Jennifer Idol's Journey in the Dive Industry; Encounters and Empowering Women Part 1 of 3 .

Jennifer, thanks for coming on and joining us today. We really appreciate it. Thank you for having me and good morning. Good morning. It's definitely a wonderful morning as well and we're going into summer, our favorite time of dive season, especially as inland divers, right? Absolutely. Although we still like our dry suits. We do. I think you and I are both into that as inland divers that there's very few times we don't dive a dry suit. Exactly. I recently got a new dry suit and have been loving being dry again. Oh, excellent. What'd you get? The scuba force suit. Oh, nice. Nice. That's always the big question is which one did you get? Did you because you get your first dry suit, you kind of go with the flow of everybody else and then all of a sudden you spend all that time in a dry suit and you start figuring things out and you start getting this bigger expanse. So I always say your second dry suit is the one you really like because you've had that time in a dry suit and you understand and get it. I'm on my fourth dry suit. So you really, really get it. You had that opportunity to move through the process. What's been your favorite dry suit, this one or another one? So manufacturers change their manufacturing processes over time. And I used to go with the DUI suits. We had a DUI team and I would go exclusively with that. But as my diving challenges increased, I needed more durability. So I've got this, it's a pretty thick tri laminate from scuba force and it's kind of got a gritty exterior and it's been rugged enough to survive me so far. Oh, there you go. That's the other trick is getting one that will survive the type of stuff we want to do. We're certainly not a once every few months kind of divers, that's for sure. And I finally moved into the turbo souls, you know, for a while I was a diehard booty fan, like put the boots on and tie them around the ankles. And now I've moved into the attached boots on your dry suit. There you go. Right on. I'm still in the tie them up. I like my Hollis rock boots. That's for sure. I enjoy those and the extra protection, but I can see going that direction as well. That's for sure. Yeah, they're pretty rugged. So thanks for having me this morning. I hear you have a few interesting questions to go through and maybe help your audience learn more about some of the weird things I get into. That is for sure. You definitely get into some places that most people wouldn't realize. And your book is amazing. We're definitely going to go through your book as well, which we have on our coffee table. And I encourage all my readers and all my listeners to make sure to pick up Jennifer's book. It's absolutely amazing. It's a must have for every coffee table for a diver and it creates amazing conversations as well. But Jennifer, let's just jump into it. What inspired you to become an underwater photographer? Scuba diving. I started as a scuba diver. So I've been diving since I was 14. And it's always been part of my life. I've loved water. I love the underwater world. And I was an artist. So I actually went to university as a graphic designer and I worked in corporate for that for a number of years before I encountered some things as a scuba diver that made me realize I needed to share my stories underwater with my graphic design and photography tool set as well. So I merged the two and became an underwater photographer and videographer now too. An amazing one at that. I've always appreciated that. So where did you first get certified? Texas. People don't realize how much water is in Texas. They're often like, how is it an underwater photographer came out of Texas? And then I remind people, well, you remember Ralph Erickson and Karen Erickson who started PADI? Karen lives here in Austin, Texas, where I live as well. Tanya Streeter, a renowned freediver, lives in Austin, Texas. And Wes Skiles' buddy, Jim Bowden, also lives in Austin, Texas. So we have a plethora of underwater people. Never mind Bill Still. And some of the cave diving starts around here as well. So there's water here. There are caves here. There is coral reefs out in the flower gardens. We have our lakes, which are technically reservoirs. The only natural lake in Texas is Lake Caddo. And that's more of a swamp, I would say, than a lake. But I started diving in Lake Travis and got my first few hundred dives there. I worked as a local dive master and then worked my way into instructor and started teaching people how to dive. That's fantastic. Who certified you? The first one? I have 26 certifications. Who gave you your first open water card? David Duval gave me my open water card from a dive shop that's long since closed. And he now lives in Tennessee. But I still stay in touch with him. And he said I was an unusual student for him because I questioned everything. I asked questions. And he didn't see it as a challenge. He realized that it was really me searching for knowledge. So as a dive instructor, you can get divers who are curious and you may think they're challenging you when they ask you questions. But really, they're just trying to understand this complex world of breathing underwater. And he answered every question. And here I am today as a pro. I'm having a bit of a Wi-Fi lag. No worries. It happens. They recorded you though. So you're good to go. Well, perfect. And I agree with you that the students that ask the questions, I never take it as a challenge. I always look forward to the questions. And I realized that if they weren't interested, they wouldn't be asking questions. So