Review: The Other Stuff

See/Rescue

Any search-and-rescue veteran will tell you that it can be impossible to spot a lost or injured soul from the air. Smoke bombs and flares are commonly flashy ways to get noticed by the higher-ups, but they tend to fizzle quickly. So forget the pyrotechnics and go with something low-tech enough to work with certitude: the See/Rescue ($50-$99; 888-411-9888). It's an unmistakably orange polyethylene streamer that turns a capsized boater or stranded hiker into a 40-foot neon exclamation point. It has decidedly few other features, but it does float, and plastic struts keep it from tangling — and thus becoming less visible. Packed in a handy tube, the boating-oriented unit clips to a life vest and comes in various widths weighing from 9 to 22 ounces, depending on how risky you're feeling. The pocket version, which is smaller at 6 inches by 25 feet and 6 ounces, suits land use and comes rolled tight in either a pouch or tube. In either case, it's an easy way to get noticed. — Douglas Gantenbein

Five Ten Nemo Kayak Shoes

If the shoe fits, wear it, but it seems shoes never do jibe with the narrow nose of a kayak. Now the Five Ten Nemo ($85; 909-798-4222), at once rugged and streamlined, armors your feet for the riverbank and still wedges into the tight confines of today's low-volume boats.

Its advent replaces one-dimensional options such as unpleasantly clammy — and easily punctured — wetsuit booties or soggy tennies that log their onboard time stuffed behind the seat. While you're paddling, the Nemo's slipperlike flexibility lets you brace your legs properly, but there's enough heel padding to keep your feet comfortable. Disembark, and you'll appreciate the thick sole when you're scouting, hopscotching over topsy-turvy boulders, or simply lugging a 40-pound boat. And the nubby sole is made of Five Ten's flypaper-sticky AquaStealth rubber, a grippy-when-wet version of what the company uses on its climbing shoes. It keeps you surefooted and upright on even the slimiest rocks, though it would feel a bit lumpy on, say, a dance floor. A hole at the heel expels water in a few squishy steps, and the upper is made of a breezy mesh that helps the cause. The durability of the plastic-strap-and-metal-buckle closure seems a little iffy, but Five Ten has used the system on its popular Water Tennie with no problems, and only time will tell. Meanwhile, for the avid boater, the Nemo fills an important, albeit tight, niche. — Steve Shimek

StingRay Underwater Video Housing

Diving along a bright tropical reef is among the most enchanting experiences on our watery planet. And now you can record every iridescent fin in the Technicolor glory formerly reserved for the film crew of Titanic. The StingRay underwater video-camera housing system from Light & Motion Industries enables amateurs to capture the magic of the octupus's garden. Of course, it'll cost you a titanic $4,299 to outfit your existing camcorder with the watertight housing, lighting, required batteries, and a baggage-handler-proof carrying case.

Light & Motion offers 16 differently shaped housings to accommodate all of Sony's digital and TR camcorders, the most common line of small recorders. Toggle switches on the side allow you to work all the controls on your camera smoothly and reliably, and you get a clear view through a glass lens instead of the less precise image offered by traditional acrylic ports. Cruising in the shallows, you can pivot a filter over the camera lens to correct for lost color, but when you dive deeper for a close-up shot of an anemone you'll need the help of the SunRay high-intensity discharge lights — the real innovation here.

Extending like alien tentacles from the housing, the SunRay lights cast a clear, white daylight on your murky surroundings, so a queen angelfish will glide across your frame in its true blue instead of looking purple in the glow of conventional halogens. The lights use the same technology as sports stadium lights and account for the bulk of the StingRay's price (the housing alone costs merely $1,000). Best of all, though, is that the lights' arms bend any which way, allowing you to take the StingRay along with you in the narrowest of confines.
— John L. Stein

Photographs by Clay Ellis