Pics from Puerto Gelara - first trip with my Fuji S2

After bumming around wetpixel for close to 6 months, and asking lots of questions, I finally made my first dive trip with my housed Fuji S2. Tks to James, Eric, Marriard, Dhaas, Patmandu, Lndr, Ike and many others for either answering my queries or selling me their stuff at great prices.

I have downloaded my pics at http://www.imagestation.com/album/?id=4287697703 .

Sorry fellas but you will have to create an id for yourself first to view the pics.

Constructive comment are most welcomed. Still a lot to learn about strobe placement but I can't wait for my next trip .

Regards

Eric

Eric

Here's a tip. Very few people will view your images if they have to create a login to do it.

Larry

Tks Larry. This is one of the few free online album which has unlimited storage as well as a slideshow feature. Guess i will have to start looking for another.

Or set up your own website. It's not that expensive, nor difficult.

(I'm also someone who is not likely to take the trouble to register or set up an id in order to view somebody's pictures.

Who were you diving with at Puerto Galera? PG was one of my favorite places to dive when I lived in Hong Kong. There didn't used to be that many u/w photographers going there, but the numbers had started to increase. It's an under-rated location.

Hi Robert

have you gotten back your strobe from Singapore Ikelite? I share your sentiments about the id thing. It's just that imagestation.com has features I like and it's free. Ya, prob i'll look into setting up a webpage when i have the time. Was playing with picturestoexe last nite till 3 am and i enjoyed it so much that i forgot i have a regular day time job :oops: tried emailing to my wife who is on business in USA my creation but didn't seem to work. prob trial versions don't work on winzipping and emails.

Anyway, I was diving with Sabang Inn Resort. My DM was Cenon. Water was a freezing (for me) 22 deg celsisus and we did just 2 dives a day. Saw your pic of harlouquin shrimps and we made the DM dived Dry Docks 3 times! Only Coleman Shrimps there, but still it's a bonus to me as it's my first sighting.

My diving buddies are from HK and yes, HK is a market PG courts aggressively. Koreans as well.

PG is getting more popular these days, esp to Asian divers in the northern hemisphere.

Regards

eric

Eric,

If you're looking for a free photo hosting site which doesn't require viewers to sign up, login etc., you might want to check out webshots. However, there are space limitations and it doesn't allow "deep links" which I believe Imagestation still allows. Here's their website:

http://www.webshots.com/homepage.html

If you don't want to set up your own website but want greater flexibility than imagestation or webshots, another alternative is to host your photos on a pay photo hosting site. This is what I've done until I get around to setting up a website. I went with Allenhost which costs about US$33 for 12 months. You can pay by Paypal. Here's their webpage:

http://www.allenhost.com/

While I'm in the region, I haven't yet had an opportunity to dive PG, but I hope to in the not too distant future. Is the water always that cold ? I'm used to water temps around 28 degrees.

Cheers.

For much of the year the water temperature would be fine for you then. But not at this time of year!

I have been there quite a few times and still love it. It's a great "long weekend diving" destination from HK.

-David

Eric,

It's been a long time since that pair of Harlequin shrimps were at the sunken Dry Dock. Nice while they were there, though. I've never seen them anywhere else.

There's an amusing story about those shrimps: One of the DMs from Asian Divers in Little La Laguna was taking some divers to the Dry Dock to see the Harlequins. Unsurprisingly, there was a local shortage of blue (Linckia) starfish near the dry dock, so the DN picked one up a couple of hundred meters away to use to lure the Harlequins out of their hole, and was holding it in front of him by its arms as he led the customers, finning against a slight current to the site.

When they surfaced, one of the divers exclaimed excitedly, "That was fantastic! I've never seen anything like that! Absolutely incredible!"

"So you liked those Harlequin shrimp?", the DM asked.

"No, no, forget the shrimp or whatever that was," the diver interjected. "I meant, how you were able to navigate all that way using a starfish. How do you do that? You've GOT to show me!"

"Oh, well, just follow the middle arm," the DM replied.

Oh, and I did finally get the strobe back. Both the SS200's (and a back-up film housing) are already in Rajah Empat on the boat we'll be on next month, which should save some weight on the flight to Sorong.

P.S. The white frogfish I image I use for an avatar was shot in PG, just out near the motorboat wreck in Little La Laguna Bay.

Reefwreck, many tks for the suggestions.

Robert, as for the Harlequin shrimps, my DM forgot the blue starfish while navigating. No wonder we didn't see any. Hahahhaha!

We were also looking for these small colourful frogfishes as well, but what we got were those as big as a netball.

Enjoy yourself in Rajah Empat. My friends are diving with Irian Diving in April, but too bad I cannot join them on this one. And to think I am the person who suggested the place to them !