I think having somebody that reaches out and wants to understand all the pieces of it. At what point did you realize you wanted to take that career into tech? I fell in love with wreck diving. And I had some friends who were diving on wrecks. And I thought, boy, wouldn't it be neat to go into, say, the mighty Oreskine out in the Gulf of Mexico. And I just had it in my head that I wanted to see bigger things. So I entered the tech world through wreck photography. Well, I was a photographer at that time already, but through wreck photography. And I was diving with a cave diving team. So I then got involved in cave training and eventually became a part of the Ozark Cave Diving Alliance, which is the OCDA in Missouri. Right on. Now, you've got this amazing book out there that I think everybody should get, The American Immersion. Thank you. How did that happen? How did that come about? That was the impetus for my taking my underwater photography professionally. Because I flew to Tobago, and I had my first drone rig and was shooting. I started out shooting on simple point-and-shoot systems underwater, even though I shot on land professionally. As a DSLR digital photographer, I had long since learned how to shoot on land. But shooting underwater is different. There's a larger task load. I'd taken my first DSLR underwater, and I was flying back kind of exhausted when we flew over the Gulf of Mexico, and the pilot announced that Deepwater Horizon was on the right side of the plane. I was in the window seat and looked out, and I saw the spill at the time when they were burning oil from the surface of the Gulf of Mexico. At 30,000 feet, there were all these tiny oil tankers surrounding the fire, just desperately trying to contain the accident that happened. As a Texas diver and somebody who had been in the Gulf of Mexico, seeing the underwater life that's there, seeing our National Marine Sanctuary with dense corals, working with Dr. Donna Shaver with the Kemp's Ridley sea turtles, an endangered sea turtle species, I knew what a precious resource was underwater there and felt like I had to do something. Because when I observed the oil spill, I didn't take the photo. I was just aghast. I didn't know what to do with it. And then, I mean, it's a commercial airliner, so it passed by in an instant. And I just was racked with grief and guilt for what can we do. So I sought out to share our local waters and showcase the diversity that's out there. Most people don't realize that there are wonderful natural resources in every state, all across the world, and it's really important to maintain these resources for the life that's in them, for our lives. You know, our water, our drinking water, the thing that sustains us comes from our local waters. That's been one of the common themes I've noticed among all of us as divers and tech divers. And those of us that take this very seriously and work to make this a great career is that we're very environmentally conscious, especially of our oceans. What have you done to increase your environmental awareness and decrease your environmental footprint? You know, it's complex. Megan Haney Greer runs a YouTube channel called the Imperfect Conservationist, and she's a free diving champion. And I think her title of her program sums it up perfectly. We're imperfect in our conservation, and instead of striving to be perfect, we should strive on improvement and doing what we can in the sphere of influence around us. So personally, advocacy has been a big part of what I've done in sharing our local waterways and helping people understand that you can't just toss things and they disappear. They're still existing underwater. I've seen heaps of party folks out on our local lake, and you'll see like people in inner tubes, and they'll turn around and they'll just shove cans underwater thinking nobody cares or notices. It's a more common practice than you expect. Certainly, I've tried to focus more on reducing what I use and being purposeful in the things that I intake wherever it's possible. I do things when I travel, like I have a friend, Alex Rose, who owns a company called Blue Ring, and I use her blue ring wooden silver, wooden utensils when I travel instead of grabbing, you know, the plastic fork or, you know, whatever when I'm eating abroad, because I travel quite a bit. So I do what I can to reduce the impact, and I'm aware that some of the travels I do to tell stories have an impact in and of themselves. So, you know, reducing water use, using good products like stream-to-sea products that have a better impact on the underwater world in particular. The best sunscreen I've ever had is my stream-to-sea rash guard. So I wear that and then I put stream-to-sea on my face and I'm good to go for a whole day of diving. So I do things like that. That is wonderful, and I agree with that completely, and that's something we do as well. We don't go to restaurants anymore that use plastic cutlery, and we go to, when we go to like coffee shops, I make sure to use one that has actual mugs as well, plus obviously the no more single-use containers. I've made, we've made that commitment as well, so good job. I appreciate that as well. So kind of go back under your American Immersion book, what was the most surprising experience you had during your travels, and how did that impact you? So that was a five-year journey, and it was like, if you're a video gamer, it's like you keep leveling up as you go through the 50 states. And I've talked with the, one of the other people, there's three of us at the time that had completed it, and I connected with the other two