Bluewater Photo has 6 amazing blue shark trips scheduled. The first two have completed, and were amazing! Everyone got photos of beautiful blue sharks. Now the real question is – will we make it onto the best shark diving in the world list?

Blue shark being hit with sunlight

Blue shark approaching an underwater photographer

We went out of San Pedro on the famous 73ft “Shark Boat”. Some people slept on the boat in the large bunks the night before. A great breakfast was waiting for us when we arrived.

We saw pods of Rizzo and Bottlenose dolphins on the way to our spot. Attempts to photograph the dolphins underwater were unsuccessful, but it was fun to try.

The famous “Shark Boat”

2.5 hours later, we were at the “spot”. Some of us went underwater for a quick bluewater dive looking for jellyfish. However, vis was poor, and the wind was pushing the boat quickly, so it was hard to take photos. It will be better with less wind.

Fried egg jelly

After we finished the bluewater photo dive, we checked the waters for blue sharks. None yet! However, we spotted a Mola mola near the boat. A couple people snorkeled over to the Mola, but it was swimming and it was hard to keep up with it. 3 of us jumped into the skiff and motored around looking for it. We found it!

Mola mola and diver in the open ocean

Saturday’s trip only had to wait 2 hours for sharks to show up. Then they stayed around the rest of the day. They had 3 sharks for 4 hours!!   We had to wait longer, it was about 4 hours when the first shark showed up. We saw 2 total, and everyone got some shots.

Blue shark swimming

Blue Shark biting the buoy line

Blue Shark getting very, very close

Captain Chris ran a great operation. Awesome crew, great food and great sharks. Special thanks to Chris, Ocean, Jeremy, and Paul. I can’t wait to go again! All photos on this page were taken this past Sunday, while snorkeling in my drysuit (lots of drag!), with my Nikon D7000, Tokina 10-17mm lens, dual YS-D1 strobes.

Join us in May on one of our Blue Shark trips!

The post Blue Sharks in California – amazing trip first appeared on In Focus Underwater Photography Blog.

Colorful, beautiful, and devilishly quick.  Those are just some of the words I’ve heard people use to describe juvenile garibaldi.  These tiny versions of their parents, sporting their temporary iridescent blue spots, spend their days darting in and out of the shallow reefs.

Mirrored image? These two seem to be playing an optical illusion trick on us. 1/10, F22, ISO 100.

This past weekend I set out with the intent of capturing these speedy subjects, and portraying their elusive nature.  But how?  Certainly focusing, and then maintaining focus while they dart around would be near impossible, and frustrating to say the least.  My approach: let them come to me.

These little guys and gals seem to stay in a relatively small area of the reef (at least from my observations).  With that in mind, I set my dSLR to AF-C (release), utilizing the AE-L/AF-L button to focus.  This would allow me to set my focal plane at a specific distance, and leave it there.  By using the AE-L/AF-L button to focus, this freed up the shutter button to only release the shutter, so I could fire the trigger whenever my heart desired, whether or not the subject was in focus.  This allowed me to do two things:

1. By predetermining the focal distance, I could focus on another object at the same distance (a rock, for example), and then position my strobes for the ideal lighting and take test shots.
2. Once the focal plane and strobes were set, I could concentrate on timing and composition.

I decided on an aperture of F22 or higher to provide the depth of field I would need to get a majority of the fish in focus.

Anything but cryptic, this juvenile looks surprised as it peers from behind its algae hide-a-way. 1/10, F25, ISO 250.

You could do the same thing with any camera by determining the distance you want to compose the image, then keep the shutter pressed halfway down until the fish came into focus.  You would just have to repeat the pre-focus after each shot if you did not have a separate button for focusing.

For this shoot, I really wanted to capture and portray the speed and elusive nature of these colorful critters, so I decided to use really slow shutter speeds to show the movement (e.g. 1/1oth of a second).  By setting my camera to rear-curtain sync, the camera would expose the movements of the ambient light, before the strobes would fire at the end of the exposure, therefore freezing the motion and allowing for a colorful and sharp photo.

A pair of juvies chase each other around the reef. Their speed, combined with a shutter speed of 1/1o, shows the “streaks” of their movement and brings a sense of motion to the photograph.  1/10, F22, ISO 100.

All photographs were taken with a Nikon D7000, Sea&Sea Housing, Nikon 105mm macro lens, and dual Ikelite strobes.  Special thanks to Selky Charters for a great day on, and under, the water!

A young garibaldi, streaking across the frame, proudly showing off its gorgeous blue markings. 1/10, F22, ISO 100.

These two seemed to chase each other for most of the dive. It was great just to pull the camera from my eye and watch them hide behind my housing. 1/10, F22, ISO 100.

The post Capturing the Elusive first appeared on In Focus Underwater Photography Blog.

On our recent Blue Water Photo underwater workshop trip to the Sea of Cortez I had been prepared to shoot mostly wide angle big animals.  I had packed my macro lens for night dives and I figured on doing one maybe two critter dives on the trip.  On the first dive I was amazed to see dozens of pike blennies.  They were everywhere, in their holes out free swimming, I had never seen so many.  Fortunately we continued to see large numbers on almost every dive.  I knew this was a opportunity that I may never get again so I grabbed my Canon 100mm lens, and got some great pike blenny behavior shots.  If your ever presented with a unique opportunity don’t let it pass you by.  You never know if the animals or the conditions will be the same in the future.

All images: Canon 5D MKIII, EF100mm f/2.8L Macro IS, 1/200 sec @ f/11, iso 100, 2 ikelite DS160 strobes.

The blenny in the foreground just caught a meal.

A good look down a blenny’s throat.

The post Don’t let a good opportunity pass you by. first appeared on In Focus Underwater Photography Blog.