UNDERSTANDING ERICH RITTER
Sharks do not eat people. The media continue to be fascinated by these "monsters of the deep", yet fewer people are injured by sharks than by, say, murderously falling coconuts.
However, sharks are big animals with sharp teeth, and if one chose to feel you, as a baby feels things with its mouth, the results could be catastrophic.
It may not eat you (give it another million years or so to acquire the taste) but you have a good chance of bleeding to death, or drowning.
It could be argued that dogs are just as dangerous, but that we're used to them. We avoid the aggressive-looking ones and ignore those led by old ladies. This is the thrust of Erich Ritter's book, Understanding Sharks.
I met Ritter in 1999 at Walker's Cay in the Bahamas, where Gary Adkinson had set up a chumsicle feed for reef sharks and later started feeding the bull sharks.
We attracted some magnificent specimens to the shallows by baiting the water, and snorkelled with them while Gary kept them interested with dead fish. I was able to get close-up photographs, but was always careful not to appear to compete with the sharks for the bait.
I know what happens when you try to take a bone from a spaniel.
Ritter, on the other hand, was intent on doing stunts, snatching the bait away as a shark was about to eat it, or standing on the bait to deny the shark.
He gave me all sorts of reasons why he was perfectly safe. Nor did he get bitten - not that time, anyway.
Erich Ritter is a self-proclaimed "shark behaviourist". As he seems to be the only shark behaviourist, this gives him leave to invent all sorts of technical terms that reveal his German background.
"Angstination" is one example - the combination of fear and fascination that people may have for sharks.
Ritter is an expert and I am only a witness. He draws diagrams that reveal the shark's Inner Circle. I translate that as "get too close and look threatening" and the shark might warn you off. You don't want to be warned off by something with lots of teeth.
He says a shark normally swims up and past you. Well, it would, wouldn't it? If it swims up to you and doesn't swim past, it's goodnight nurse!
Most of the pictures in the book are from Walker's Cay. The bull sharks that congregate there each winter are impressively large and Ritter has got used to jumping in with them.
It is safe to swim with sharks if you're sensible about it, but it's different swimming with those that are chasing injured fish to those looking for carrion in a relaxed way. Sharks close their eyes (to protect them) when they bite, which can make their aim less than accurate.
Erich Ritter continually puts himself in the firing line in pursuit of proving that it is safe to swim with feeding sharks. He has not been eaten, but he has lost one calf (and nearly his life), which would be enough for most of us.
This book sets out to rationalise what he does. It carries some useful information, including theories of previously recorded "shark accidents". He discusses exploratory bites and his intentions are good - he wants sharks top be saved from extinction.
And extinction is a real possibility, thanks to a massive Asian shark-finning industry that supplies 1.3 billion people who want to eat sharkfin soup. (Ironically, this book is printed in China).
I still think that feeding sharks need to be treated with healthy respect. Be a neutral observer, by all means, but try not to get involved.
What I think this book goes some way to understanding is Erich Ritter!
John Bantin

LEARN TO VIDEO - from DVD or book?
What's the best way to learn the basics of recording, editing and producing an underwater video? From a DVD, or from a book?
I began by putting my feet up and watching the DVD Your Guide to Creating Underwater Video. A couple of hours later, having watched it all plus the extras, and repeating some bits, I popped it out of the drive and thought: "I could do that."
The book, Underwater Digital Video Made Easy, took longer to read and digest. The three writers cover the subject in considerably greater depth and detail. I felt I had learned more, but even with the short written case-studies, the printed medium is limited by having no examples to view.
Both book and DVD could have benefited from a more detailed worked and annotated example, providing some continuity about how the techniques and advice are applied, and showing an overall project from end to end.
The DVD might have found room for such an example by having fewer shots of writers Annie Crawley and Jeff Morse standing in the studio talking to camera, and providing a commentary instead.
The book would have needed more pages to do the same thing. No space is wasted; every page says something useful. The writers write with considerable authority.
To create a football analogy, if cameramen such as Peter Scoones and Howard Hall are Premier League, the book authors fall somewhere in the middle of the Championship, and the DVD team in Division 2.
Yet it isn't just about the experience and ability to produce, film and edit. It is also about the ability to communicate and educate. In that respect, both the DVD and book teams score the same.
Though not designed as a set, the book and DVD complement each other. Even so, if I had to choose one, I would go for the book.
John Liddiard

