Favourite Image Of 2012

It is that time of the year again, when I hope you will join in the fun and share your favourite photo taken during 2012.

These days forums aren't usually the place where most photos are shared. In fact, just as an example far more go up on the Wetpixel Facebook Group page, than we see here in the Photo and Gallery Showcase forum each day.

But I hope you'll want to share your images here (rather than post into the blackhole of Facebook), so it can join our other threads from down the years and can be enjoyed for years to come:

Favourites 2011

Favourites 2010

Favourites 2009

Favourites 2008

Favourites 2007

Favourites 2006

Favourites 2005

As always this thread is about sharing your favourite photo and your reasons for your choice and perhaps the backstory. People often like to comment about their diving in general over the year too.

It is not a competition and it does not necessarily your best photo. And it wouldn't be this thread if everyone didn't break the rules and post more than one.

So here is my contribution. Definitely not a shot that everyone likes. But it is one I like because it is something a little different. Taken with Nikon D700 and 16-35mm lens, Subal housing and Zen 230 port.

It is an abstract photo of jacks hunting over a coral reef, taken in Grand Cayman.

Alex

Love, love this thread. I look forward to it every year. Per my custom I'm going to cheat and post two. First up is from a local dive on the Big Sur Coast called Lobos Rocks. There are two small islets which are home to a sea lion colony and also some really incredible invert life. The best action and scenery is shallow and right up against the rocks. You don't want to be there on a rough or even moderate swell day.

The site features cuts in the wall that channel surge up and down. The sea lions use them as launch tubes to gain access to their haulout on the rocks above, a technique not recommended for divers. These cuts also support the most dense aggregations of green anemones. When it's calm and clear they are an amazing place to dive though even on a calm day you can find yourself in whitewater at 40 feet. We were lucky enough to have several days this summer with good conditions. This is my buddy Vanessa playing with a young sea lion.

Second is a shot from the Solomon Islands. This is from Leru Cut. My buddy Dave and I spent most of a dive working on this shot. Have to say I was pretty happy with it.

Can't wait to see everyone else's images!

Clinton

This is a fun thread...I enjoy my favourite photos more than I enjoy my "best" photos. The difference is usually the effort required to get the shot. If it was easy, I don't like it as much, even if it's technically a better image.

I'm picking two as well, from the two sides of my diving life. First up is an ocean shot from my local dive site in temperate Melbourne. The whole area is stunning but the vis is often terrible and wide-angle photography is hard. On the rare occasions when the vis was good over the last few years I've been terrible at getting the right lighting to make the zooanthids yellow and the water blue - one or the other often comes out a sickly green. But with a run of good vis dives there recently I've finally perfected the settings to show off my favourite dive site in all its glory:

My second shot was taken in a cave we were exploring back in August. My buddy here is reeling into never-before-seen virgin cave. While I've taken lots of shots of buddies pretending to reel out in exploration, and I've reeled out in exploration myself, this was the first time I captured the actual event. The effort required to get a camera rig past the end of the known line was large, and while this isn't the greatest underwater cave photo that ever was, I'm really proud that I brought it home.

This is a thread I look forward to. Nevertheless it can be a challenge to decide which image to show. I have been thinking about this for a while so was prepared with this shot in mind.

I have taken many pix of salmon spawning. For many of these shots it would not likely be possible for someone not rather knowledgeable about salmon or fish behavior to know what behavior was being shown without a caption. For example, I have many shots of females digging - either during preparation of the nest or redd as well as after spawning when the female covers the redd. These pix show a fish turned sideways. Eggs typically are hidden by milt and drop out of sight during spawning and so often I do not get any or just a few eggs in a pic.

In this shot a number of eggs are clearly seen. The female is turned just completeing a digging action following spawning, which has raised them into the water column, a bit atypical. The strobe light (from a Seacam Seaflash 250D) hit them just beyond the shadow cast by the male. I also like the play of light on the female's head. She has just tapped the surface, something they often do. Note the ripple. FYI, the egg in the foreground is probably from a different female. Eggs get displaced when females dig near a previously laid clutch. I suspect this is one. Camera: Canon EOS 1Ds MkII and 8-15mm zoom at 15mm. Seacam housing. Taken using remote control from about 10 meters away.

Not just a favorite image also a favorite first time underwater experience for 2012; the sheer chaos and excitement of sailfish in a bait ball. Hopefully I will get to experience it again next month.

Bahamas on the Carib Dancer. Nikon D7000, 60mm macro with 1.4 TC and +5 diopter.

