Andrew Lim
Singapore
Photography Speaker (2021)
Andrew Lim’s first foray into photography began with arguably the most difficult form of the art – underwater photography. At age 21, Andrew published his first underwater photography book, Silhouette of Serenity, the partial proceeds of which were donated to charity. He was invited to meet the (former) President of Singapore, Dr Tony Tan, in recognition for his work and was also invited to
speak on platforms such as TEDx. The 25-year old former national rock-climber has since founded Drew perspectives and now focuses his art mostly on people.
Connie Chan
Hong Kong
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Owner of Mandarin Divers (HK) Limited, business including local Chill Out diving, PADI 5 stars centre, shop located in Wanchai carrying premium brands, organizing dive travel and training to overseas. Be involved in UW360, as a Chinese Editor, am so happy to be part of the best Dive Magazines in Asia and one of the best Dive Expo the world, hope that I could help on spreading the wonderful messages from UW360 to the Chinese market. Owning and developed a PADI IDC 5 stars dive resort in Puerto Galera, Philippines, named Hai Wu Jian Dive Resort. Be one of the best training stations on PG island, we also supporting photography workshops, tech diving etc. Partner, training and marketing director at Mandarin Divers Hong Kong which was est. since 1989, we provide service for divers on distribution and retails for niche luxury brands, plus also the only one dive shop in Hong Kong which included both Recreational and Technical divers’ training. In 2016, I quit my existing business, jumped into the exploration of an interesting business, scuba diving, which is my passion, love and dream.
Nadir Quarta
Switzerland
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Swiss born, Nadir Quarta, began his diving career in 1989 in the mountain rivers and lakes of Switzerland. Qualifying as a diving Instructor in 1993, his world travels as a diver took him to many rarely visited locations – including cave diving in Mexico – as well as introducing him to rebreathers and the evolving technical diving community.
Now a highly-regarded Technical Diving Instructor, Nadir – through his company, ZeroEmissions – teaches a range of CCR courses as well as organizing expeditions to explore and document some of the world’s most iconic wreck and cave diving destinations.
Flavia Eberhard
Brazil
Professional Model, Freediving Champion
Freediving Speaker (2021)
Flavia Eberhard is an international fashion model, South American freediving champion,
TV presenter, conservationist, Yoga Teacher and owner of “Freedive Mexico” School.
Scouted by FORD Models from the age of 17 she participated in numerous campaigns, magazines, catwalk shows, commercials and hosted her own TV show APNEA about freediving around the world.
Passionate with the sea since her childhood, Flavia joined various water sports, but it was below the surface that she found her real passion for freediving. Able to hold her breath for 6 minutes and dive to 74 meters in one breath, she achieved 9 records for Brazil including a South American title. Sharing her time between the flashlights and her love for the sea, Flavia wishes to connect fashion modelling to the awareness of the beauty and fragility of our oceans. In this talk, she will talk about her path and share underwater modelling tips with you aiming to bring an edge to your shoots.
Ram Yoro
Philippines
Photography Speaker (2021)
“Ram is a full-time scuba instructor, tech diver, and underwater photographer based in the Philippines. He is a pioneer of Bonfire Diving, a method for documenting plankton in shallow coastal waters, and was among the early practitioners of Blackwater Diving in the country. He is also an avid explorer in the region, visiting and documenting green reefs, caves and wrecks with colleagues from the Filipino Cave Divers and the Philtech Dive Teams. Outside these, Ram teaches scuba and underwater photo workshops out of his base in Anilao, and he regularly contributes to various online and print publications as well. Among his notable publications include co-authoring the “Guide to Anilao”, the “Legends Beneath the Waves – Philippines” (aka Philippine Wreck Book), and contributing to the plankton visual compilation “Black is the New Blue Volume II”. To checkout more of his works, visit “Ram Yoro” in Facebook and Instagram.”
Mike Bartick
USA / Philippines
Photography Speaker (2021)
Mike is a widely published, award-winning photographer, writer and international public speaker with work appearing monthly in various publications, aquariums and museums.
Originally from Southern California, he has an insatiable love for finding unique marine life and telling their story through photo and video.
Mike is a widely published, award-winning photographer, writer and international public speaker with work appearing monthly in various publications, aquariums and museums.
He hosts photo clinics, workshops and seminars at Crystal Blue Resort, concentrating on the different aspects of Underwater Photography and the natural history of South-East Asia and the Indo-Pacific.
Marty Snyderman
USA
Photography Speaker (2021)
One of the exclusive DEMA SCUBA diving Hall of Fame members, Snyderman is an Emmy Awardwinning cinematographer, photographer, author and speaker specialising in marine life. He is the Marine Life Editor of Dive Training magazine and the Senior Editor for California Diving News. Marty teaches underwater photography worldwide and is on the Board of Trustees of the Reef Environmental Education Foundation. He also publishes an online magazine for young children on the different marine animals.
Ben Reymenants
Belgium
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Belgium Ben Reymenants is probably best know for his deep dives, his work in the diving medicine field and cave explorations. His career spans close to 3 decades under water and his exploits and teaching style makes him popular for technical courses. He owns a dive centre in Phuket Thailand where he runs technical instructor workshops and deep cave courses in the jungle. He is a fellow of the explorers club and he was part of the initial cave rescue team in the North of Thailand for which he was decorated.
Jill Heinerth
Canada
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Jill Heinerth is a veteran of over thirty years of filming, photography and exploration on projects in submerged caves around the world with National Geographic, NOAA, and television networks worldwide. She is the Explorer in Residence for the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, recipient of Canada’s prestigious Polar Medal and the diving world’s highest award from the Academy of Underwater Arts and Sciences. Partnering with Penguin Random House in Canada and Harper Collins in the US, Jill will soon be releasing four new major-market, non-fiction and children’s books.
Cristina Zenato
Bahamas
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
A professional diver since 1994, Cristina is an ocean and cave explorer, shark behaviorist, photographer, speaker, writer and conservationist.
A member of the Women Divers Hall of Fame, and The Explorers Club, she is a firm believer in the power of education and spends her time teaching below and above the water. She has conducted the exploration and surveys of numerous new cave systems and is the first person to ever connect an entrance on land with an open ocean blue hole.
She is the founder of the nonprofit People of the Water, organized to widen the distribution of training, education, research related to ocean and environmental issues.
Richie Kohler
USA
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Richie Kohler is an author and shipwreck explorer whose 40 years of diving experiences have taken him to all corners of the globe. These exploits have been detailed in documentary films and in a NY Times best-selling book, Shadow Divers, by Robert Kurson. Kohler hosted fifty-six episodes of the popular History Channel program “Deep Sea Detectives” and numerous other television programs detailing his explorations on some of the most famous shipwrecks in the world, including the Andrea Doria, RMS Titanic, and the HMHS Britannic. Utilizing submersibles and cutting-edge diving equipment, Kohler’s focus in underwater exploration has been on the human aspect of shipwreck tragedies, correcting fractured or missing history and in doing so, providing answers and closure to family members. Locating and identifying lost warships such as the USS Murphy, USS Lagarto, U-215 and U-869 and reaching out to these people has been the real reward in shipwreck exploration. Kohler’s recent work on a forgotten WWII submarine battle helped bring posthumous recognition to American Naval Captain in an award ceremony at the US Pentagon.
