We need more positive media about Sharks & Rays. We are releasing our new title, Sharks & Rays, in time for World Ocean Day. It is important for us to speak up together and give sharks a voice.

Produced by Annie Crawley

PDF Sharks & Rays Press Release

Sharks & Rays, a new film release from Dive Into Your Imagination for the home, school, and retail markets, takes you on a journey to discover the wonders of sharks and rays. Underwater photographer, filmmaker and ocean explorer, Annie Crawley takes you on a high definition adventure around the world documenting these amazing creatures.

Sharks & Rays, shares with you the biology of these elasmobranchs and engages you with complex information in easy to understand language woven into interesting stories about these creatures. Exclusive footage will have you diving with schooling hammerhead sharks, observing manta rays feeding, nurse sharks entering a state of tonic immobility, plus you will experience the first Shark Sanctuary in the world while diving in the blue waters of Palau. This program takes you on a journey to discover sharks and rays around the world. Whale sharks, hammerheads, great white sharks, electric rays, manta rays, reef sharks, mako sharks, dozens of species of sharks and rays from around our world’s ocean are explored in this program.

The importance of sharks in the world can in no way be understated. People are often terrified of these animals because of misinformation. Sharks & Rays shares with you how sharks and rays move, what they eat, what makes these animals similar and different plus shares some of the threats they are facing.

Sharks & Rays showcases spectacular up-close underwater footage, with shark information suitable for young and old. Created and narrated by Annie Crawley, a team of underwater photographers and filmmakers contributed to this work including famous shark filmmakers Bill Fisher, Joe Romeiro, Tom Osborn, Nick Martorano, Pascal Kobeh, Amos Nachoum, and Marty Snyderman. The film was sponsored in part by Sam’s Tours in Palau, Shark Diving International, and DivEncounters.

The underwater scenes include expeditions to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Belize, Galapagos, Mexico, Malpelo, Cocos, California, Rhode Island, and more. You will want to share this over and over as you learn about the magical world of sharks and rays.

Says Annie: “Filming sharks and rays excites me as there is so much still to be learned and discovered. There are more than 500 species of sharks and 700 species of rays from cold water to the tropics, shallow water to the deep sea. This film was produced to share with you the fascinating life of sharks and rays, hoping you will love and respect them as I do. We protect what we love. Many species of sharks and rays may go extinct within our lifetime if we don’t change the way we interact with these animals. It is my responsibility as a filmmaker to entertain and educate.”

Sharks & Rays is the first of several shark and ray films being released by Dive Into Your Imagination. Look for Great Whites, Hammerheads, Mantas & More and Explore Galapagos, Dive Into Biodiversity coming soon. If you would like to include images with your article, please contact us for web or print images.

Annie Crawley, CEO of Dive Into Your Imagination, has spent the past 20 years living and working around the world.  As an award winning producer, photographer and motivational speaker, Annie photographs and produces programs about life on our planet, specializing in our ocean. Trained as a journalist, with a corporate as well as a non-profit background, her recent work includes books, educator guides, DVDs, films, cartoon characters from the Adventures of Ocean Annie series, and a series of eBooks designed for the iPad® available on the iBookstore. Annie is a member of the Women Divers Hall of Fame and is the Camp Director of Beach Camp at Sunset Bay in Edmonds, WA. As the founder of Dive Into Your Imagination, her mission is to promote an understanding about ecological systems to create a sustainable human relationship for a healthy Ocean. Dive Into Your Imagination is changing the way the next generation views the ocean and themselves. Annie is available for interviews and speaking engagements. Contact us today. Phone: 805-453-1947

Annie@DiveIntoYourImagination.com

Sharks & Rays Credits

Filmed, Written, Narrated by Annie Crawley

Editor Justin Bergeron
Justin Bergeron edited Sharks &Rays. Bergeron has more than fifteen years experience producing, filming and editing award-winning projects in the film, television and corporate video industries and specializes in HD & digital cinema production. He has managed a wide array of projects for clients including Lucasfilm, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures & Walden Media.

During his career he has filmed projects in over twenty countries, including such challenging locals as Egypt, Papua New Guinea, and South Africa. 

