Anilao - May 2015

A clip of my recent trip to Anilao in May.

It was shot on my GH4 and I uploaded it in 4K but unfortunately YouTube has done a pretty poor processing job at lower resolutions especially on the Anthias at about 0:21

https://youtu.be/qQ6rM6QViVg

I experimented with some small zooms and pans in post. The one of the pink frogfish might be a little overdone but the others seem to have worked out OK.

What do you think?

Cheers

Steve

Enjoyed the video. Thanks for sharing.

The color seems a bit off, especially those shot with light. Did you just set the white balance to Auto or set to the temperature of the light?

Colour temperature at 5,500K to match the light but all the shots have been colour corrected and graded to taste in post. Most also have a vignette applied.

Do you think I went a bit overboard?

Hi Steve,

Thanks for sharing with us, love the diversity you were able to capture. The color does look a bit desaturated on my screen.

Going to have to add Anilao to my list,

Cheers,

Steve

Nice work! I've been diving Anilao for the past 11 years and can say that you've got a lot of its "greatest hits", even one or two that I have yet to find (do you remember where you saw the hairy frogfish? They have eluded me to this day! I will be there on Saturday and maybe this guy is still around). Great shots of the flabellina nudis too. Finally, do you know what the eggs are at about 2:30?

By the way, for my tastes, I would liked many of the shots to hold just a little longer, and I agree with the other guys, the color looks desaturated to me also and even a little greenish at times. But my monitor isn't calibrated, I don't shoot video, and I really enjoyed watching, so take my advice with a large lump of salt.

Troporobo

I can't remember the name of the dive site where the hairy frogfish was but I did a google search of Anilao dive sites and I think it might be Secret Bay. It was on the south-eastern end of the peninsular just north of the point. There was a village there with quite a bit of construction going on. It was a sloping flat gravel bottom at about 18-20m deep. It will be hard to find as it was only about 5cm long.

The eggs were from flamboyant cuttlefish and were on the house reef at Crystal Blue. A couple of the people I was diving with were lucky enough to actually see two of them hatch - I would have loved to have gotten that on video!

Yes - I understand what you mean about holding the shots longer but people's attention span being what it is today a 5 minute clip is about the maximum you can have so I had to decide on keeping the shots short or making two vodeos. In the end I went with the former.

The colour saturation is a funny thing. - It all seems to depend on how you view it. On my computer monitor the colour looks quite saturated and I thought I might be overdoing it but when I watch it on my 55inch UHD TV it is so much less vivid.

Cheers

Steve

Troporobo, hairy frog fish can be found at Secret Bay. I dove there a few times at night and they put up a good show. Some are as big as a big mango. At one point my dive buddy said she saw 5 hairy frogfish.

A clip of my recent trip to Anilao in May.

It was shot on my GH4 and I uploaded it in 4K but unfortunately YouTube has done a pretty poor processing job at lower resolutions especially on the Anthias at about 0:21

 

 

I experimented with some small zooms and pans in post. The one of the pink frogfish might be a little overdone but the others seem to have worked out OK.

What do you think?

 

Cheers

Steve

Bit off-topic, but i see you're diving a rebreather: can you recommend a nice dive operator which support rebreather diving there?

Nicool

It's not a rebreather - I took a selfie while I was trying out an old Aqualung twin hose regulator that belongs to a friend.

I don't know of any rebreather friendly operators at Anilao.

Steve

You might be right about the color being dependent on YouTube versus viewing a local version of the file.

I know Secret Bay quite well, but usually manage to go there only once on every trip. Guess I've just been unlucky, but if everyone thinks good thoughts for me, maybe this weekend will be the charm!

On the other hand, I once managed to find two miniature frogfish, one bright orange and one white with red, tucked up under a bit of grey sponge. They were a nice find. Lots of other good stuff there too. Unfortunately with the massive new hotel and all the other construction right at the shoreline, I fear for the health of the site. It's already borderline filthy at times.

Happy hunting tomorrow.

Secret Bay is filthy at time....... yeah I feel for you. I spent 10 days at Anilao, saw used diaper, women maxi-pad. The second last day we stopped at the Secret Bay beach because the DM need to stop by his family's place a bit, I jokingly said to my fellow divers that I have seen all human waste trash possible, accept for used condom....... long and behold, one of the ladies used a tree branch to lift up a used condom waving at me. Good thing I wasn't in the water, I burst into laughter and it was just totally silly moment.

Anyway, Nicool, if you dive rebreather, contact Mike at Crystal Blue. In our trip, one of the guys dove rebreather. He got assign to the boat where everybody has best air consumption. Crystal Blue don't have pure oxygent tank but I was told when the rebreather guy need oxygen, they have to go out about 35 minutes away to pick or refill the oxygen for him. They go out of their way to accommodate the diver. I'm sure high tips is expected. I feel sorry for the DM on the boat that has rebreather diver, I heard that the DM ran out of air almost every dives and at one point he had to buddy share air with one of the diver while still pointing out creature to all the divers, talk about dedication!

I've never seen a rebreather in use at Anilao, but if anyone wanted tips, the folks at Nautilus Dive in Makati are keen users and would be sure to know

Nice work! I've been diving Anilao for the past 11 years and can say that you've got a lot of its "greatest hits", even one or two that I have yet to find (do you remember where you saw the hairy frogfish? They have eluded me to this day! I will be there on Saturday and maybe this guy is still around). Great shots of the flabellina nudis too. Finally, do you know what the eggs are at about 2:30?

 

By the way, for my tastes, I would liked many of the shots to hold just a little longer, and I agree with the other guys, the color looks desaturated to me also and even a little greenish at times. But my monitor isn't calibrated, I don't shoot video, and I really enjoyed watching, so take my advice with a large lump of salt.

Troporobo,

Hairy frogfish in Secret Bay, just in front of the new construction to the left of the big resort in 25 ft of water and in Coconut to the right at 40 ft there is a big one and also a little one.

Elmer

I've never seen a rebreather in use at Anilao, but if anyone wanted tips, the folks at Nautilus Dive in Makati are keen users and would be sure to know

Acacia has 100% O2. One of the guys I dove with was on a rebreather

Nice shot of that one with the lure waving about! I know that they are out there, I just have not been lucky (or my DM / spotter is not looking the right way!)

No luck this weekend either. The habagat (SW monsoon season) has started so the weather is pushing straight at the peninsula, and shallow sites like Secret Bay are churned up with horrible vis. We had much better conditions at the "offshore" sites like Kirby's Beatrice, and Sombrero, although also some of the strongest at-depth currents in a long while.

Still, it was good to be in the water, and I found other nice subjects. That's the thing about Anilao, almost no matter the conditions, there are accessible and productive sites available.