A fellow in the Explorer’s Club, Kohler continues to lead expeditions worldwide in search of lost ships and the mysteries they hold. He has written numerous magazine articles about shipwrecks, deep diving and diver safety and in 2017, published his first book, Mystery of the Last Olympian detailing a decade of work on Titanic’s sister ship Britannic. Over the years he has made numerous presentations at schools, libraries, diving conventions and symposiums promoting diving safety, education and awareness.
Bret Gilliam
USA
Diving Pioneer
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Gilliam has founded and sold six companies since 1971, comprising if V.I. Divers Ltd, Ocean Quest International, AMF Yachting Group, G2 Publishing Inc, Divesafe Insurance and International Training Inc. As Vice President and CEO, he was instrumental in taking UWATEC Public in a sale for 44 million Dollars to JWA in 1997 and sold his publishing company ISCUBA Times and Deep Tech to Petersen/E-Map in 1999. His entrepreneurial success in the diving industry have made him a multi-millionaire. The aggregate value of his companies when sold was in excess of $80 million.
Ramdzan (RAM) Salim
Singapore
Salvage Master
Guest Speaker (2021)
Having started diving in 1987, Ramdzan has taken his passion and love of the sea to a full-time career immediately upon finishing school, starting first as a salvage diver and working his way up the career ladder. He has held various positions from Diver Medic Technician, Dive Supervisor, Dive Superintendent and as a Salvage Master, leading teams to respond to maritime casualties worldwide in their endeavours to avert environmental catastrophes. Although he is more involved in project planning and logistical aspect of operations these days, Ramdzan will jump at the first chance to get wet every now and again when the opportunity presents itself in the course of any project.
Rico Besserdich
Germany
Photography Speaker (2018)
Besserdich is a professional photographer, artist and visual philosopher specialising in “Aquatic Imaging”, the art of utilising water as the key element of expression in imagery. In 2018, he celebrates his 40th anniversary of being involved in photographic arts. His mission to raise awareness for the importance of water earned him recognition by the Nobel Organisation, the United Nations, the Swedish Parliament, among others. His images have been published in magazines and books all around the world. Rico is also a member of the Ocean Artists Society. He wrote two books about underwater photography and was a lecturer for artistic underwater photography at the SAAR Academy of Fine Arts, Germany.
Rico Besserdich
Germany
Guest Speaker (2017)
Besserdich is a professional photographer, artist and visual philosopher specialising in “Aquatic Imaging”, the art of utilising water as the key element of expression in imagery. In 2018, he celebrates his 40th anniversary of being involved in photographic arts. His mission to raise awareness for the importance of water earned him recognition by the Nobel Organisation, the United Nations, the Swedish Parliament, among others. His images have been published in magazines and books all around the world. Rico is also a member of the Ocean Artists Society. He wrote two books about underwater photography and was a lecturer for artistic underwater photography at the SAAR Academy of Fine Arts, Germany.
Rico Besserdich
Germany
Photography Speaker (2021)
Besserdich is a professional photographer, artist and visual philosopher specialising in “Aquatic Imaging”, the art of utilising water as the key element of expression in imagery. In 2018, he celebrates his 40th anniversary of being involved in photographic arts. His mission to raise awareness for the importance of water earned him recognition by the Nobel Organisation, the United Nations, the Swedish Parliament, among others. His images have been published in magazines and books all around the world. Rico is also a member of the Ocean Artists Society. He wrote two books about underwater photography and was a lecturer for artistic underwater photography at the SAAR Academy of Fine Arts, Germany.
Takuya Torii
Japan
Divison Director, Global Operation Division of INON INC. INON global
Guest Speaker (2021)
As a corporate messenger boy of INON INC., manufacture of underwater imaging gears, serving the company nearly two decades, he used to show up different dive shows to meet enthusiastic people fascinated in diving and underwater imaging and deliver the corporate messages as well as collecting market voice. Since the normal duty is on hold, he grabbed the opportunity to show the latest products and tips for using INON products on this webinar.
Katherine Lu
USA / Singapore
Professional Underwater Photographer
Photography Speaker (2021)
Katherine is an American award winning underwater photographer residing in Singapore. Her journey into scuba diving began well over 2 decades ago. Her adventure spirit and wanderlust has led her to travel to over 60 countries and dive all around the world. Currently residing in Singapore and within close proximity to the coral triangle, she bought her first camera in 2013 to show friends and family the world beneath the sea and soon after developed a specialty for underwater macro photography, though she also loves photographing sharks and large pelagics when travel opportunities arise. Completely self – taught, she enjoys creating artistic expressions and visual stories that can capture the beauty of the ocean, its inhabitants and fragility of the ecosystem. Awareness and education are key to preserving the ocean and she hopes her images can contribute towards conservation.
Adam Hanlon
United Kingdom
Publisher & Editor-at-Large, Wetpixel
Photography Speaker (2021)
Adam Hanlon is an underwater photographer captivated by the challenge and beauty of the underwater world and passionate about its conservation. His images and reports have won international competitions and been used in prestigious publications and by world-renowned organizations. He grew up in South Africa, learned to dive in the mid-1980s and has been pursuing a career “beneath the surface” ever since. He holds recreational and technical diving qualifications up to instructor level from many agencies and dives very regularly. He is the editor of Wetpixel, the worlds leading resource on all things underwater imaging and through Wetpixel Expeditions, Adam leads regular photography expeditions and workshops around the world. He also owns a successful dive school based near Lancaster, UK.
Chris Kim
Canada
Co-Founder, Molchanovs
Freediving Speaker (2021)
Chris Kim – Molchanovs Co-Founder and Former CEO, Zen Freediving Co-Founder. After a career in technology at such companies as Facebook, Google and Yahoo!, Chris discovered a passion for freediving. He left the corporate world and works to share his love of freediving, co-founding Zen Freediving (a leading freediving school in Singapore), as well as Molchanovs (a producer of record shattering freediving gear and the fastest growing freediving education system in the world).
Kelly Tan
Singapore
NParks National Parks Board, Coastal Management
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Kelly is a graduate of the Masters of Environmental Management, a marine intertidal guide and has volunteered for turtles hatcheries overseas. She is currently the manager of biodiversity in the Coastal and Marine branch in National Parks Board. She manages the Marine Park, and is directly involved in the coral husbandry work on St John’s Island, and manages the turtle hatchery in Small Sister’s Island. She also spearheads local marine conservation education and outreach efforts, using her work experience to inspire the next generation, and the general public to love and appreciate nature.
