Groove Cheek Goby

Blogged by Simon on March 14, 2010 9:16pm | Last updated by Irene on March 14, 2010 9:19pm | Category: Underwater Photography | Get a Print Get a Print |

Groove Cheek Goby (Nesogobius sp. 2)I wasn’t diving this week, so I’m working on a few stock images I have shot during recent night dives in Sydney. With the usual suspects like Anglerfish (Antennarius sp.) out of the way, I am now trying to identify smaller fish like this, almost transparent, little Goby. Currently, my best guess is the Groove Cheek Goby (Nesogobius sp.), which I still need to confirm.

There was a small group of them seeking shelter next to the anchor chain in Chowder Bay, all between five and seven centimeters small. These are nervous little fish and very easy to disturb, so I approached from the side, trying to move as little as humanly possible, hoping it wouldn’t dart (it did of course, but lucky me after I took this photo). This shot is level with the subject, and I had to sit the housing directly on the sand to do get this perspective. Composition wise, the subject is a little further from the lens and there are out of focus elements in the photo which are closer. I usually try to avoid this, but here this rule is broken on purpose. The idea behind the blurry sand is to add depth which kinda works here (though I had to darken the foreground to avoid focussing the eyes on it).

I also got to try out my new Sea&Sea compact macro port for the first time with the 60mm macro lens. Honestly, I can’t see any difference between the longer DX macro port for the 105mm lens and this one, so I’m curious about the new Tokina 35mm lens which it’s for. This is now my backup macro port, but I may use it full time for the 60mm lens, it’s just shorter and makes the kit less bulky.

Other camera settings for this shot: Nikon D300, 60mm lens, f/16 for 1/200s in manual mode, manual flash compensation set to 3.6EV and subject distance about 50cm. Other than what I already described, I post processed this photo only minimal for levels, saturation and added vignetting.

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  1. Stingray In The Dark | Underwater Photography Blog by Simon Mittag
    on March 19th, 2010
    1

    [...] On this dive, we followed a circular pattern and photographed the ray a second time around, after it escaped me the first time. I just waited there for about a minute before carefully approaching and got to try 3 shots, before it finally disappeared into the blue. When I saw the animal resting on the sand, I tried to compose this photo with the upper half as negative space and using the sand as a compositional aid to give depth to the image (similar to the Goby shot). [...]

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