DVD Review : Pantalleria 2005

About the DVD (from the manufacturer)

In May 2005 a team of 10 scuba divers from the Global Underwater Explorers began a project designed to carve out a model of the archaeological site  from a detailed survey off point Tracino on the Pantelleria island. Many amporae dated back 200 BC are brought to evidence and for the first time are documented resting on the sea bed at a depth of over 80 meters.

Pricing and Purchase Locations

• UK - DirDirect - £18
• US - Extreme Exposure - $17.95

Content Summary

There are the following chapters on this DVD:

1. Documentary in Italian
2. Documentary in English
3. Photo Gallery
4. Bonus Material

Starting the DVD I get a quality impression, there is only one menu to allow you to select which chapter you wish to watch. I think the menu looks very nice, the imagery in the background is beautiful, the audio is nice and crisp and the menu is exceptionally easy to read and navigate.

DVD Menu (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD).

This review has been based upon watching the DVD in English.

Core Material - Summary

The DVD starts with a short introduction and history to the island of Pantalleria and the wreck that they will be diving in the Mediterranean. I really liked this short history, some documentaries that I've seen jump straight in without the "history lesson" at just 1.5 minutes long it was light and concise but to the point.

Short history on the wreck (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD).

Skipping forward to the present (2005) day, the narrator explains that the local authorities wanted to explore the wreck and understand the history more , this is where the GUE team came in. Video starts with some gentle rock music showing the dive teams getting prepared, setting up equipment and some fun video of divers on scooters. During this "start-up" phase of the video, I found that the clips were short, just a few seconds each which allowed you to grasp the point of what you were viewing but not truly understand it.

Just as an example, a short clip shows a truck parking up with the dive and mixing cylinders - if it had been a slower clip and also a bit longer, it would have helped the viewer grasp the magnitude of the diving to come:

Truck load of cylinders (from Pantalleria 2005 DVD).

The rock music ends once you start seeing divers enter the water and start to descend, a calm, sedate music now starts with underwater video. The first diving you see is the divers on an equipment check and site orientation dive.

Day 2 : Checkout dive (from Pantalleria 2005 DVD).

On this DVD, the scenes transition seamlessly from each day of diving to the next. Whilst this makes good for lots of uninterrupted underwater footage. I would have liked to hear some of the surface discussions to add a more personal side.

Day 3 : Orientation dive (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD).

Whilst writing this review, I am trying to wear two hats, firstly commenting on the footage as a diver, but also trying to critique the video as well - I do hope to one day be making documentaries of my own! During Day 3 diving, the narrator does explain how after the orientation dive the process of tagging and surveying begins - this aspect of the diving helped to bring to the audience's knowledge the magnitude of task.

For every artifact found, it is given a unique tag so that it can be surveyed along with the entire wreck.

Survey tags (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD)

It was interesting to learn that the GUE exploration team laid line from the entrance of the sea to the wreck in two routes. This meant that the team could simply scooter to and from the wreck as opposed to being dropped in by boat. This simple idea meant that the teams got more in-water time. These also helped form parts of the survey too.

Day 4 - Scoping the wreck (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD)

Amazingly, the wreck covered a massive 1500 m2 after laying the line which took the entire dive team a shift-pattern to cover.

Day 4 - Scoping the wreck (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD)

The videography of this DVD is great - I really enjoyed how they didn't focus purely on the wreck, there are some great scenes of the fauna and footage of the beautiful fish in the area too.

Underwater life at 90m (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD).

The interest in the expedition by the authorities is not to be underestimated, as part of the dive, the team were asked to recover a sample, not something I would normally expect on a historic wreck.

The story returns to the underwater world and even more beautiful footage is shown. The diving on the wreck is coming to a close, the objectives of the dives are now to survey the artifacts identified. I must admit, at this point I felt an admiration of the exploration divers, not only because they are competently doing 90m survey dives, but watching some of the rebreather divers hovering absolutely motionless while surveying, fins not sculling at all. That level of in-water comfort is everything a diver strives for. I must admit that I personally only feel that level of comfort after doing a solid weeks' diving when on holiday!

Day 8 - survey artefacts (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD).

As part of the survey and documentation of the site, the exploration team produced a relief map showing the contours and location of the site. This will help the local authorities to maintain and protect the site.

Survey of the Pantelleria wreck site (from Pantelleria 2005 DVD).

The narrator concludes the documentary and highlights how the work at the Pantelleria wreck site is far from over and there is in fact an area of the site that highlighted that there may be many other relics to discover. There is also the middle section of the wreck and the hull, which assuming they still exist are still to be found.

Conclusion

The videography that went into this short documentary is quite literally stunning. It was incredible, there was a scene where a rebreather diver was launching their bottom stages to the surface via SMB.  Whilst you could tell that they were more than just 10m from the surface, the water was so clear it looked more like a 40m dive!

I think the actual production of the documentary is excellent, I highlighted earlier that I felt some scenes were far too quick and didn't allow the observer to truly grasp what they were looking at. But that is a minor point, the quality is brilliant, although there are a few spelling mistakes on the packaging and as part of the captions in the documentary - I'm still happy to overlook these. Its only because I've watched the DVD about 5 times writing this review I spotted them.

Overall I'm extremely impressed with this documentary, my only issue is the price. At £18 for just 12 minutes of actual documentary I find that quite steep. Whilst I appreciate that its supporting GUE initiatives and I'm an avid supporter, I feel that might have pushed the price too far. I would have felt better paying about £12. Paying £9.99 I think would represent very good value for money.

There is also some bonus footage showing divers surveying the wreck and also a short photo reel which is just as beautiful.

Price aside, I do recommend it and is worth a watch.