Underwater live streaming camera

jaxwiththecrax wrote:

Hi folks,

I live in a coastal town, and love spearfishing. It is pain in the ass figuring out how clear the water is, and would love to set up a remotely operated underwater live streaming camera. I have been doing some research but know nothing in this field, and am having issues finding adequate equipment for this type of project. The camera would need to be battery/solar power operated, and every piece obviously waterproof. I would attach the set up off one of the jetties (large piling of rocks). Please let me know your suggestions!

-Jackson

It's a tough ask, and I suspect the required answer costs more than its worth. But your best bet may be to look for marine bio departments that have web cams on their web portals. Topside surfcams are also essentially the same problem, just without the camera being placed UW. Or if you have any navy buddies, if they have implemented such (and can give any information). Each of these has the need. But a big lead battery with a panel next to salty wave action? Might have marine regulations against this as hazmat as well. If the panels can provide enough voltage in most cloud conditions, maybe the battery is unnecessary, but you'll likely have more intermittent operation.

Your waters - is the viz consistent top to bottom, or can you have a surface muck and then it clear below? Or more prone to lousy viz because the waves or tides stir up the sediment on the bottom? If you tend to have consistent viz, and you're pretty close to the jetty (< a mile or two), could consider the drone approach. Put some large Xs at fixed depth, fly over, and see how many you see. Sort of borderline on the FAA VFR rules, however.

Instead of a camera, perhaps its enough to have light intensity sensors at different depths?   That would be lower power, lower bandwidth.

Are there any NOAA buoys broadcasting data? If you know the tides, the buoys, and the historical patterns, then you can take wind, swell, and temp info to make forecasts. For Monterey, California divers, I hosted the WAM (Wave activity model) in the early 2000s before it got a more perm home.

https://www.garlic.com/~triblet/swell/wamglance.html - not sure this is still being well maintained, as sadly Chuck passed a few years ago.

https://www.garlic.com/~triblet/swell/Inet1XMP.html - how to read info, specific to this area, but perhaps some value to your's.