eaton - their commitment making the whole event not only possible, but smoothly run. She has also worked tirelessly for Mavericks at the London International Dive Show.
