Capturing the Moment

  Nudibranchs are a macro photographer's dream animal. They move slowly and boast some of the most vibrant colors and patterns of any underwater wildlife. Yet with all of their brightness it is still quite easy to miss them thanks to all the other colors in the reef. Our eyes are trained to look for movement so we glance right past the hiding octopus, the camouflaged scorpionfish, and even the ostentatious nudibranch....but not on this dive. Baby frogfish number one was tucked down into the rock, peering up at his reflection in the lens as I got in close for this shot on the left. Heidi found another wedged in amongst coral polyps. These juveniles will someday grow into volleyball size adults one day if they can avoid all the dangers on the reef. Now this guy was a real tough find. Once again master spotter Heidi pointed him out to me. I initially saw the fin but only the fin. I was amazed when I focused on the entire area and realized it was all one big scorpionfish! I h...

Turtle Town isn't just for turtles anymore. Today Heidi and I went to a well known turtle hotspot for a scuba dive. Knowing us we weren't there for turtle watching, we were looking for the small things like this iridescent blue striped Ewa Fang Blenny mimmicking the coloration of a juvenile cleaner wrasse in order to get in close to bite bigger fish. This frog fish on the other hand would not fit into the 'small' category. It was massive and very green. It was stationed just off the reef not moving, just waving its lure out to draw in unsuspecting prey. These frogfish are related to deep sea angler fish and have a very similar lure on their foreheads. As we were taking in the full size of this frogfish Heidi notice a small, brownish nudibranch crawling along the reef. It turned out to be a rare red spotted nudibranch. The color red is the first to go when you get deep in water but when I took a flash photo the red color really popped. Also showing off a bea...