Macro photography and what the **** was meant to be in that photo?

[Nettie-NZ]

Just doing some sorting of photos I took in Anilao last year.

Several things keep coming to mind:
- I wish I could go diving again soon
- I wish I could go back to Anilao and Lembeh soon
- Excellent Dive guides make a big difference
- I definitely think the longer I was there the better my macro photography got

But every so often there’s a photo I come across where I’m wondering what I was trying to capture and I also think - maybe it’s time for bifocal lens in my mask for macro!

Anyone else get similar feelings?

 

[Laurie S.]

Always! LOL

 

[MaxBottomtime]

Most of my photography is macro. Sometimes my buddies and I add a teleconverter to the lens and then place wet diopters over the port to get the nearly minroscopic animals that barely resemble specks on kelp or rocks. Many times we've tried to get a photo of a tiny animal only to find a great bycatch that we wished we would have taken a second shot of.

I found this tiny Trinchesia albocrusta on a small piece of rusty metal.

Actual size. I'm wearing blue drygloves.

 

[bvanant]

All the time. Sometimes for two reasons. One is that the critter jumped away (I swear that some critters can hear the focusing motor of the lens). The second is that you can't see what the guide was pointing at (it was too small). I have a lot of shots of substrate where there is nothing to see; its a good thing digital is mostly free would hate to pay for processing of those
Bill

 

[dirtfarmer]

Sometimes I take my diopter off and use it as a magnifying glass just to see what the guide showed me, and I don't need bi-focals!
I really like it when my guide shows me something super macro they point me in the head on direction. Nothing worse than shooting a photo of a tiny nudis ass.
It always takes me a day or 2 to get back into photo form.

My last trip to Anilao my dive buddy was shooting macro video and would spend lots of time with a subject, I enjoyed that since it was just him and I and our guide, I felt no rush and that was really nice. That's why I like Tulamben so much just me taking all the time I want and my guide off finding more critters.

I'm afraid my macro skills are gonna get rusty. The only trips I'm taking are a Great White Shark trip and a Tiger/Great Hammerhead Shark trip. Poor me.

 

[Ricardo V.]

Same here!!!
Two things that I’ve found very helpful to overcome or help compensate for my below average visual acuity:
A. Always use a magnified viewfinder.
B. Try to learn where critters live. What’s their specific habitat.
These 2 things help me tremendously.
Another thing that I encounter when processing photos, particularly macro which is 95% of what I shoot, are little critters that photobomb a shot. Of course, I don’t see it till I’m working on the image. Most of the photobomb critters are out of focus, but they are fun for me to see them and I always ask... if I would have been able to notice that the critter was there...wow! Fun stuff.
Here is a photo of a hermit crab during a night dive. You will see an out of focus little shrimp sitting on top of the shell the hermit is occupying. It’s got blue eyes and it seems like having a translucent body.
These discoveries I find fascinating and keep my curiosity and interest going, particularly for those small wonders of the underwater world.
Cheers,
Ricardo
PS: One more thing that I rely on is my dive buddy. She spot critters for me all of the time. I’m lucky she has great vision and is passionate about macro and diving in general.

 

[Nettie-NZ]

Actually just been doing some more sorting. The latest photo I had trouble recognising was a giant black frog fish in the middle of some feather stars. Ok it’s not the best photo, but this one wasn’t even macro! I’m going to have to restore some pictures because I’ve probably deleted a better one of this guy. I really had to laugh about this - couldn’t work out why I’d taken several photos of feather stars. Ok, it was a nice colourful group of them, but it wasn’t what I’d gone to Anilao for ;-)

However I am very happy with some of my efforts like this little hairy guy. Wrapt that I can get some half decent macro photos with my little Oly TG-4