Some of Bergeron’s career highlights include working with acclaimed filmmakers while playing a variety of creative, technical or supervisory roles in projects including, “Star Wars, Episode III”, “Journey to the Center of the Earth, 3-D”, and “The Blue Realm”.
Says Bergeron, “Working with Annie on the latest programs in the Dive Into Your Imagination series was a privilege as well as great fun. Natural history documentaries are among my favorite to work on and Annie’s genuine passion for the oceans and the various creatures that inhabit them comes through in an easy to understand and entertaining way that is enjoyable for audiences young and old.”

Music:
Craig Dobbins
Premium Beat Music Library

Sponsors:
Sam’s Tours Palau www.SamsTours.com
DivEncounters www.GalapagosSky.com
Shark Diving International www.SeeSharks.com

Please Support:
Palau Shark Sanctuary: www.SharkSanctuary.com

Additional Footage:

Bill Fisher & Joe Romeiro www.333Productions.com www.JoeRomeiro.com
Peter Ickx
Bill MacDonald www.MacDonaldProductions.com
Nick Martorano www.OceanWonders.org
Marty O’Farrell
Tom Osborn
Mark Santa-Maria
Mathew Broughton

Additional Photography:

Tom Gruber
Pascal Kobeh www.PascalKobeh.com
Amos Nachoum www.BigAnimals.com
Marty Snyderman www.MartySnyderman.com

Scientific and Educational Advisors

Lori Bobak
David Shiffman
Michele Hoffman Trotter

www.DiveIntoYourImagination.com or www.AnnieCrawley.com

Call:  805-453-1947 or Annie at AnnieCrawley dot com or Annie at DiveIntoYourImagination dot com

Related Materials Enhanced eBooks available on the iBookstore

What are you waiting for?  Order yours today!

We are all one. We are connected to one another, to nature, to God. I know this. I feel it in my heart and soul. One of the reasons the ocean draws me close to explore life below the sea is to experience the interconnection to self, life, love and one another. Yet when I surface and deal with the complexities of life, I forget this simple truth of interconnection. It is so easy to become human doings rather than human beings and in this moment of Yoga energy, I commit once again to the art of remembering and the feeling of completeness when connected to a Higher Power and Purpose.

Yoga stretches my body and mind. It allows me to dive deep into a place of silencing my mind from the clutter of life. Practice. By practicing Yoga, it allows me to remember and wake from this dream of separateness. Every time I stretch and open my body, I feel a release of past energies stored deep inside my body. Scuba diving allows me this same pleasure. The breath travels in and out, slowly, methodically, taking my mind to peace. Yoga gives me strength and a time to contemplate where my mind travels and how much we have to pay attention to stay on our path. What is the mantra I live by? What is important to my soul? The passion I feel when deep below the sea. I have set my personal mission to be an inspiration for all people I meet. With everything I think, say and do, my goal is to be an inspiration. And as I lay on my mat, breathing in and out, feeling these surges of energies releasing, I wonder if I live my mission. How come it goes wrong sometimes? How can I improve? Why do I react with certain people and with others I am able to take action?

What is the mission you live by? How do you break through your challenges? What support system do you have in place to create growth? The surface of our lives can be so vast, yet when we dive beneath an entire world opens up to us.

As I walk through this journey we call life, it is easy to look with hindsight and see the connections of why we meet certain people and how circumstances we experience shapes who we become. It is more challenging to explore our journey being open without the clutter of our lives and our own stories getting in the way of expansion. I strive to take advantage of each circumstance and recognize each moment as a blessing, whether it is a challenge or celebration. Today I realize the importance of recommitting daily to the art of staying in the moment of human being rather than doing. Oh the places we can go! For me, I need to remember the connection to my Blue World, the wondrous sea.

What is your daily practice? How do you stay focused? Are you awake or need to be awakened? How do you separate yourself from who you were born to become? Explore, dream, and discover your ocean soul. If you do not set intentions, you will end up becoming a part of someone else’s dream. Create your life through your imagination. Begin today to make your dreams become your reality.

As the person behind the camera, I do not often get images of myself. Diving with all of the families at Stingray City with DiveTech in Grand Cayman was by far one of the highlights I experienced this summer. I was fortunate to get to dive with almost every group, photograph and film the families and crew. The images will be both on Kids Sea Camp website, as well as being posted through stories in the coming months, so if you were one of the families or crew I had the pleasure of diving with, don’t worry…your images will be posted if they are not already up!