Dr Jani Tanzil
Singapore
Senior Research Fellow, St. John’s Island National Marine Laboratory
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Dr Jani Tanzil is a marine ecologist with the Tropical Marine Science Institute, National University of Singapore. She is also one of the resident scientists working at St. John’s Island National Marine Laboratory. Dr Tanzil started scuba diving in 2002 and has been actively exploring the coral reefs of Singapore and the region for work and leisure ever since. Her current research involves examining the bands in the skeletons of corals (similar to tree “rings”) to reconstruct past environment conditions, and growth rates of corals around Southeast Asia. With her work, Dr Tanzil hopes to better understand coral responses to climate change and other environmental disturbances.
Debby Ng
Singapore
Founder of The Hantu Blog – Bringing Clarity to Singapore Waters
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Debby Ng is an ecologist, photojournalist, and National Geographic Explorer. She is the founder of pulauhantu.sg – a volunteer organisation that collaborates with public stakeholders and government agencies to save coral reefs in Singapore through education and ecotourism. Through their blog, guided dive tours and free talks at schools, corporate events and public festivals, pulauhantu.sg has made Singapore reefs accessible to thousands of divers and non-divers since 2003. Debby received her BSc (Hons) from the University of Tasmania (Australia) and Dip. Mass Communications from Ngee Ann Polytechnic. She studied Wildlife Disease Ecology at Colorado State University (USA), and is a Duke University Global Fellow in Conservation Biology and Policy (USA).
Sam Shu Qin
Singapore
Co-Founder, Our Singapore Reefs
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Sam is an avid diver, coral scientist and educator. With the main intention to raise awareness about marine debris, She co-founded Our Singapore Reefs to connect like-minded marine enthusiasts through diving and educational outreach programmes. With her training in science communication, she hopes to increase public knowledge, inspire marine stewardship and promote discussions in marine science and conservation through various public engagement activities.
Mathieu Meur
Mauritius
Photography Speaker (2021)
An underwater photography veteran of over 25 years, Mathieu authored the first PADI-approved digital underwater photography specialty course in the world in 2001. He contributes regular columns on photography techniques in dive and photography publications and co-authored An Essential Guide to Digital Underwater Photography with Michael Aw in 2004 – the first book entirely dedicated to the techniques associated with shooting digital underwater. He has published two interactive e-books on underwater digital photography: Complete Digital Underwater Photography (2013) and Everything on Underwater Photography (2014).
Peter Symes
Denmark
Guest Speaker (2021)
Hailing from Denmark, with a Master’s degree in Biology and Media & Communication, Peter Symes is a former research scientist specialising in aquatic ecology and ecosystem modelling and restoration, and is the founder, editor-in-chief and publisher of X-Ray Magazine and AquaScope Media.
John Thet
Ocean Citizen
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
John Thet. (Publisher/Editorial & Creative Director) first embarked into the publication industry in the year 1993.
His experience started with Dive Publication was back in 2001, The first issue of Scuba Diver AustralAsia as Creative Director and one of the pioneer member with Asian Geographic Magazines Pte Ltd, In 2005, John succeeded as publisher/editorial director and underhis able leadership, the magazines (asian Geographic, Scuba Diver AustralAsia, Scuba Diver OceanPlanet, Asian Diver” AND Online media uw360.Asia. He gone from strength to strength, winning more than 89 awards in both the publishing and creative arena. he is still actively involved with the editorial and creative direction of all the media and is relentless in his efforts to bring dive media to new heights.
Michael Menduno
USA
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
An award-winning reporter and technologist, Michael has written about diving and diving technology for 30 years. He coined the term “technical diving.” His magazine aquaCORPS: The Journal for Technical Diving (1990-1996) helped usher tech diving into mainstream sports diving. He produced the first Tek, EUROTek and ASIATek conferences, and organized Rebreather Forums 1.0 and 2.0. He received the OZTEK Media Excellence Award in 2011, the EUROTek Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012 and the TEKDive USA Media Award in 2018.
Simon Pridmore
United Kingdom
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Over the last 25 years, Simon Pridmore has pioneered mixed-gas deep diving in Asia and been involved in technical diver training, exploration and equipment manufacturing. Today, he writes books for divers, most recently “Scuba Exceptional – Become the Best Diver You Can Be” and “Dining with Divers – A Taste for Adventure”.
Bernie Chowdhury
USA
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Bernie Chowdhury is the founder and co-publisher of The International Technical Diving Magazine. A world-class diver, Explorers Club Fellow, an author, and a recognized expert on extreme sport diving, he also makes documentary films and is a frequent lecturer.
Richard Nicholls
Australia
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Dive store owner, former equipment wholesaler, and Underwater videographer, Australian-based, Richard Nicholls is a PADI Course Director, and one of the handful of pioneers who helped popularise the recreational use of Nitrox, SCR’s, and Technical Mixed gas diving in Australia in the early 90’s.
An active proponent of the need for increased marine protection, he was a key driver in establishing Cabbage Tree Bay, on Sydney’s Northern Beaches, as a No-Take Aquatic Reserve, a place described by both locals and visitors alike as being one of the world’s premier shore-diving sites.
Zena Holloway
United Kingdom
Photography Speaker (2021)
Zena Holloway (1973) is a self-taught, British photographer best known for her distinctive images of people and animals in underwater environments. Her photographic career spans the last thirty years and features in a wide range of publications including National Geographic, Dazed&Confused, Paris Match, How to Spend it, Harpers Bazaar, GQ, Vanity Fair, The Observer, 125, Stylist, Quintessentially Magazine, JFW, Twill, Vision, Neon, Schon, Cent magazine and The Sunday Times.
Her underwater photographic projects have a common narrative that connects people to water and increasingly promote environmental awareness and conservation. In the Hidden Rivers series, she explores the ugly truth of pollution and over-extraction in rivers across Europe, whilst in Seawomen she celebrates the unique knowledge and deep understanding that the Haenyeo of South Korea have for the oceans they harvest. As a keen climate activist, Zena is interested in material science and the biological products and processes that are set to shape our world in the future. In Rootfull she has pioneered a method of cultivating grass to grow in moulds – carved from beeswax. The process channels grass-root into patterns that become speculative coral sculptures. It’s an ongoing, green-art, project created in a bid to expose the beauty and vulnerability of coral and to highlight the devastating bleaching events that are killing vast areas of coral reefs around the planet. Zena lives in London with her husband and their three children in a converted MOD torpedo testing centre.
Tim Ho
Malaysia
Photography Speaker (2021)
In 2009, Tim purchased his first underwater compact camera. As upgrading was too expensive and beyond the means of an island dive instructor, he started to explore and develop his own comprehension of how his camera worked. Today, his methods and compact camera techniques are used as reference materials by underwater photography trainers when teaching about compact camera use. Some of his earlier works are still often used as benchmarks of what to strive to achieve when shooting with a compact camera.
