CHRISTIAN PETRON NEEDS YOU

“The Posidonia ... This is the kind of dive site that does not usually delight divers because diving in leeks, what an interest ... And yet ... I am currently editing a mini-series doc on marine ecosystems, including: l Posidonia herbarium.

I realize that I have very few beautiful images of Posidonia when looking in my archives ...

Indeed, contrary to what one might think, having beautiful pictures of Posidonia is not so easy because the subject is always quite dark.

If you give it a try and photograph these flashlit flowering plants, you will be amazed at the poor result.
If you film them, you will need to use very powerful projectors for
hope to obtain interesting light shows. I had two 250 W HMI lamps on my last attempt, real HMI, no HDI or LED, and that was insufficient for a real good result. I think it would have taken a 1200W ...

The difficulty then comes from movement. We must find herbaria located in areas of current. Not won, due to the stability of the image, difficult to find in water, without support on the ground. I love paneling left to right while remaining stable, but try to do it in the Montremian channel of Port Cros with 2 knots of current! Same problem for a very stable long tracking shot! No, it's not won ...

Over 2000 hours of images taken in the Mediterranean, I was still able to find in my archives some sequences that should be suitable. They were taken in different seasons:
- in spring when they are very small and very green,
- in summer when they are huge and covered with concretions
- in autumn when they fall.

So I gathered the images and started editing on a mix by Luc Baiwir whom I thank for agreeing to create original, different melodies, which the youngest may not find modern enough, but which reproduce so well the very emotions of a gliding dive that I am in heaven. I love his music ...

The film will last 26 minutes and will cover all aspects of posidonia meadows: stages of growth over the seasons, microcosm and life in various meadows, refuges for fish and larvae, as well as all regression problems for example and others.

I'm still in the early days of the film.

I put it online today on scuba-people.com to get a feedback on your feelings and your opinion… (please use the form at the bottom of the page)

Hope to receive many comments.

Thank you in advance for your cooperation and, above all, good dives to you all! ”

Christian PETRON

Difficult than to present Christian PETRON to the rare exceptions who do not know him ... too bad I take the plunge but things are clear ... it's a very small summary ...

Personalized Under-gifted on vacation from Claude Zidi going through Didier Alain Chabat or even OSS 117: Cairo, nest of spies by Michel Hazanavicius, Christian and his team produce a large part of the underwater images of our favorite films.

Christian Pétron on the set of OSS 117 with Jean Dujardin

In 1975 he creates his own company, Photomarine, which becomes Cinémarine in 1986. From 1982 he turned to television for which he directed twenty underwater animal documentaries as part of the TF1 show Les Animaux du monde.
In 1988, Luc Besson asks him to be his director of photography on The Big Blue then Atlantis in 1990). He was then technical director of the exploration campaign for the wreck of the Titanic (launched by the American chain Discovery Channel) and runs 4 movies from 1996 to 1998. With his experience on filming at great depth, James Cameron He then proposes to collaborate with him on the Deep Rover project in 2002.

Christian Pétron & James Cameron in front of the Cinémarine premises

His work for television is extended with a series of four films of Jean-Michel Cousteau : Shark at risk (for PBS in 2001) then the Dance of the whales and the Malpello sharks for Canal + in 2001 and 2002, shark under surveillance for the Fifth and Thalassa in 2006.

Christian Pétron on the set ofOSS 117: Cairo, nest of spies by Michel Hazanavicius

Through his company he will technically support a dozen underwater archeology films, produced by the Discovery Channel, such as the discovery of the submerged city of Thônis-Héracléion in Egypt and on wreck excavations in the Philippines. The main titles broadcast in France are: The wreck of the San Diego, The white gold of the Royal Captain, The Lighthouse of Alexandria, The Palace of Cleopatra, The lost dream of Napoleon at Aboukir, Alexandria Cited engoutie, Heraklion Since 2006 its The company works with the distribution group ZDF Entreprise and will make as director a dozen films broadcast around the world as “Sharks under high surveillance” Fragile Mediterranean ”“ Mémoire de Port Cros ”the Franco-German series broadcast by ARTE in Europe“ Ocean Quest ”or” Dance with the Fishes ”in French Version.