STYLE GUIDE
This book will keep you awake at night - fretting about how to afford your next diving holiday. Not only has Tim Simond made it his business to track down dive centres where the boats are small and comfortable and the diving good, he has also checked out the best places to stay.
Twenty-two hotels and four liveaboards are included in Dive in Style, a beautifully produced hardback that contains clear, useful information on dive sites, whether snorkelling is possible, which wetsuit to wear, optimum visibility, state of the coral and marine life present.
Remarkably, Simond took every photograph, both above and below water. His philosophy was: "If I saw it during a four-day visit, then you have a good chance of seeing it".
So, when he says there are large groupers in Picchi di Punta Coticcio in Sardinia, he has the photo to prove it.
The book is a smart addition to a diver's coffee-table collection but also holds eminently practical advice, including a very useful weather chart for each destination that also explains which species are present in which season.
Some of the resorts are surprising: Little Palm Island in the Florida Keys is included and, according to Simond, Looe Key is "bursting with fish life". He has images to prove it.
Dive in Style performs a valuable service in showing what the resorts and hotels featured are really like (all pretty amazing, as it happens), but also how big the day-boats are and how long the trip to the reef will really take.
If it's classy accommodation and good diving you want, this book is for you.
Tim Ecott

ARTFUL PAGE-TURNER
The Art of Diving brings together the well-honed journalistic skills of Nick Hanna and undoubtedly fine photographic techniques of Alex Mustard.
I compliment the author on the extensive research that allows him to quote some obvious and sometimes less obvious sources, and the photographer on the remarkably clean look of the pictures, and graphic simplicity that never fails to draw the eye.
Although I can't see this book really appealing to anyone who has no personal experience of the underwater world, the clear intention is for it to be read by an audience beyond that of divers.
If Hanna can persuade the wider public to read it, I am sure it would do wonders in promoting our underwater activities.
It may look a little like a coffee-table book, but any divers who start browsing will soon find themselves reading it like a novel. Hanna has skillfully woven quotes from divers into a well-constructed narrative. Two Cousteaus, Hans Hass, Howard Hall, Ned DeLoach, Trevor Norton, Cathy Church, Arthur C Clarke, Sylvia Earle, Eugenie Clarke, Thor Heyerdahl and even HRH Prince Charles are among many, including a raft of lesser mortals too numerous to name, who have added to the text wittingly or unwittingly.
In fact, it's said that Hanna has been astute in quoting so many people, because if their mothers all buy the book, sales can't fail to be impressive!
More seriously, the journalistic approach has avoided that pompous, pseudo-poetic text that all too often accompanies the colour plates in otherwise worthy books of underwater photos.
Tim Ecott is reported to have said of this book: "It beautifully reveals the deepest secrets of our love affair with the liquid world." He may be right.
With 270 pages filled with interesting quotes and jaw-dropping illustrations, if you liked Ecott's Neutral Buoyancy this is similar but in glorious Technicolor! An excellent book.
John Bantin