I met Skyler at Kids Sea Camp Grand Cayman with DiveTech this summer and it was a complete honor to dive with both her and her dad Reuben. As it turns out, Reuben is an instructor and came to help out at DiveTech and experience Kids Sea Camp with his daughter. Little did I know that Skyler had grown up watching my Dive Into Your Imagination DVDS because her dad uses them in his program to introduce kids to scuba diving. Skyler is an advanced diver with photo and DPV specialties. We were able to dive together with our SeaLife Cameras as well as on the last day dive together at Sting Ray City. Skyler is an amazing diver and ocean advocate. I’m already looking forward to talking with her and sharing these images with her. Special thanks to “Pinky Jo” who is a PADI Course Director. Skyler and I were first in the water with her and she took my camera so Skyler and I could have a few images together underwater! Will write more later…Skyler, these are for you!

After a quick lunch, charging batteries, and prepping cameras, I headed out with the adults for an afternoon dive. The kids needed a siesta after their action packed morning. The water is so warm in Yap, 86 degrees, so I have been diving in just my favorite Fourth Element rash guard and board shorts. It is simply bliss when you can dive with minimal weight and feel the warmth of the sea welcoming you. What has been spectacular for me is trying to capture the sunrays dancing in the water. I just love how you can really see the light moving in the water because of refraction. Late in the day the sun dances through the sea and leaves me in awe of nature.

My Zen mood did not last long because as soon as we returned to Manta Ray Bay Resort we pulled out the kayaks and I roused up the gang of kids. We eat on a three-story high pirate ship everyday, which is huge, and it sure does look a lot bigger from the water line in a kayak! I really did not know what I was getting myself into with nearly a dozen kids kayaking around a pirate ship. I should have guessed the next thing, a whole lot of ramming and dumping going on. I was very happy I brought my mask, snorkel and fins! One of the kids said, let’s get Ocean Annie…and bless my SEAL Team…Captain Nick said, we can’t get Ocean Annie, she is our teacher. We have to protect her! I could have kissed him on the spot!

Tonight was extremely special because Senator Charles S. Chieng joined us for dinner. During this past year Yap has declared their waters as a Manta Ray Sanctuary and realized the importance of Manta Rays to both their economy and to our ocean. The Senator’s speech was so moving, I asked for a copy to share with you:

Welcome to the Blue Continent – the South Pacific Ocean. And since Yap State is in it, Welcome to Yap!!! Or should I say, “Welcome to your home away from home.”

As islanders – I guess including yourselves now, if I may say so, in the vast ocean of the Pacific, within our solar system, so must our hearts be of a Pacific Heart, and our minds, be of a Global Mind…that we may be able to peacefully accept with greater respect Bio-diversity that beautifies and makes our world an interesting place to be. As you can imagine, this whole world may not be so interesting if it is all painted “RED.”

Mr. Acker, a good friend of mine, realized the importance of diversity and conservation of our natural resources of the island sometime back, and to that, I thank him. We are here this evening at Manta Ray Bay Hotel because of Margo Peyton, Founder of Kids Sea Camp. Even though she is not with us today, what she started with and for her family has grown into this! And I thank her for what she has created.

It is a pleasure to be here tonight, especially among friends, families, and especially the young ones, the future guiders and/or leaders of the future generation, most especially in the area of marine habitat.

I am hopeful that you have, and perhaps will continue to do so, found the Ocean and the vast numbers of creatures “it houses” lovely and interesting as many of us do.

As humans, the sea, or the underwater world, is not our home. It is the home of fish and many other beautiful creatures of the sea. The sea is the home of fish! The land is the home of humans. Therefore, when we visit the home of the fish, we do so with a good deal of respect much like we show ourselves as humans.

I would be disrespectful, for example, if I were to walk right into your home and into the kitchen. Open up your refrigerator, satisfy my appetite, and walk right out!

Respecting the world of fish, we can do what we can, the best way we know how to keep intact, as much and as long as possible despite Charles Darwin’s theory, “survival of the fittest.”

It is very important we work together for the preservation of the home of the fish. Thank you Margo and Kids Sea Camp for your dedication to the preservation of our natural resources and sharing your love of scuba diving with families and children.

Senator Charles S. Chieng was born in Yap. He left to Yap to study in the United States. He returned to Yap in 1998 and ran for Senate. He has been a Senator for the State of Yap since 2003.

All I can say is it is an honor to be a part of Kids Sea Camp South Pacific Adventure! Three more days to go and I already am sad to be leaving!

More photos from the kids shark dive!

Dive Into Your Imagination it’s a Kids Sea Camp Sealife Week!