people, and they said that most people struggle after halfway. So like after state 25 people, peter out, because it gets harder, and it does get exponentially harder, just the rigor of it. So as you're going through, like first you're like super impressed with like all of these quarries that you're diving, and just how many different water bodies there are. But the lasting impressions that I've had have been from connections and partnerships I've made with people. I got to meet you as part of that journey in a way. Diving in sites like Yellowstone Lake have had a longer lasting impact. Things like Alaska really, that really blew my mind. So Boone Hodgins at Ravencroft Lodge has a salmon shark expedition he runs out there, and through the 50 state journey, I was introduced to that expedition type of diving, which is how I then got connected with Andy Murch of Big Fish Expeditions, and began working with him as an expedition leader to help introduce other people to wildlife encounters. So there have been connections just in diving locally that have reached further, and then the destinations I keep going back to that I find have had the most impact. Right on. So with that, and I get it, it's like saying, telling people who my favorite child is. Alaska. Yes, it's diverse. The cold water, as you can appreciate, it seems like the underwater, especially the invertebrate life, is bigger in size. And so just the scale of diving in Alaska, and the diversity from nudibranchs all the way up to like the salmon sharks, or sea otters, or even salmon and the salmon runs, you know, there's just so many different subjects and things to get, or the big jellyfish smacks, which are the aggregation of moon jellies. Nice. And I like the speed to which you answered that question. There wasn't a hesitation. Quick draw. Good job. I agree. I've been, my wife and I have been diving, dying to get to Alaska as well. So this definitely sounds interesting and amazing, and some of the glacier dives as well. Just, oh my goodness, we hadn't thought about it until we talked to Dive Alaska, and yeah, so we're right there with you. We're dying to go, and look forward to seeing that as well. So what are some of the challenges you face when filming or photographing underwater? There are so many. I mean, weather, I've got to say, has been the number one challenge. You know, having good visibility, good conditions for diving, having it all come together for your shoot. Certainly when you're shooting, you want the best visibility possible. That being said, I have a history of working in low visibility, which is more akin to night diving style of photography and filmmaking. So weather's got to be right up there. Your equipment itself, maintaining it, keeping it top of the line, having equipment struggles, not being in a hurry, and communicating to clients that, yes, I need a day of setup and preparation to check out everything before I'm running and gunning in the water. Because so often, budgets or shoots or whatever experience you're on, be that a vacation, I see divers on vacation who haven't tested their equipment before they get to the vacation, and then we have to overcome challenges during the limited working time you have underwater. So getting everything set so that precious underwater time is maximized for optimal shooting conditions is probably the biggest thing that I face. You mean you should prepare before you go on a dive trip? Yes. Silly. I just can't even imagine that checking your gear out before a dive trip. But no, I get that. And you dive with some very, very nice gear that I'm sure takes a little bit more maintenance than my point and shoot camera that I use. So absolutely. What are you currently shooting with? Right now I'm shooting with two cameras. I've got a Sony ASR3 for my video, and I've got the Nikon D5 for my stills. But I am, as soon as the credit card and the things get paid, moving into another Nikon. I was looking at the Z9 to kind of combine both of those into one camera. But it's an investment, you know, for the kind of housings that I shoot with to meet the conditions that I need. I shoot with Nauticam housings, and I'm not sponsored by Nauticam in any way. I just like the ergonomics and durability for myself because I take them in the caves. I take them, you know, in rocky places, shoreline entries, you know, just not ideal conditions a lot of times. And they're rugged enough to withstand the abuse. But it's, I don't know, a $5,000 to $8,000 investment just for the body. So I don't know about you, but that's a lot of money for me. A lot of money for anybody in the dive industry that's specific. We all know the joke about what's the difference between a dive instructor and a pizza. Well, we're hoping to change that. I think some of it has been people's value system and charging appropriately for our rates. You know, photography, videography, and dive instruction are all in some degree service level industries. And service level has always been like a race for what's the most affordable I can get into this by the consumer. And as an industry, I've seen over the last 20 years, kind of not a race for the bottom, but people just, it's the margins are not big enough to be a sustainable business. And people think of margins as excessive profit as a consumer. But what margins really are is a business's ability to grow and adapt and build and support the staff that helps you have a meaningful experience underwater. So some of the rates that it takes to become a scuba diver are the same that they were 20 years ago. And that's insane if you think about how expensive the world has