The camera system Diveye, designed to support real-time video from Freediving competitions, has been in France recently to support the Nice Abyss Contest and French National Championships.
Both events were demonstrations of camera system capabilities and its potential to increase safety and providing the media coverage of international freediving events.
At the Nice Abyss Contest, AIDA International staff were in attendance to see the demo and to confirm safe operation of the drone in a setup with a counter ballast and its suitability in the context of AIDA World Championships to be held in Roatan this year.
During the French National Championships, Diveye presented new features of the live stream developed to further increase the appeal of a live stream for both Media and a Consumer audience.  The new features included:
- video overlay of athletes data (age, weight, height, PB’s) and photo
- Interview with the athlete presented in the stream just before his/her dive
Alexandru Russu, judge at Nice Abyss Contest and AIDA International Secretary had this to say about Diveye:
“Hindering the competition for the sake of the publicity was my first concern as a judge at Nice Abyss Contest. The risk of rope entanglement especially with a counter ballast and bad weather was the main safety issue, but not the only one. The organizers in Nice used sonar to track the dive and if the signature of Diveye was similar to the one of the athlete on the sonar screen, this would have create confusions and impact the rescue procedures. The risk of hitting or intersecting the trajectory of the safety divers at depth was also something to take into consideration and generally, the sea is unpredictable, so any additional element in the competition zone is practically one more thing to worry about. Despite all this, everything went smooth with Diveye during the 3 competition days and even when we had to stop the competition due to bad weather, the Diveye team handled the drone without difficulties, controlling well the trajectory and keeping at a safe distance from the divers. Also, the sonar signature of the drone was clearly different from the one of the divers and it did not create any confusions. Overall, I can say without hesitations that Diveye did not hinder the competition. On the contrary, allowing judges and safety coordinators to view on portable tablets the whole dive in real time for each athlete was useful and also pleasant.”
For more information on Diveye take a look at their website.