Sam Craven
Philippines
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Sam is a marine biologist turned conservationist who has been diving for 20 years. She has been working with UK charity The Reef-World Foundation since 2012, focusing on the Green Fins programme and bringing practical tools to governments, marine tourism businesses and communities around the world. Sam believes that we can all play our part to safeguard fragile coral reefs if we have the right knowledge, tools and skills, and the newly launched Green Fins Diver e-course aims to provide us with exactly that. Here’s Sam to tell us more.
Robin Cuesta
France/Indonesia
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Robin Cuesta is the only active Technical Cave Diving Instructor currently operating in Indonesia. He started exploring caves in Sulawesi three years ago and has never stopped since then. His passion had led him to unravel unexplored caves all over the country, from Sumatra to Papua passing by Java and Sulawesi. He recently opened the first “Rebreather, Technical and Full Cave Diving Training Center” in Indonesia, and helps to develop cave diving interest and education among the local community through the Indonesia Cave Diving Association.
Jeffrey Glenn
Australia
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Jeff Glenn is an instructor trainer with the three largest dive agencies on the planet. With an illustrious resume as a PADI Course Director, a TecRec Instructor Trainer, a TDI Instructor Trainer to Advanced Trimix, a TDI Advanced Wreck, TDI Full Cave and JJ-CCR/SF2 CCR Instructor and a RAID Instructor trainer as well, Jeff is easily one of the most qualified PADI Course Directors in Asia. Jeff has been diving since the early 90’s, starting his professional career as a PADI Divemaster in Airlee Beach, Australia and has logged thousands of dives worldwide. Jeff has focused the last 15 years of his career on the professional and technical diver and instructor development and is extremely passionate about technical diving in particular.
Marc Crane
United Kingdom
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Hailing from the sunny south coast of England, Marc learned to dive while on work experience from school, after immediately getting addicted he joined the local scuba club. Turning Pro in 1996, Marc has spent more than 2 decades diving and teaching globally, with a primary focus on all things rebreather since 2005. He is an SSI XR International Training Director as well as TDI IT, he teaches throughout Asia from his home in Bali. Marc has been involved in a variety of deep reef and cave expeditions in Indonesia and has been with Unseen Expeditions since their inception.
Jimmy Choo
Singapore
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Jimmy Choo started his diving career during his national service in the Naval diving Unit back in 1990. After he graduated from his basic diving course, he decided to join the Naval diving unit as a professional diver. In 1992 he was chosen to train with one of the toughest special Force unit in the world – the US Navy SEAL. During his service, he was called upon for one of the most massive underwater search and recovery tasking in 1997 – Silkair flight 185. During his service in the force, he has been chosen to work with different diving units worldwide. Jimmy is also an Instructor Trainer in the Naval Diving Unit and has been training both Naval Diver and Special Force diving team. As for his recreational diving experience, Jimmy started with SSI as an instructor, and then he works his way up to SSI Technical Instructor Trainer. He didn’t stop pursuit diving education and soon he becomes an instructor trainer at all levels with SSI, IANTD, TDI, RAID, and PSAI. Currently, as a diver he has more than 9000 logged dives under his belt and he is a GUE Tech 2, Cave 2, and a GUE Instructor. He has been teaching mostly GUE since he became a GUE Instructor. He is also a specialist in wreck diving.
Jimmy Choo chooses mainly to teach the GUE course is because he like the GUE system due to its holistic approach toward diving safety. Jimmy always believes that “Diving isn’t a course or a lesson. It’s more than that: Diving is a method, a philosophy, a way of life”.
Mathilda D’Silva
Singapore
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Mathilda D’Silva, the founder and CEO of the non-government organisation, Ocean Purpose Project (OPP) to tackle the problem of marine pollution and plastic waste, and innovate its use, in Singapore and beyond.
Swietenia Puspa Lestari
Indonesia
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Swietenia Puspa Lestari is the founder and executive director of Divers Clean Action (DCA), a youth-led organization based in Indonesia that focuses on marine debris cleanup. Currently, DCA works with more than 1,500 volunteers across Southeast Asia. Beyond cleanup efforts, DCA has also launched environmental programs with diving institutions and conducted various training and campaigns with the coastal community. For her work, Lestari was named as one of BBC’s 100 inspiring and influential women last year. In 2017, Lestari represented Indonesia at the United Nations Climate Change to speak about youth involvement in marine issues.
Rob Thompson
United Kingdom
Conservation Speaker (2021)
I spent my childhood playing in the ocean. At the age of 3, I had my first glimpse under the surface of the ocean and instantly became hooked on the underwater world. However, my plastic Odyssey started properly in 2014 by pulling together a group of divers to clean up a cove in Cornwall. Thousands of pieces of plastic were recovered and we continued by setting up a charity to recover underwater ocean plastic. The challenges we faced were accessing coves, recycling recovered plastic, funding and preventing plastic from getting in the sea.
I believe part of the plastic problem is our lack of resourcefulness, and the thought that the plastic we recovered was ending up in landfills troubled me. Odyssey Innovation was established to pioneer the circular economy by converting plastic from beach cleans and end-of-life nets from fishing communities into products. Our first were kayaks, these are used in our ‘Paddle for Plastic’ campaign to support communities to collect plastic waste from otherwise inaccessible coves and waterways.
Our work is only possible through collaboration and through these we continue to capture people’s imaginations and change views about marine plastic “from waste to resource”.
Gareth Lock
United Kingdom
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Gareth has been involved in high-risk work since he left school in 1989. He spent 25 years in the RAF in a variety of front-line operational, research and development and systems engineering roles which has given him a unique perspective. In 2005 he started his dive training with GUE and is now an advanced trimix diver (Tech 2) and JJ-CCR Normoxic trimix diver. In 2016 he formed The Human Diver with goal of bringing his operational, human factors and systems thinking to diving safety. Since then he has trained more than 350 people face-to-face around the globe, taught nearly 2000 people via online programmes, sold more than 4000 copies of his book Under Pressure: Diving Deeper with Human Factors, and produced ‘If Only…’ a documentary about a fatal dive told through the lens of Human Factors and a Just Culture. His goal, bring human factors practice and knowledge into the diving community to improve safety, performance and enjoyment.
Dr. Klaus Stiefel
Austria / Philippines
Conservation Speaker (2021)
Klaus is a underwater photographer and videographer based in the Philippines. Austrian by birth but a citizen of the ocean by heart, he has dived and photographed in California, Japan, Australia, Indonesia, Micronesia and the Philippines. Klaus is also a technical diving instructor and a published popular science author.
Klaus teaches fish and coral reef biology as an adjunct professor at the Institute of Environmental and Marine Sciences at Silliman University on the Philippines. His main research interest are the biodiversity and the behavior of gobies, a family of small marine and freshwater fishes.
Enrico Somogyi
Germany
Photography Speaker (2021)
I’m 49 Years old, born in a small town near Leipzig where I works in the catering trade. Since 2008 I am a certified Diver.
