A deep sea photography machine built by undergraduates for £1,800 is the star of today’s image, the winner of Cambridge University’s Department of Engineering photo competition.

Shown here is ‘Project Pebble’ undergoing tests in a swimming pool. The idea was to use relatively cheap off the shelf parts to build a vessel capable of carrying a camera and some bait to the bottom of the sea and find some deep sea beasties.

Sadly, things did not end well for the intrepid craft when it was put into the sea in May.

“Unfortunately, Pebble was accidentally picked up by a passing fishing vessel during deployment, and could not be recovered,” says the project team. The search for Pebble was formally abandoned in June.

Pebble may live on though. Future undergraduates at Cambridge will try to improve the design and bring the cost down to under £1,000.

See all entries in the photo competition here.