The undocumented tragedy

This is a very specific tragedy — and an extremely common one — for anyone doing serious field work. There’s also a slightly cruel irony to it: the more extraordinary the moment, the less available one is to actually document it.

The people truly involved in the action rarely have free hands — literally and mentally — to think about framing, lighting, or even pulling a phone out of their pocket without immediately regretting it five seconds later.

And then there’s the invisible factor for those watching from the outside: the environment itself. Saltwater, wind, humidity, sand, gloves, cold, rush, stressed animals, expensive equipment scattered everywhere, endless logistics and attention split across a thousand critical details where, if a single one fails, the entire operation can go spectacularly sideways.

On a boat, especially, every extra movement feels like an unnecessary risk and that’s probably why so many of the greatest scientific and exploration stories end up surviving only in the memories of the people who were actually there.

The frustrating part is that, from the outside looking in, these situations would have enormous documentary value precisely because they are real and irrepeatable. This isn’t “content”. It’s genuine field history. Meanwhile, there are thousands of influencers out there inventing adventures and staging spectacular posts while we somehow keep accumulating very real adventures without anyone stopping to document them — because, in the moment, we’re all too busy solving problems.

Ironically, when photos do exist, they’re often technically awful: blurry, crooked, covered in salt spray, with terrible lighting and water droplets all over the lens. Yet those are often the most valuable images of all, because they’re the only proof that those moments actually happened.

The idea of bringing a dedicated photographer makes perfect sense. Not just for the aesthetic side of things, but because it completely changes the dynamic: someone whose only mission is to observe while everyone else executes. And very often those images end up having impact far beyond simple project communication — they help with funding, outreach, institutional credibility and even the team’s own personal memory of these insane adventures.

Of course, then comes the tricky part: finding the right person, paying them properly and, with a thousand other worries on our minds, we inevitably end up saying “next time”.

Meanwhile… twenty years of adventures have already gone by.

Without a photographer.

Anyway.

Maybe next time we’ll finally get our act together and make this happen.