Now I have more than 1000 dives and I have a PADI Advanced Certificate. I took a camera on a dive for the first Time in 2009. After some years just taking Photos for fun and memory I found my passion in the creative Underwater Photography. Some of my Pictures has been very successful in various Competitions. My favorite Places to take Pictures are Anilao in the Philippines and Ambon and Bali in Indonesia.
Pete Mesley
New Zealand
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Learning to dive in England more than thirty years ago and now living in New Zealand, Pete Mesley is one of the southern hemisphere’s most experienced Technical Divers and Instructors.
With significant experience in leading deep wreck expeditions and dedicated to researching, finding, diving and photographing shipwrecks, Pete is an accomplished underwater photographer and a member of The Explorers Club of New York.
His highly successful dive travel business, ‘Lust4Rust & Shock&Awe Big Animal Diving Excursions’ is focused on taking experienced divers to specialised dive locations worldwide.
Alex Mustard
United Kingdom
Photography Speaker (2021)
Alex Mustard is an underwater photographer and marine biologist. He took his first underwater photos when just 9 years old. Alex has a Ph.D. in marine ecology and worked a marine scientist until 2004, when underwater photography became his career.
He has been winning international photography awards since his teens and his work is particularly well known from the Wildlife Photographer of the Year contest, where it has featured in 14 different portfolio books of winning photographs over the last 20 years. In 2013, he was named overall winner of the European Wildlife Photographer of the Year and is still the only underwater winner of that title. His book Reefs Revealed (2007) won the International Prize for Best Book of the Year at the World Festival of Underwater Pictures. He is a founder and chair of UPY: the Underwater Photographer of the Year competition.
He is especially known for sharing his knowledge, his best-selling book Underwater Photography Masterclass (2016) was reprinted just two weeks after being released. He runs highly popular underwater photography workshops all over the world. During lockdown he has recorded more than 200 episodes of Wetpixel Live, an educational YouTube on underwater photography with Adam Hanlon.
He has written over 500 illustrated articles for magazines around the world on underwater photography, marine life and scuba diving, and photographed over 200 underwater covershots. He has contributed to more than 50 books, including those that accompany landmark documentary series, such as David Attenborough’s Life On Earth, Blue Planet and Our Planet.
In 2007, Nissan built a concept car version of the NV200 specifically designed around his needs as an underwater photographer, although he does not get to used it as it is now displayed in the Nissan museum in Tokyo! Alex is an Ambassador for Mares and Fourth Element.
He has been an Editor at Wetpixel.com since 2006, and a committee member of the British Society of Underwater Photographers since 2002. In 2016, he received the ADEX Award for his ‘Extraordinary Contribution to Underwater Photography” and in 2020 he was awarded the Golden Trident from the International Academy of Underwater Sciences.
In 2018, he received national recognition, receiving the title of MBE from Queen Elizabeth II for ‘services to underwater photography’.
Xie Fei
China
Photography Speaker (2021)
影视导演，潜水教练，从事影像工作数十年，参与多部电影，电视剧的水下拍摄。尤其擅长水下人像拍摄，斩获全球70多个国家的国际摄影比赛金银铜奖数百个，作品广受追捧。
世界潜水联合会荣誉水下摄影师，高校教材《水下摄影》编著者，中国著作权协会会员，企业家摄影协会(深圳)理事，2017年度国际摄影展览十杰摄影师，2018年度国际摄影展览十杰摄影师，2018全华人商业摄影十杰摄影师，深圳市南山区潜水协会水下艺术顾问，中国国家体育总局国资认证潜水指导员，深圳职业技术学院摄影嘉宾讲师，深圳五次方摄影有限公司摄影导师 。
Gert Leroy
Belgium
Freediving Speaker (2021)
James moved to Singapore from the UK in 2002 and entered the local dive industry a few years later as a part-time instructor. As a passionate educator and diver, he has both dived and taught across the world. At the beginning of 2018, James resigned from his corporate job as a Principal R&D engineer with a multinational Semiconductor company to work full time in the diving industry. This allowed him time to more focus on developing RAID across Singapore/Malaysia/Brunei/Indonesia & Maldives, and the continued growth of Diving Solutions e-commerce platforms.
James Costello
United Kingdom
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
James moved to Singapore from the UK in 2002 and entered the local dive industry a few years later as a part-time instructor. As a passionate educator and diver, he has both dived and taught across the world. At the beginning of 2018, James resigned from his corporate job as a Principal R&D engineer with a multinational Semiconductor company to work full time in the diving industry. This allowed him time to more focus on developing RAID across Singapore/Malaysia/Brunei/Indonesia & Maldives, and the continued growth of Diving Solutions e-commerce platforms.
Edmund Yiu
Hong Kong
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Edmund currently served as the Greater China Regional Head for RAID (Rebreather Association of International Divers) serving dive centres and developing instructors throughout the region. Edmund is qualified as RAID Examiner, RAID Recreational, Technical OC and CCR Instructor Trainer and RAID Full Cave Instructor. Edmund has over 20 years of experiences in recreational, technical, rebreather and cave diving, with more than 6000 dives conducted throughout locations around the world. He has been focused in Technical Diving since 2000 and continue to pursue his passion for diving, exploration and conservation through Scuba diving instruction. Edmund also has years of experience in dive equipment servicing, retail sales and distribution business, providing technical support and total solutions for dive centres and instructors. Through his wealth of experience that brings to the industry, Edmund hopes to improve safety, establish higher quality of training standards, modernized training’s best practices, ensure professionalism with the correct attitude and at the same time improve the profitability of dive centres and instructors. Edmund also holds numerous Instructor Trainer / Instructor ratings from several other dive training agencies in Recreational/ Technical and Rebreather Diving.
Andy Davis
United Kingdom
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Andy Davis is an avid sidemount technical wreck diving instructor, an author, an underwater photographer who have logged over 9000 dives, including RAID, PADI, SSI, BSAC and ANDI instructor courses. Andy first learned to dive with BSAC at college, before getting PADI certified in 1996 and have experience diving in Cyprus, the Maldives, Oman, Ascension Island, United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Vietnam, Belize, Spain, Egypt, Israel, Malaysia, Singapore, Borneo (Sabah) and the Philippines.
Yvonne Press
Germany
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Yvonne Press is currently the only female TDI Instructor Trainer and Advanced Trimix instructor in Southeast Asia. She is a PADI TecRec instructor and has been managing Two Fish Tech in Amed, Bali, Indonesia since late 2015. She started diving in Scotland in 2003, going full time into diving in 2010. She became a tech diver in 2011, moved to Bali in 2014 and became a tech instructor and cave diver in early 2015 in Thailand. She qualified as a TDI IT in late 2016.