Nice ones so far. I love this thread every year. I look forward to seeing what everyone has to offer up. Thanks for always starting it off Alex. Of course, I could not choose just one either. I took these in Grand Cayman in January at one of Alex's workshops.

Both of my favorites are firsts for me. Using my new 105 macro lens that week - took this shot of the wire coral shrimp while hanging out at about 80 feet on the Pinnacle at Babylon to get this shot - I took quite a few shots to get some that were in focus. Espcially with the wire coral swaying in the current some and nothing to hold on to.

Green Stripes

This second one is a close focus wide angle shot with snoot. I had made a homemade snoot to take on this same trip and tried it out for the first time. I love the effects it has on CFWA work. I had fun with my friend Nadya and her Minnie Mouse ears modeling for me to add depth to this picture.

The Purple Sponge

Happy Diving and Merry Christmas to All - I so loof forward to meeting many of you in the coming year on trips and sharing more fun together. - DiverPam

I hope these are okay - I have two favourite images. Both are from Malaste Tulamben, Bali and I had just done a one day workshop with Jeff Mullins and we made some home made snoots for my Sea & Sea YS110A for me to try out.

Both images were take with my Canon G12, twin YS110A strobes (snooted) and a +3 macro wet lens fitted to the housing.

I had tried snoots before but they never seemed to workout but with Jeff's help things just seemed to fall in place and worked.

Karl

This would be one of my favourite images for 2012, it doesn't have a lot of great elements for a good shot but it is all about family.

Sharing diving is just something you just can't put words to.

My favourite 2012 image is a picture I have wanted to get a long time. It is from Nudi retreat in Lembeh, where this snake was extremely cooperative and spent quite some time checking out the camera.

I had a good uderwater photography in 2012

here are my 2 favourites:

1. Gymnodoris ceylonica eating a sea hare

2. Eagle Ray:

Love all the images..Here are two of my favorites...

Cheers and look forward to more images ..Merry X MAS TO ALL

Despite being one of the first images from my D800, not the highest of resolutions...

... a weird optical set-up and a high ISO, thanks to having no strobes (my old gear almost certainly imploded at 500m or more off a Sudanese reef). Nonetheless, I find this image one of the most evocative of British wreck diving, my first passion as a cold-water diver, that I have ever taken.

Mine's a compilation...hard to choose one...Its been on the BookOfFace, so apologies for the double post...

All chronologically ordered from top left working across & down to bottom right; RN divers removing the net from Scylla; Bardo over an anchor found by the Shipwreck Project; Mark Pearce & Bardo with a Coronation gun; Bardo with the wooden hull the Shipwreck Project has found off Chesil; Martin Stanton using an UW Mac at Vobster; Bardo in the fuselage; Drift diving in Weymouth; The truly gorgeous Ivory Flame; RN with 1000lb bomb at Garvie; Bardo and some fish at Vobster; Bardo with an MP5 at Vobster; and finally Helen Hadley on the Coln in Scapa.

Some dives - like Scapa - had more choice than others, but I have chosen personal favourites. Some are relevant to just me and the other diver/model...such as the hull section we found with Grahame Knott on the Shipwreck Project. Some images remind me of fun times - the 1000lb bomb is fun. And some are images I am just very pleased with.

All in all, a good year. Thanks to one and all - both featured and otherwise - for the help and assistance. It really is appreciated.

If it breaks the rules, so be it!

Here is a couple of mine, the shipwreck is the Eber Ward in the Mackinac Straights of Michigan, USA and the crab is from Little Cayman.

One of my favorites from latest summer's Goliath grouper spawning aggregation off Jupiter Florida.

Planet reef, Canon 5DMK3, 8-15mm at 8mm.

Apo Island, Dauin, Negros Oriental, Philippines.

Dorid on red carpet, Canon 7D, 100mm.

Tulamben, Bali, Indonesia.

Happy holidays, everyone!

EJ,

Cottesloe, Western Australia by Xander Rood, on Flickr

Taken in Perth, Western Australia in front of my house on a rare calm evening with good visibility.

Tulamben, Bali by Xander Rood, on Flickr

And this one, because I went searching to find this animal and found it! Which I thought was never going to happen

Happy holidays everyone

These are my favourites from out trip to the Phillippines last year. This was my second trip with an underwater camera so I'm glad I got anything decent.

Pygmy Seahorse taken at Wakatobi last May. My first trip outside North America, will always be memorable.

Nikon D7000, 60mm w/1.4x Teleconverter, 2 YS110a strobes