TotK Camera Work in the Depths: Where Robbie Is

Camera Work in the Depths is one of the main quests in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and the one that gives you the Camera and the Hyrule Compendium. Josha has found a figure on a slate fragment from the Depths, standing on two legs with one arm raised, and thinks it proves people once lived down there. Robbie will not let her go alone, so he drags you along instead: down the chasm south of Lookout Landing to find something like it and photograph it. The quest is short, and for many players it is the first trip into the Depths.

When can you start Camera Work in the Depths?

After the first half of Crisis at Hyrule Castle, once you have the paraglider and Purah has handed you Regional Phenomena, Josha hurries off to talk to Robbie about her chasm research. Speak to Josha and Robbie in her lab at Lookout Landing and the quest begins.

1. Josha shows you a slate fragment from the Depths and explains that the figure on it could be evidence of a people who lived there. She wants to go and look herself.
2. Robbie says it is far too dangerous and offers to go with you instead: find anything that resembles the figure and capture it with the Purah Pad’s camera. You have never used the camera, so he promises to show you once you are down there.
3. He suggests entering through the chasm south of Lookout Landing, then heads off without you.
4. Josha gives you 10 Brightbloom Seeds and 5 Arrows, and tells you that a seed attached to an arrow lights up the area where it lands.

How do you get down to the Depths, and where is Robbie?

Josha tells you: “OK, you’ll want to head straight out of Lookout Landing’s southern gate. You’ll find the chasm Goggles used just outside.”

1. Walk to the chasm. Go out the south gate and keep heading south to the Hyrule Field Chasm, ringed with red Gloom, with a Zonai Survey Team camp at its edge. Jiosin Shrine sits on its south side; activate it as a travel point first.
2. Jump in. Free-fall, and open the paraglider just before the bottom. Avoid the Gloom on the ground: it temporarily lowers your maximum hearts.
3. Ask Ponnick. At the campfire where you land is Ponnick of the Zonai Survey Team. He ran out of Brightbloom Seeds and lost track of Robbie: “And last I saw him, he was heading way out there, off to the west.”
4. Light Nisoij Lightroot. A short way south of the landing spot is Nisoij Lightroot (Show on map). Activating it lights up a large area and adds a travel point. The Note on the Table at the campfire beside it is from Robbie and says he went on to the Lightroot to the west.
5. Head west. Past the Lightroot’s glow it is pitch black, with pools of Gloom and monsters on the way. Light your path with Brightbloom Seeds; there is a second note from Robbie partway along.
6. Light Iayusus Lightroot. Activate Iayusus Lightroot to the west (Show on map). Robbie is at the campfire beside it, and the huge statue nearby is the one you need to photograph.

If you run low on Brightbloom Seeds, caves on the surface are full of them. For the basics of exploring down there, see the Depths guide and Lightroots.

How do you photograph the statue?

Talk to Robbie. He finds that the Camera and Hyrule Compendium on your Purah Pad are locked and unlocks them on the spot. He then asks you to take a picture of the nearby statue, which doubles as a test of the camera.

1. Open the camera and point it at the statue.
2. When the name Statue with raised arm and an exclamation mark appear in the frame, take the picture.
3. Show it to Robbie. Satisfied, he heads back to Lookout Landing and tells you not to keep Josha waiting.

The picture goes into the Purah Pad album. If you delete it by mistake, Robbie sends you back down to take another.

What are the rewards?

Fast travel back to Lookout Landing and show Josha the picture. She is convinced the figure on her slate shows people, calls it a big discovery, and gives you 5 Zonaite as thanks. That completes the quest. If your pouch is full, she asks you to make room for five pieces of Zonaite and come back.

The real prize is the Camera and the Hyrule Compendium: anything you photograph, whether creatures, monsters, materials or weapons, gets registered. How to fill the Compendium is covered in Hyrule Compendium.

What should you do next?

• The Depths story: Josha goes on sifting through what the survey team brought back for more fragments, and Robbie says he will head back to his lab once her Depths research is sorted out. After you finish any one regional quest, Josha gives you A Mystery in the Depths, which leads to Autobuild; after that Robbie returns to Hateno and starts upgrading your Purah Pad, see Purah Pad upgrades.
• Camera jobs: the empty picture frames at the stables (stable pictures), the Ancient Tablets and plenty of side quests need pictures, and you can do all of them now.
• Bargainer Statue: the half-buried Bargainer Statue head indoors at Lookout Landing trades items for the Poes you collect in the Depths; see Bargainer Statues.
• Main quests: for the order of the four regions and why, see main quest order.

Further reading

• Crisis at Hyrule Castle: the main quest before this one.
• Chasms: every chasm in Hyrule.
• Beginner tips: what else to do around the time you get the camera.