"The Vision of the Oraculum"

Creative underwater filmmaker, Gyula (Jules) Somogyi garnered the
Silver Medal at the Our World Underwater/DivePhotoGuide/Wetpixel
competition this year with this stunning short film. Gyula says of
the genesis of this film: "The original version of "The Vision of
the Oraculum" was shot and edited during the 2007 SanDisk RedSea
shoot-out in Eilat. The idea of making a short film with a complex
story had two origins: I had already dived in Eilat in 2006 and was
impressed by the beauty of the famous Moses-rock. I started looking
into how this reef got its name. The very unique shape of the reef
was the answer, because when Moses struck the rock with his rod,
the rock divided into ttwo parts. So now I had an explanation, only
the story was missing. Then into the picture came a very well know
commercial, the 1984 ad directed by Ridley Scott. The amazingly
complex story in 56 seconds served as my indirect assistant, its
structure and storyboard helped me to design and sketch my
storyboard. What is the common ground? The biblical Moses story is
very well known--as well as the novel of George Orwell, 1984. Both
stories became part of our common cultural knowledge. "I arrived at
Eilat with a shot-list, and asked underwater photographer Sharon
Rainis to be my Oraculum and underwater photographer Amir Stern to
be Moses in my film. Their patience and readiness to help gave me
the chance to make this film. The first cut was finished
within 8 hours in my hotel room in Eilat. After the competition I
got some very valuable advice from Christian Petron, who was the
head of the jury at the SanDisk RedSea shoot-out. The first cut was
also extensively discussed in the Hungarian on-line diving
community at the forums of the Divecenter.hu. Then I let the film
rest for a couple of weeks. "Around Christmas I asked my friend,
Arthur Grosz, a young Hungarian composer, to create a new
soundtrack for this story. Based on the old film's sequences but
utilizing the re-defined structure and storyboard, Arthur composed
the new soundtrack and I finished the new edit just before the
deadline of the Our World Underwater 2008 Competition. In
conclusion, after spending about two months to create this little
film, I am very pleased that it was awarded the Silver medal at his
competition and has reached you, dear viewer, via the DiveFilm HD
Video podcast. Enjoy!" For more information on Gyula's underwater
films, and his new DVD release, "Ships of Darkness," please visit
his website: http://helioxfilm.hu For more information on Wetpixel,
please visit Wetpixel.com For more information on DivePhotoGuide,
please visit DivePhotoGuide.com