Jack Austin

An experience of a lifetime

Having the opportunity to spend a month in Mozambique, learning the art of Underwater Photography, was well and truly one of the most inspiring experiences I’ve ever had. Mentored from Fiona Ayerst, a world-renowned underwater photographer, I managed to cultivate the skills and understanding of Underwater Photography in a friendly and positive environment. The course is set in Guinjata Bay, a remote bay near the town of Inhambane, providing the perfect setting to really live and breathe the course. You’ll wake up to the sounds of the ocean, spend all day in the ocean and then spend the night watching it; there’s really not an experience like it and you’ll find a place that at first, felt strange and surreal, becomes like home very quickly. Everything was very well organised, right from the communication prior to the trip, to the daily activities and schedule, to even now being supported as an alumni of the course. I learnt a lot about myself during this experience and there was so so many things I didn’t get right or felt I wasn’t great at. However, the support throughout your learning here is incomparable and through getting out there day after day, you will soon find you’re making some amazing progress from when you first started. The honest truth is, I started the course with 6 open water dives (4 of them were in my OW course). Since completing this underwater photography internship, I then went on to become an Open Water Instructor, working in the dive industry in several dive destinations around the globe and now work as a professional underwater photographer. I put this all down to the experience, learning and teaching that I had in Mozambique. I highly recommend this course for those with either a passion for marine life or photography. Using myself as an example, you don’t have to have a tonne of dives to partake on this course, you will quickly develop those skills too except it will be way better as you’ll have a full underwater camera set-up in your hands. No question, I would love to go back and do it all again!