Although I love scuba diving with adults, taking photos, producing, writing…and everything else we do at Dive Into Your Imagination to bring the ocean into the hearts and minds of kids, there is nothing more powerful than introducing a child to the unbelievable underwater world. I’m in Yap, an island in Micronesia, with Kids Sea Camp, a company founded by Margo Peyton designed with families in mind! The family camps run all summer long and throughout the year during holidays. This week we are at Manta Ray Bay Resort and Yap Divers. The family camps are the most amazing family holidays I have ever experienced. During the course of the week parents dive with parents and kids dive with other kids their own age.

The teens that joined Kids Sea Camp this year in Yap all have SEALIFE cameras. We have been scuba diving together and I am training them to use their underwater camera systems, which can take both photos and video. On the first night we had an orientation and by the next day every family and all the kids had cameras in their hands. We had SEALIFE video lights and strobes to go with their cameras. In order to take great photos, you need to have excellent buoyancy. Before everyone went diving with their cameras, we did a buoyancy workshop to become more familiar with the equipment and the feeling of diving. When scuba diving we are weightless underwater and the more we are comfortable with the “feeling” of scuba diving, the better divers we become. Shooting photos and video on land can be challenging, taking the equipment underwater adds an entire new dimension to the experience.

The past two days we have been non-stop. After finishing a couple of boat dives with the families, I worked with three 9 year old kids to become SEAL team kids. PADI has a program in which kids 8 years old and up can start learning how to scuba dive. Scallywag Spencer, Captain Nick, and Tiger Shark Tionna took to the air tanks and scuba equipment like seasoned pros. We have successfully completed missions 1, 2, and 3 so the kids are already becoming familiar with their equipment. They have learned how to take the regulators out of their mouths, clear their mask and breathe from an alternate air source in case of any emergencies. The kids will go on to do the Master Seal program in Palau in which they will get to go on a scuba dive in the ocean.

Yap is the first country to become a manta ray sanctuary. Scientists believe shark and ray populations around the world are being threatened and many are endangered. Manta rays are in the same family as stingrays, but they have no stingers for protection. Manta rays only self-defense is speed and they cannot escape fishing nets. Both sharks and rays are targeted species by fisheries, yet if we do not create a moratorium on shark and ray fishing, there might not be any left. During the next two weeks we will be diving with sharks and rays. While learning about their biology, we will also be discussing what we can do to help protect them. Public awareness is the first step in corporate and policy change. I’m helping the kids get great photos and video, write stories, and discuss ways they believe they can share what they are learning with their friends and family. We want the entire world to have a Blue Heart Ocean Soul!

One of my favorite places on the planet besides the deep ocean is flying in an airplane because of the views. There is something about being above the clouds looking out at the horizon and then down at the clouds. The shapes, forms, and beauty of the blue sky meeting the white puffy cumulous clouds makes my imagination run wild. I pretend that I can run out and jump on them; dive and swim through them just to spring back out into the blue sky to jump some more. I know that is not possible, but a girl can dream. I’m going to blame it on Jack and the Bean Stalk. As a child, I always envied Jack because he grew a beanstalk that allowed him to climb into the sky. It is really hard to believe that every cloud and every drop of rain is connected to the ocean. All precipitation (fancy name for rain) was once a part of the ocean through the water cycle. The ocean covers more than 70% of our planet and water leaves the ocean through evaporation. Water in the atmosphere forms clouds. The next thing you know it, because of changes in temperatures, wind, and a couple other factors, the next thing you know it is raining! Maybe that’s why I always want to dive into the clouds…because it would be like diving in the sea. I love the feeling of being submerged and encompassed by the ocean. I love dreaming…and I love daydreaming.

Did you know that no matter how cloudy it is during the day, when you fly it is always sunny because you are above the clouds?

When we arrive in Yap it will be midnight. After a good night sleep, we will prep our equipment, get a briefing and soon be diving on coral reefs. I am going to dream and pray for sharks, mantas and more. Let me know if you have any questions and if there is anything you would like to know! I’m looking forward to teaching everyone more about photo and video. Will keep you posted because it is a Sealife Camera week!

We have been working for the past five years on an Educational Program to bring the ocean into classrooms around the world. If you would like to find out how to bring our ocean to a school near you, please contact me annie (at) anniecrawley (dot) com. Also, we have just applied for a grant and need your help in voting. Please check out the small business grant Living Social and Chase Bank have sponsored, if you support our mission, please vote for Dive Into Your Imagination based in Seattle, Washington.

