By Michael Dalder
After shooting 15 days of swimming, diving and synchronized swimming, the staff of Simons Dive Lodge helped me with the final dive into the Olympic pool. We went down to take our remote controlled robotic underwater camera out of the water.
To get this special perspective from below, we brought 6 Peli Cases containing some 200 kg (440 pounds) of equipment including 150 meters (yards) of power and network cables to the Aquatics Centre to place the underwater camera in the water.
Covering swimming with the underwater unit guarantees long work days as the camera can only be accessed early in the morning or after 10pm at night after the last swimming competition is over.
To get different angles I jumped into the water almost every day to change positions and lenses. I spent almost 8 hours over the last two weeks in the Olympic pool doing 25 dives to adjust, replace or rescue the remote controlled underwater camera. This was definitely longer in the Olympic pool than stars like Michael Phelps from the U.S. spent.
The timeframe allotted for us to access the camera was determined by the Olympic Broadcasting Service – often on very short notice.