become. Absolutely. And I agree with that completely. And it's refreshing to see that point of view that we need to do that. We need to start putting value on what we put our life into. I mean, truthfully, I mean, this is a life-threatening sport. Do you really want to go to the, and I don't mean to pick on Walmart or the dollar store version of dive instruction, or do you want to make sure that we're supporting good divers and putting money into it so they can grow and become better, become safer? So I agree with that. And I love the perspective. Absolutely. So kind of along those lines, what have been some of the challenges you face as a woman in the dive industry? You know, when I first started diving, I was 14 and I've just been doing it for so long. Yes, I was early on the only woman very often. And I have clients, I lead expeditions for big fish and they come on board and I had one lady, she goes, oh good, there's another woman on board. And it's not just you as the dive leader. So they appreciate that I'm a female dive leader when I have female clients. But it really helps also for them to see other normal people, because I'll jump into anything. So I just never really paid mind to the fact that I was the only woman and I worked harder to get there. I'd say some of the things I probably have to hear comments from people and learn how to manage expectations with people, particularly in speaking engagements is where I have had people not understand because they're not out on the boat with me working. By and large, it's been a respectful industry. But there certainly are some things I think I have to answer that some of my other colleagues haven't had to deal with. And I'd say the best way I handle that is just by modeling, being a great diver, trying to be a good person. I focus more on the human side. Like I want to be the best diver. I don't want to be the best woman diver. It took some, because I'm the first woman to dive all 50 states. That was what was remarkable about it in the public eye, but it took some convincing for me to be able to say I was the first woman to dive because I'd rather be the first person to dive all 50 states. But it's still meaningful enough that I got the messaging out. Absolutely. Sometimes you just have to get the message out first and then worry about the semantics of it later. Absolutely. I just say do your best and don't be afraid of following your dreams. I agree with that completely. So what are you doing to empower other women to join you in this industry? Through speaking engagements, through collaboration, connections, supporting other people. I'm actually in the middle of a partnership with a 15-year-old girl for a book that we're writing called Dive Into Texas. Right now we're pitching publishers. I have some publishing connections and we're hoping for a response in the next few days for my choice publisher. But we are in the publishing seeking process because she wants to help other young divers in particular get into this sport. And we're going to show them that through Diving Into Texas. So we've conducted a series of dives throughout the state to highlight all those different waters that I talked about at the beginning. That's wonderful. That's one way. It's partnerships. Partnerships is great and I appreciate that. Now that you've gotten there, helping others achieve the same goals. That's fantastic. Now what advice would you give other women that want to pursue a career in the diving industry? It's not just women. Anybody that wants to pursue. I actually had another alumna from my university, the University of Texas, write me this last week. And I wrote her, it's hard work. And Amanda Cotton is a well-known underwater photographer. And she gave me the advice when I got into the industry that you have to do everything to survive this. You have to write. You have to shoot photography. So I'd say lean into whatever your strengths are. You know my strength and differentiator in the industry is graphic design. There's nobody else really in the industry who has the quality and understanding of graphic design that I do. Particularly with the background of the scuba industry. To be able to communicate in the industry and share messaging through that design talent. This alumna that I talked with, she's in architecture school. I was like, wouldn't it be amazing if you built, you know, underwater museum exhibits or things of that nature. So apply your skill set in a way that's meaningful that you can also be responsible financially. So if you're getting into it, like when I started, I was doing this in addition to my day job. You have to build into it. Being an entrepreneur comes with a business responsibility to building all of that. So if you want to get into photography, go out there and shoot. These days you can take any smartphone, put a housing around it, and create quality footage. That's actually how James Blackman at Divers Ready started his YouTube channel. He had a big iPhone with a case, a Kraken case, and went down and he made some excellent 4K footage off of that. Now he's shooting on a Panasonic. It's not the equipment that's the whole fact. It's what is it you want to do in the industry? Who do you want to impact? What story do you want to tell? Do you want to guide divers and mentor them as an instructor? You know, you're a technical diving instructor and that certainly has its own eye-opening. I know I appreciate the technical diving instruction I had from my instructors and that carried with me, not just through diving, but those principles are relevant to the rest of your life. Absolutely, absolutely.