Commander Vishwanath Rajan
India
Tekdiving Speaker (2021)
Vishwanath’s constant endeavour to make dive education safer and at par with the rest of the advancements in the sport, led to him co-founding Scuba Evolution India at Goa. Dive safety and top quality dive education is the mantra of Scuba Evolution India. Vishwanath is a technical Trimix and Full Cave Diver. He retired from the Indian Navy to pursue teaching scuba diving full time and is a keen ocean conservationist. He teaches Technical and Public Safety Diver courses, along with Marine Resource Management, coral and shark conservation. Scuba Evolution India started as the first dive centre on the mainland to provide accommodation. A PADI 5-Star IDC and TecRec Centre, they offer scuba diving courses from introductory to professional level, and are also dealers for Dive Rite diving equipment. Safety, high quality dive education, exploration and research are high on their list of priorities. A full fledged service centre with mixed gas blending facilities makes them a go-to for all levels of diver training and exploration projects.
Tan Xiaolong
China
Tekdiving Speaker (2019)
A veteran of the Chinese underwater industry, Xiaolong is one of the leaders and most experienced trainers in the technical diving scene in China. An avid fan of road trips on his motorcycle, Xiaolong and his wife have just completed a 261- day trip on their bike, travelling 73,084 kilometres through 53 countries in Asia, Europe and Africa.
Guillaume Nery
France
Freediving Speaker (2019)
Born in Nice, Guillaume has broken several records, earning a world championship title in deep-sea freediving (-126m), Guillaume continues to explore the human limits and the unknown world of the deep-sea. He writes and creates images that combine aesthetic style and high performance, such as Free Fall, Ocean Gravity and his latest project, One Breath Around The World.
Julie Gautier
France
Freediving Speaker (2019)
Former holder of several French records in deep-sea free diving (-68m), Gautier expresses herself through her underwater cinematography. The Reunion Island native shoots unique images in apnea, using her artistic flair and the infinite freedom of her movements. Top-side, Gautier is an author and a director. Her sensitivity explains her attraction to the world of fiction, as shown in Narcose.
Tan Szue Han
Singapore
Guest Speaker (2019)
Ar. Tan Szue Hann, M. Arch, Managing Director of MINIWIZ Singapore, an award-winning global Circular Economy RD&D design firm. He also conducts Design Studio as an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the Architecture & Sustainable Design Pillar, Singapore University of Technology & Design (SUTD). Szue Hann graduated with M Arch from the National University of Singapore (NUS), with a visiting fellowship to the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) in 2007. He was awarded the Lee Kuan Yew Medal, Board of Architects Prize, and the ICI Gold Medal. A registered architect, Board Member of the Singapore Green Building Council (SGBC), and Council Member and Chairman, Sustainability, of the Singapore Institute of Architects (SIA), Szue Hann is also an appointed World Cities Summit Young Leader (from 2016), and BCA Built Environment Young Leader (from 2016), both by the Ministry of National Development.
Roger Munns
United Kingdom / Malaysia
Photography Speaker (2019)
Roger is currently working as a Director of Photography on a landmark series about the world’s Oceans for Netflix. He was a principal cameraman on the BBC’s Blue Planet II series, Director of Photography on Apple’s Under the Sea Screensavers, and a sequence cameraman on David Attenborough’s Seven Worlds, One Planet. He is a British Emmy™ and BAFTA award-winning underwater cameraman, based in Sabah, Borneo, Malaysia.
Specialising in Natural history documentary film-making, Roger logged over 600hrs underwater as a principal cameraman on the Blue Planet II series. He filmed ten different stories for four episodes – One Ocean, Coral Reefs, Open Ocean and Our Blue Planet. You can read more about that on Roger’s Blue Planet II blog.
An underwater cameraman since 2001 Roger has experience working in diverse locations and habitats from the Antarctic to the tropics, open ocean to coral reefs. While enjoying the challenge of filming megafauna, such as manta rays and blue whales, his specialty is crafting complex, character-led stories. Notable sequences include ‘Percy the Tuskfish’ smashing clams on an anvil for Blue Planet II, the first filming of the humpback whale heat-run in Tonga for One Life and a story about human interactions with the largest fish in the sea – Whale Sharks, for Seven Worlds, One Planet
Roger is an excellent freediver and has logged over 600hrs on various rebreathers including his rEvo closed circuit rebreather. He owns and operates an 8K Red DSMC2 Helium and a 5K Red Gemini cinema camera housed in a Gates Deep Weapon underwater housing and has worked extensively with lighting and grip underwater.
Lynn Wu
Taiwan
Photography Speaker (2019)
Lynn Wu discovered her passion for the underwater world during a trip to Palau. She likes taking macro images, and her work has been featured in various international publications. She has won several awards, including the Compact Camera Photo of the Year for Deepblu ADEX Voice of the Ocean 2016.
Jim Chen
Taiwan
Photography Speaker (2019)
Jim Chen loves extreme sports and underwater photography, and combines adventure and creativity in his work. In 2007, he was certified as an open water diver. He began his underwater photography journey in 2008. He has been featured in the Daily Mail, Apple Daily, TVBS, and various other media.
Diego Garcia
Canada
Film Festival Speaker (2019)
At the age of 24, Diego was thrust into the world of TV, handed an underwater camera and whisked away on a 12-episode travel show across Southeast Asia. Now with 15 years experience, Diego’s video work has appeared on Discovery Channel (Daily Planet, Shark Week), National Geographic, CNN, Crime & Investigation, CNA, and has filmed in more than 25 countries. In parallel to his TV work, Diego received his first assignment as an underwater photojournalist with Asian Diver Magazine in 2005, and went on to become editor of Scuba Diver AustralAsia Magazine. Today, he is Senior Editor of both magazine titles, bridging video with print in the multimedia landscape.
Gemma Thomas
United Kingdom
Tekdiving Speaker (2019)
Gemma, has a PhD in Organic Chemistry and started diving after moving to Singapore in 2008 and was immediately hooked. She loves the sea and diving gives her the opportunity to travel and explore the world. Gemma decided to follow her real passion for teaching, not only she is a certified tech and cave diver, but she also became the first female GUE instructor in SE Asia. She has been actively introducing GUE recreational programs to Singapore and other parts of SE Asia for 3 years.
Edmund Yiu
Hong Kong
Tekdiving Speaker (2019)
Edmund currently served as the Greater China Regional Head for RAID (Rebreather Association of International Divers) serving dive centres and developing instructors throughout the region. Edmund is qualified as RAID Examiner, RAID Recreational, Technical OC and CCR Instructor Trainer and RAID Full Cave Instructor. Edmund has over 20 years of experiences in recreational, technical, rebreather and cave diving, with more than 6000 dives conducted throughout locations around the world. He has been focused in Technical Diving since 2000 and continue to pursue his passion for diving, exploration and conservation through Scuba diving instruction. Edmund also has years of experience in dive equipment servicing, retail sales and distribution business, providing technical support and total solutions for dive centres and instructors. Through his wealth of experience that brings to the industry, Edmund hopes to improve safety, establish higher quality of training standards, modernized training’s best practices, ensure professionalism with the correct attitude and at the same time improve the profitability of dive centres and instructors. Edmund also holds numerous Instructor Trainer / Instructor ratings from several other dive training agencies in Recreational/ Technical and Rebreather Diving.