GONE DIGITAL - and all the better for it
In the '70s and '80s, I was an advertising photographer based in London. At the time Britain's photographers were known for being the best, and one thing all these talented people had in common was an understated belief in their own skills.
They didn't need to oversell themselves. Budgets were enormous, their work was displayed throughout the country on billboards and the agency cheques were confirmation enough that they were good.
Martin Edge was not part of this world. He is a self-taught amateur, and a pretty good one. But when he wrote his first book on underwater photography, he laced it with sections on aspects of "art", and for me, these didn't ring true.
It was as if he had learned about art from a novel-writer rather than from the world I knew.
So I was surprised to be asked by Focal Press some time back how The Underwater Photographer could be improved. I didn't hold back: get rid of those sections out of Pseud's Corner!
Martin Edge has a reputation for being a good teacher of underwater photography. He is evidently also a good learner, because the third edition of his book is almost a complete rewrite.
Gone is all the pretentious arty nonsense. This comprehensive book is packed with useful information on almost every aspect of the subject. Each section is concise and to the point, making it easy to dip in and out. I would go so far as to say that this could be the first standard reference book on the subject.
Like most of us, Edge has made the transition from shooting under water on film to electronic image-gathering.
That must have been painful. In the days when correct exposure and sharp focus were secret arts, only a
few practitioners had the monopoly on getting consistent results on film.
Digital photography has changed all that, calling as it does for a different range of skills, and The Underwater Photographer bears this in mind.
The book is well illustrated, not only with colourful examples of the author's photography but with pictures of equipment, lighting set-ups and effects, and computer displays during post-shooting digital processing.
The book may be sub-titled Digital and Traditional Techniques, but the author has realised that few newcomers will now put themselves through the tortuous route that comes with using film, and it is hardly mentioned.
My only complaint is that, armed with this book, almost any diver can become an expert underwater photographer, and my children will have to take up the still-secret arts of plumbing to make a decent living instead.
John Bantin

SPECIALIST BALI
Having recently returned from a trip to north-east Bali, I was quite interested to review Tulamben - Reef, Wreck and Critter Guide. Had I covered the best sites? What had I missed out on?
I was pleased to find that I had dived the top half of the sites covered by the book and that the descriptions pretty much matched my impressions of the dives and the critters to look out for. With the help of my local guide I had found and photographed most of them, ALthough there are some macro weirdos that I missed. I could have done with this guide book a couple of months earlier.
Jeff and Dawn Mullins obviously know their patch inside out, and are pretty good photographers as well. It's a shame, however, that the matt reproduction doesn't really do the pictures justice - bright and glossy would be better.
I would have liked to have seen a more detailed map, too, but other that it's as good as any guide book. You browse in the shop and decide which one suits the way you like to research your trip.
John Liddiard

COME ON IN, THE WATER'S FINE!
Amanda Ursell's new book is about scuba-diving, but it's not intended for divers - it's for your friends and relatives who would love to dive if only they weren't so nervous at the prospect.
Enthusing non-divers to the point of taking the plunge is not easy. DIVER tried it with a relatively successful book called Get Started in Scuba-Diving
a couple of years ago. We concentrated on overcoming fears rather than the actual techniques involved in diving. That's because the more you read about the techniques without the reassurance that comes with actually trying them out, the scarier it all sounds.
Going Down: Reflections of a Reluctant Scuba-Diver flirts with danger by revealing quite a lot about the process, but just when I thought any would-be novice would be about ready to slam the book shut, terrified at the idea of losing a lung or eardrum in one careless moment, Amanda Ursell sensibly switches the focus to the wonders to be found under water.
She could have been a little more reassuring about the negligible risk of shark attacks, I felt, but other than that she seemed to hit the right notes every time.
This comparatively short book is written in a chatty daytime-TV style (Amanda is a TV presenter as well as a journalist). It's based on her own experiences and designed to allow everyone from the pre-pubescent to senior citizens to breeze through it.
Combining her "if a scaredy-cat like me can do it, you can" approach with her science background to keep the facts straight, Going Down might just be the book that tips your nearest and dearest into the training pool.
If that's what you want to happen, leave a copy lying around!
Steve Weinman

