Borut Furlan started to participate in national competitions in underwater photography in 1979, when he exposed his first rolls of film (fish photo hunting – to catch fish with a camera instead of with a spear-gun - is an original idea of Slovenian underwater photographers). His results placed him in the middle, but in next years, when he improved his technique, he moved up through the ranks and in 1985 won the Yugoslavian national championship. In the last days of former Yugoslavia (1991), Borut Furlan joined the national team for the 1st International championship on Sardinia, Italy, where the team won the 3rd place.

Contests in general underwater photography in Slovenia at the time were unorganised and had no fixed categories. In 1994 Borut Furlan proposed national contests in general underwater photography to be organised as they were in other countries (macro, fish, ambient etc.). From this year, national contests were held every year, and from 1998 they were organised by Smiljan Zavrtanik, underwater photographer from Nova Gorica, Slovenia, who also invited foreign photographers to the contest (International contests Vodan) Borut Furlan participated in this contest for 10 years, from 1994 to 2003, and won the championship every year. In 2003 he withdrew from national contests and has been participating in international contests from time to time.

In 1995 Borut Furlan participated in CMAS Word Cup in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt, for the first time and also in all later World Championships, until 2005. He won the prestigious "top-ten" rank at least in one category every time, and later also in general classification. His best achievement was the 3rd place in general classification in 2000, again in Egypt. In that period of time he also participated in some other international contests in underwater photography.

Awards (international only)

CMAS World Championships in Underwater Photography