Jason Isley
Malaysia
Photography Speaker (2016)
Jason underwent training in Australia to be an underwater cameraman before moving to Sabah in Malaysia to co-found underwater filming and photography company, Scubazoo. For 10 years, Jason filmed all over the world for productions including Nick Baker’s Weird Creatures for National Geographic channel and Perfect Predators for Discovery Channel’s Shark Week. From 2006, he focused on full-time photography, becoming the driving force behind Scubazoo’s publications division. He was pivotal in the production of their first book Sipadan-Mabul- Kapalai, meaning “Sabah’s Underwater Treasure”, and then managed the publication of six more coffee table books for Scubazoo.
Imran Ahmad
Singapore
Photography Speaker (2016)
Imran Ahmad is Asia’s most celebrated and internationally published underwater photographer. He has been capturing the magnificence of life both below and above the water’s surface for over 20 years. Known for his experimental photography with light and motion, he is an ambassador for Blancpain Ocean Commitment, SEACAM (Austria), RGBlue Lights (Japan), DEEPBLU and a member of the Ocean Artist Society (USA).
Aaron Gekoski
United Kingdom / Malaysia
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Gekoski is an environmental photojournalist, presenter and filmmaker. Based in Borneo, he presents wildlife and conservation shows on ScubazooTV, including Borneo/Indonesia/ Timor Leste from Below, Borneo Jungle Diaries and Borneo Wildlife Warriors. His images and articles have appeared in numerous international publications. This year, he was awarded Wildlife Photographer of the Year (photojournalist category), a competition organised by the Natural History Museum in London.
Mathieu Meur
Mauritius
Photography Speaker (2016)
An underwater photography veteran of over 25 years, Mathieu authored the first PADI-approved digital underwater photography specialty course in the world in 2001. He contributes regular columns on photography techniques in dive and photography publications and co-authored An Essential Guide to Digital Underwater Photography with Michael Aw in 2004 – the first book entirely dedicated to the techniques associated with shooting digital underwater. He has published two interactive e-books on underwater digital photography: Complete Digital Underwater Photography (2013) and Everything on Underwater Photography (2014).
Andrew Marriott
USA
Photography Speaker (2016)
Andrew is a long time diver, photographer and writer. Originally from the USA he found the ocean while working in the world of financial derivatives. After a move to Guam he devoted himself full time to the ocean, helping many new divers fall in love with the water while working as an instructor and enthusiastic underwater photographer. After much encouragement from his friends and students, he devoted himself full time to taking and sharing his images and writing about diving.
His first professional success came when he won first place in every category he entered in the Asia Pacific Photo Challenge. Following this he was asked to provide photos for magazine work, and shortly after was writing the articles to go along with them. He has since written over twenty articles for six different dive and travel magazines. He has had a number of cover shots in these magazines, the most published being the cover of the May 2017 issue of Chinese National Geographic. Along with the magazine work came invitations to speak at major dive shows across Asia. To this day Andrew is a regular speaker at major dive events; having spoken at many shows from Beijing to Singapore and pretty much everywhere in between.
The next logical step for him was to write books on diving and adventure travel. The first of these was Legends Beneath the Waves Vol. 1: Truk Lagoon. This book was very well received and its success has led to an additional six books in that series being committed to. Aside from the shipwreck books, Andrew began to also write dive guides. His guides focus on small areas and seek to take the reader diving in that location in their mind. The first of these is Let’s Go Dive Guide to Anilao. Between books he still can still be found teaching around the Pacific, as he is a much in demand coach for underwater photography. Currently he is working on the next books in these two series while living in Beijing with his awesome wife Dalice and two daughters Elly and EJ “Doomy”.
Mark Messersmith
USA
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Mark is the C.O.O. of Halcyon Dive Systems and a Board of Directors member of Global Underwater Explorers. He has nearly 50 years of dive experience and three decades of diverse business experience. As an avid cave explorer, he has “added line” to many systems in both Florida and Mexico. He is an accomplished entrepreneur creating and leading companies in locations around the world. He has contributed to articles and photographs in assorted publications such as Avian Biology, Time/Life and National Geographic magazine. Mark now lives in North Florida with his wife and dogs, where he continues to teach cave diving and jump out of perfectly good airplanes when given the opportunity.
Alex Santos
Philippines
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Alex is a commercial and technical diver. He and his PHILTECH team work in harsh and peculiar environments. Their unusual profiles allow him to study predispositions to DCS and develop in-water recompression methods for rapid treatment.
Alex also does deep recovery work for valuable objects and victims of drowning. His experience in body recovery has been called upon many times during disasters at sea, and he has trained recovery teams from the Philippines and from overseas.
Cave diving however is his true passion. He is a member of the Filipino Cave Divers, individuals who apply their diverse academic backgrounds in the study and preservation of underwater caves.
Simon Pridmore
United Kingdom
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Over the last 25 years, Simon Pridmore has pioneered mixed-gas deep diving in Asia and been involved in technical diver training, exploration and equipment manufacturing. Today, he writes books for divers, most recently “Scuba Exceptional – Become the Best Diver You Can Be” and “Dining with Divers – A Taste for Adventure”.
Tomasz Stachura
Poland
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
One of the most active wreck divers in the Baltic Sea, Tomasz Stachura has been diving wrecks for more than 30 years, and specialises in deep underwater photography. He is the founder, owner and CEO of SANTI Diving – an international company producing equipment for divers. He is also the co-founder of the international Baltictech Conference, dedicated to promoting wreck diving in the Baltic Sea. A member of the Explorers Club New York, Tomasz has published work in magazines around the world, with his photo mosaic of the Swedish wreck Mars Makolos featured on the cover of several European editions of National Geographic.
J. Hoon Park
South Korea
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
J. Hoon Park is South Korea’s top tek diving trainer, instructing the military and lifeguards. He is introducing tek diving techniques and underwater videography education in the country. J. Hoon also works as a TDI sidemount trainer and instructor. He is currently helping to launch Shark Savers Korea in South Korea. In 2015, J. Hoon Park led commercial photographer Y.Zin to a depth of 101 metres using sidemount systems, the first time a woman had been to that depth on that system. He currently supports Y.ZIN COMPANY, is helping to promote GoPro Korea, and is working to support underwater cave documentary films.
Ben Reymenants
Belgium
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Belgium Ben Reymenants is probably best know for his deep dives, his work in the diving medicine field and cave explorations. His career spans close to 3 decades under water and his exploits and teaching style makes him popular for technical courses. He owns a dive centre in Phuket Thailand where he runs technical instructor workshops and deep cave courses in the jungle. He is a fellow of the explorers club and he was part of the initial cave rescue team in the North of Thailand for which he was decorated.
Edd Stockdale
Australia
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Edd Stockdale works as a full-time professional diver. He teaches technical courses around the globe, and is regularly involved in research expeditions. With more than 20 years’ experience in diving – having done around 4,500 dives – he is an instructor trainer with RAID and TDI, as well as a writer for training agency courses.
