Pictures from Cozumel, Mexico

Here's my report with pictures of my last trip to Cozumel.

First time using a strobe (what a difference!). My setup is pretty basic:

Sony DSC-P9, MPK-9 case, Sea&Sea YS-25 strobe.

http://purpleink.us/blogs/eddy.html

Any pointers or suggestions on the photography is appreciated.

Cheers,

Eddy.

Eddy,

Looks like you had a good trip. Cozumel offers so much diversity in the dive sites. Many of your pictures are good. You might try to get a little closer to eliminate some of the blue water between you and the subject. Getting lower and shooting on the same level as your subject works better in a lot of cases. It takes patience and waiting out the jawfish, as you did, can be rewarding.

You asked for pointers and suggestions on the photography, but reading thru your blog site, a couple of things really got my attention.

Even though seahorses are a great find and fun to photograph, your safety HAS to come first in all your diving. Preoccupation with the photography can be distracting and you have to be more aware of these issues when you take a camera underwater.

You indicated you knowingly put yourself into deco and even ran out of air during your ascent as a result of staying too long to capture "the perfect" image of a seahorse. In another dive, you became low on air and were near an air sharing situation. Both situations are extremely dangerous. The DAN accident reports are full of incidents where people 'pushed the limits'.

I'm sure you learned a lot from your trip and will be a safer diver in the future.

Sorry to preach, but I couldn't help myself.

Welcome to the world of underwater photography...be safe and have fun

Your composition is very good. The colors in some of the pics are really good. I really like the one of the crab. Your shiloettes are really good even though sometimes digital has a hard time reproducing the highlights.

There is a lot of diversity in conzumel I'm gonna have to go check it out one of these days.

As dmoss said Welcome to the world of underwater photography. Wants you start you will never go diving without your camera again.

I agree. You need to make sure you live to do more dives so that you can take more pictures. The ocean isn't Disneyland, unfortunately. If it wants, it can have you in all sorts of ways. Let's not give it any help

.mike

Even though seahorses are a great find and fun to photograph, your safety HAS to come first in all your diving.  Preoccupation with the photography can be distracting and you have to be more aware of these issues when you take a camera underwater.

You indicated you knowingly put yourself into deco and even ran out of air during your ascent as a result of staying too long to capture "the perfect" image of a seahorse.  In another dive, you became low on air and were near an air sharing situation.  Both situations are extremely dangerous.  The DAN accident reports are full of incidents where people 'pushed the limits'.

 

I'm sure you learned a lot from your trip and will be a safer diver in the future.

 

Sorry to preach, but I couldn't help myself.

 

Welcome to the world of underwater photography...be safe and have fun

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If it wants, it can have you in all sorts of ways.

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LOL!

Jokes aside, even trustworthy buddies can fail, so I think you should always pretend that you are diving solo.

Nice photos!

I liked your Octo pics, especialy the last one from 7/5.

Much like everyone else, I've always assumed that when I'm diving with Mr. Camera, I'm diving alone. Buddies don't want to hang too close when you're trying to get a bead down on the perfect shot, etc, etc.

Race with what you brought to the track, so to speak. Don't count on someone elses air to be available....

Yes, I already got a lot flame for that particular dive. Will keep that idea of diving solo

in mind.

I'll try to live to do more reports.

The Octo pix (at night) is my favorite. I shot it almost blindly (couldn't see

the subject on the visor at all). It was a lucky shot.

Eddy.