Please download this flyer and share with your friends!

As a bonus for attending, we will share with non-divers how they can discover scuba diving for free during Diver’s Fair 2012 at Underwater Sports Seattle. In addition, I will have a set of our Educator Guides for Pre K-K and 1st-3rd Grades on review and share with you how to get the ocean into a home and school near you! Teachers are welcome at this event as we have some great programs running this summer geared for the classroom!

In 2009 an ambitious group of graduate students led the Scripps Environmental Accumulation of Plastic Expedition (SEAPLEX) to the North Pacific Ocean Subtropical Gyre aboard the Scripps research vessel New Horizon, you can follow the expedition here as I was with them for the duration of the journey and created a series of videos and journals from the expedition. During the voyage the researchers, who concentrated their studies a thousand miles west of California, documented an alarming amount of human-generated trash, mostly broken down bits of plastic the size of a fingernail floating across thousands of miles of open ocean.

Click here for an entire playlist of videos from the expedition. Or watch Miriam as she talks about one of the most disturbing days:

At the time the researchers didn’t have a clear idea of how such trash might be impacting the ocean environment, but a new study published in the May 9 online issue of the journal Biology Letters reveals that plastic debris in the area popularly known as the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” has increased by 100 times over in the past 40 years, leading to changes in the natural habitat of animals such as the marine insect Halobates sericeus. These “sea skaters” or “water striders”-relatives of pond water skaters-inhabit water surfaces and lay their eggs on flotsam (floating objects). Naturally existing surfaces for their eggs include, for example: seashells, seabird feathers, tar lumps and pumice. In the new study researchers found that sea skaters have exploited the influx of plastic garbage as new surfaces for their eggs. This has led to a rise in the insect’s egg densities in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre.

Such an increase, documented for the first time in a marine invertebrate (animal without a backbone) in the open ocean, may have consequences for animals across the marine food web, such as crabs that prey on sea skaters and their eggs.

“This paper shows a dramatic increase in plastic over a relatively short time period and the effect it’s having on a common North Pacific Gyre invertebrate,” said Scripps graduate student Miriam Goldstein, lead author of the study and chief scientist of SEAPLEX, a UC Ship Funds-supported voyage. “We’re seeing changes in this marine insect that can be directly attributed to the plastic.”

The new study follows a report published last year by Scripps researchers in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series showing that nine percent of the fish collected during SEAPLEX contained plastic waste in their stomachs. That study estimated that fish in the intermediate ocean depths of the North Pacific Ocean ingest plastic at a rate of roughly 12,000 to 24,000 tons per year.

The Goldstein et al. study compared changes in small plastic abundance between 1972-1987 and 1999-2010 by using historical samples from the Scripps Pelagic Invertebrate Collection and data from SEAPLEX, a NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer cruise in 2010, information from the Algalita Marine Research Foundation as well as various published papers.

In April, researchers with the Instituto Oceanográfico in Brazil published a report that eggs of Halobates micans, another species of sea skater, were found on many plastic bits in the South Atlantic off Brazil.

“Plastic only became widespread in late ’40s and early ’50s, but now everyone uses it and over a 40-year range we’ve seen a dramatic increase in ocean plastic,” said Goldstein. “Historically we have not been very good at stopping plastic from getting into the ocean so hopefully in the future we can do better.”

I do not want to “hopefully” do better in the future. All of the animals being affected by plastic and trash do not have a voice. We need to be their voice. Please take a moment and think of ways that you can reduce trash and plastic in your life, but also how you can help your community and our world reduce this entering our ocean.

Coauthors of the study include Marci Rosenberg, a student at UCLA, and Scripps Research Biologist Emeritus Lanna Cheng.

Funding for SEAPLEX was provided by the University of California Ship Funds, an innovative program that allows a new generation of scientists to gain valuable scientific training at sea, Project Kaisei/Ocean Voyages Institute, the Association for Women in Science-San Diego and the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship program. The NOAA Okeanos Explorer Program (2010 Always Exploring expedition) and National Marine Fisheries Service provided support for the 2010 samples. Other study support was provided by Jim and Kris McMillan, Jeffrey and Marcy Krinsk, Lyn and Norman Lear, Ellis Wyer and an anonymous donor. Other support was provided by the California Current Ecosystem (CCE) program, part of NSF’s Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) program.