THE POETIC PROFESSOR
Trevor Norton is hugely talented. His descriptions of people, places and events are highly imaginative - almost poetic at times.
Take the title of his latest book - Underwater To Get Out Of The Rain - or this description of fishing at night off Lanzarote: "The dinghy felt very small even when close to shore, but far out to sea, it shrank into insignificance. The lights of the coast had stolen away and we were lost in the stars, little more than a wooden shoe alone on the sea. The mighty Titanic had foundered on an iceberg.We would be doomed if we collided with an ice cube discarded from a spent martini".
Subtitled A Love Affair With The Sea, this is the story of the travels of this eminent marine biologist, authority on scientific diving and author, to places such as the Isle of Man where, he tells us, the prosperity of its landladies and hoteliers, starved of tourists during WW2, was saved when the government decided to intern thousands of Germans and Italians there - worth a guinea a week each to those who accommodated them.
Norton describes watching Liverpool play an evening match at Anfield: "...the Kop was an immense void, darker than the sodium sky and a-twinkle with far more stars as the crowd dragged on their ciggies. Smoke crept out into the night from under the lip of the roof like an inverted waterfall."
He tells of marine biologist Jack Kitching, who dived using an adapted milk churn over his head. He trudged into the sea supplied with air through a tube by two men on shore "frantically servicing two ordinary motor tyre foot pumps".
Trevor Norton has been to many parts of the world in search of marine biological enlightenment. He makes every journey interesting.
Bernard Eaton

SWEET AND SALTY
The Dolphin and the Fisherman is a sweet, old-fashioned tale of novella length, so it takes only an hour or so to read. A dolphin is involved, but the book has little to do with diving (wild dolphins rarely have much to do with divers anyway).
Author Laurie Emberson is, however, a diver and TV producer who has spent years making under-water feature films, including the BBC's Eye of the Dolphin. His obvious depth of knowledge and passion for the subject combine to bring a real salty tang to his writing.
One plea to those who self-publish books like this - please invest in a proof-reader. It's that much harder for readers to be transported into fictional worlds when they're tripping over punctuation errors and typos.
Steve Weinman

MOST AMUSING
For everything from a chuckle to a real laugh, look no further than the latest book by the inimitable Jay, otherwise known as John Bevan, the cartoonist for Underwater Contractor International and also its Editor.
The book's very funny cartoons illustrate all types of diver and aspects of what we see and do, the gear, techniques and tasks undertaken.
Bernard Eaton

THE LIFE AQUATIC DVD box set
Now that we are in the Age of Attenborough, with all that means for incredible, beautifully filmed underwater documentaries such as The Blue Planet, you may find The Jacques Cousteau Odyssey, a three-disc DVD containing all 12 episodes of an early TV series, disappointing. I know I did.
But then, realising that the films were made between 1977 and 1981 and having found them gripping stuff when watching them at home a little later, it is not the fault of Cousteau and his magnificent divers, but the fact that diving time has not so much as rolled on as ridden on the after-burner ever since he released The Silent World in 1956.
The films have not worn well, and look faded and often dull. Again, you can hardly blame that on his diving camera-men, one of whom nearly got the scoop of the century when Jacques-Yves, down deep inside the hospital ship Britannic on the Aegean seabed, got tangled up in the loose treads of the liner's grand staircase.
His 1980 TV audience held its collective breath - and they will do so again when watching on a laptop in 2006.
The only difference now is that from the moment Cousteau steps to the Calypso's ladder, kitted up to dive the Britannic, something about the way he moves tells us that he was getting far too old for such deep antics. Yes, I know that he had his last dive when he was 87, just before he died in 1997, but TV and film are well-known for seeing under the skin.
It is those divers who were too young to have seen these slices of underwater history when they came fresh to our screens who will get the most from these DVDs from the past.
They may mock the false heroism that some commentators adopted, and see through the occasional archaeological cover-up of a bit of good ol' treasure-hunting, but they will how much their diving development owes to this early film-making for TV. And they will enjoy some parts of Cousteau's Odyssey a lot.
Kendall McDonald