Guilded Pipefish

Blogged by Simon on January 17, 2009 6:53am | Last updated by Simon on July 28, 2010 1:21pm | Category: Underwater Photography | Get a Print Get a Print |

Guilded Pipefish (Corythoichthys Schultzi)The Cod Hole was the single best photo dive I have done this year, hands down. Ok, given there are a few days left in 2009 to improve on this, but it had everything big and small you could wish for, including Potato Cod (Epinephelus tukula), Bass (Lutjanus sp.), Anthias (Pseudanthias sp.), Gorgonians, Seahorses (Hippocampus sp.), Surgeonfish (Acanthurus sp.), Unicornfish (Naso unicornis), you name it!

After we watched the Cod Feed, we spent the next hour in the shallows around 8-10m, which is where Tina found the little Guilded Pipefish (Corythoichthys schultzi) sitting on a piece of Coral, moving around inbetween probably in search for food or protection. I waited for several minutes with my camera until it finally lifted it’s head and gave me some negative space to compose the picture with. Exposed for 1/500 at f/16, ISO800. The little fish moves so fast, the usual shutter times of 1/125s would not produce a sharp image, so I switched to faster in manual mode.

You may still notice a bit of soft glow around the head, which is residual from the burn I applied in postprocessing to get rid of some blurred Coral in the background and make the subject stand out better. I actually don’t mind the softness, it works with the subject. I also applied some sharpening around the eye and used burn to add a shadow effect to the coral in the foreground.

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