Gideon Liew
Singapore
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Gideon Liew has been diving since 1984. He began his experience in awe of the diverse environments to be found in Southeast Asia, from pristine reefs to mysterious wrecks. In 1994, he began pursuing a career in the diving industry, working with different operators, developing experience guiding and teaching from liveaboards and land-based centres. His desire to dive beyond the limits of recreational diving led him to seek further education, to explore new environments, especially deep wrecks in the South China Sea.
Paul Toomer
United Kingdom
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
A working instructor trainer and expedition diver with a wealth of diving experience and an inexhaustible arsenal of yarns, my next guest in the ADEX Pixel Virtual Expo series of, “Conversations with …” presentations – broadcast live via Zoom on Thursday 13th August – is, Paul Toomer, the President of, RAID, the newest and most innovative of the international diver training organisations.
Discovering, in technical diving, his true passion, Paul has dived wrecks and caves all around the world, safely planned and executed dives to depths deeper than 100-metres, and been a valued member of numerous wreck and archaeological expeditions.
A ‘fireside chat’ that promises equal measures of info-tainment tempered with good advice, this will be a session well worth watching.
Dharshana Jayawardena
Sri Lanka
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Dharshana Jayawardena is a pioneering solo underwater explorer in Sri Lanka. He is the author of Ghosts of the Deep – Diving the shipwrecks of Sri Lanka and has identified the origins of several mystery wrecks in Sri Lanka and discovered its first underwater cave system.
Jill Heinerth
Canada
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Jill Heinerth is a veteran of over thirty years of filming, photography and exploration on projects in submerged caves around the world with National Geographic, NOAA, and television networks worldwide. She is the Explorer in Residence for the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, recipient of Canada’s prestigious Polar Medal and the diving world’s highest award from the Academy of Underwater Arts and Sciences. Partnering with Penguin Random House in Canada and Harper Collins in the US, Jill will soon be releasing four new major-market, non-fiction and children’s books.
Shafraz Naeem
Maldives
Tekdive Speaker (2016)
Shafraz Naeem, known to everyone as “Shaff”, is an ex-military dive instructor, an award winning underwater photographer and is the World Adventure Society Ambassador to the Maldives. He started his diving career in 1994, and has extensive knowledge of diving all over the Maldives.
Sakina Sakerwalla
Sweden
Development Director for Conservation International’s Asia-Pacific Field Division
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Sakina Sakerwalla is the Development Director for Conservation International’s Asia-Pacific Field Division, and an avid diver who believes in conserving nature for human well-being. She is responsible for developing new partnerships across corporations, academia, NGOs and government, in addition to driving fundraising activities across the region.
Hannah Pragnell-Raasch
UK/Australia
Program Specialist at Project AWARE
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Hannah Pragnell-Raasch has always had a deep connection with the ocean planet and a desire to protect it. Becoming a certified scuba diver, she became all too familiar with the various impacts affecting our underwater world, further developing her aspirations to work within marine conservation and drive positive change.
Jonn Lu
Singapore
Regional Director of Shark Savers Singapore
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Jonn Benedict Lu directs, produces and hosts content on social concerns and marine topics, also leading expeditions on exploration-themed productions. When not slacklining, running around climbing trees, rocks and urban structures, he’s in the water as an SDI/TDI and NAUI rec and tek diving and freediving instructor. He runs www.FINishedwithFINS.org the largest campaign ever organised for shark conservation, featuring over 700 of the most engaging, influential and powerful celebrities and personalities in the world.
Koh Kwan Siong
Singapore
Manager and Volunteer at Nparks
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Kwan Siong manages biodiversity related projects initiated by National Biodiversity Centre. He is currently one of the project managers for Singapore’s first marine park – the Sisters’ Islands Marine Park. Apart from conducting surveys in mangrove, intertidal and subtidal habitats, he also manages a volunteer programme that outreaches to the public, creating awareness and appreciation of our marine biodiversity.
Joanne Marston
UK/Australia
Campaign Manager At Project
Aware Foundation
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Joanne has extensive and proven nonprofit campaign management experience coupled with a background in politics and public relations. She has worked in the nonprofit environmental community for over 12 years, spearheading multiple diver engagement campaigns both in Asia Pacific and throughout the world. This includes the dynamic “Extinction Is Not an Option” campaign, which helped deliver shark and ray protection at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora as well as a groundbreaking local community campaign called Ocean Action.
Jerker Tamelander
Sweden/Thailand
Head of Unep Coral Reef Unit
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Jerker has been integral in the development of Green Fins. A keen diver since 1992, he has more than 15 years of international experience from marine research, management and policy development, including fieldwork in coral reef areas around the world.
Alex Antoniou
UK/USA
Founder Of Fins Attached: Marine
Research And Conservation
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Alex has been working with and studying sharks for over 20 years. He began his work by establishing a field station for the Shark Research Institute in the Honduran Bay Island of Utila and subsequently convinced the Honduran Government to enact protection laws for the whale shark in their territorial waters. He was the first to tag whale sharks in the Caribbean with satellite tags.
Albert Li
Australia
Founder Of Scuba For Change
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Albert is the Founder of Scuba for Change (SFC). Named as “B3000+ Social Enterprise of the Year” in 2015, SFC reinvests 100% of its net earnings for the benefit of local communities. SFC offers diving in Puerto Galera, Philippines, a location teeming with underwater diversity.
Yasmeen Smalley-Norman
USA
Vice President and 3d Modeler of The Hydrous
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Yasmeen is an underwater photographer dedicated to using visual storytelling to promote awareness of our oceans. A published underwater photographer and videographer and Vice President of The Hydrous, Yasmeen uses 3D imaging and visual media to tell stories of vulnerable and endangered coral reefs. She is also an Associate Member of the Women Divers Hall of Fame, an Explorers Club Student Member and a PADI Divemaster.
Judi Lowe
Australia
Conservationist
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Judi Lowe is a marine science PhD candidate at Southern Cross University, New South Wales, Australia, with an unusual background. Using her experience as a diver, accountant and international lawyer, Judi’s research takes a fresh approach, solving practical, real-world problems in the conservation of coral reefs, fish and the marine megafauna we love to dive with.
Sally Snow
Philippines
LAMAVE
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Sally Snow is a zoologist and filmmaker. She is one of four Executive Directors for the Large Marine Vertebrates Research Institute Philippines. A passionate science communicator, she has worked with the BBC, most recently on Blue Planet II, National Geographic and PTS. Her latest project follows the team as they travel to a sunken volcano off the Philippine mainland, to study some of the last remaining sharks in the Coral Triangle.
Heng Pei Yan
Singapore
Volunteer at Nparks
Conservation Speaker (2016)
Pei Yan is a full-time school teacher who volunteers with NParks, and runs a popular blog and Facebook page about her adventures in Nature around Singapore, from guiding Nature trails, to diving in Singapore’s waters.
