Leejnd
Contributor
Had a great day on Saturday 8/16 diving at Catalina on Pacific Star with the Bluewater Photo group. The purpose of the trip was to view and photograph Giant Sea Bass. This intent was fully realized by everyone on the boat...except me and my buddy! Not that that's any surprise -- apparently I have some sort of GSB repellent quality. But hey, I got to see some great photos and videos of them on the boat during our surface intervals.
In spite of my being skunked for GSBs, it was still a wonderful day diving (hard to NOT have a great day diving at Catalina), and I saw some cool stuff and got some decent shots. Plus I got to hang out with the great folks from Bluewater Photo, who always give me excellent tips to help me improve my underwater photo skills.
First dive was Goat Harbor, where we apparently hung out a little too high up on the slope to see the GSBs that everyone else saw. But I did get some nice shots anyway:
I always manage to find an eel or two! This one refused to come out far enough to get a better shot, but at least I maintained my rep as the Eel Whisperer by finding an eel on every dive. And there was another HUGE one...biggest eel head I've seen in SoCal...but he too was playing shy and was too deep to get my camera anywhere near shootable distance.
This was my only shot at the second site (Ithsmus Reef) -- had to call the dive early due to my buddy's equipment issues. The warm waters have sure been wreaking havoc on the vis with all the decaying kelp, as you can see here.
Third site was Crane Base, where we were all in search of the famous Scythe Butterfly Fish. A few of us found them, but I don't think anyone got any photos as they stayed deep in their holes. But I did get to shoot this lovely Rainbow Scorpionfish, who kindly posed for me on a rock.
In spite of my being skunked for GSBs, it was still a wonderful day diving (hard to NOT have a great day diving at Catalina), and I saw some cool stuff and got some decent shots. Plus I got to hang out with the great folks from Bluewater Photo, who always give me excellent tips to help me improve my underwater photo skills.
First dive was Goat Harbor, where we apparently hung out a little too high up on the slope to see the GSBs that everyone else saw. But I did get some nice shots anyway:
I always manage to find an eel or two! This one refused to come out far enough to get a better shot, but at least I maintained my rep as the Eel Whisperer by finding an eel on every dive. And there was another HUGE one...biggest eel head I've seen in SoCal...but he too was playing shy and was too deep to get my camera anywhere near shootable distance.
This was my only shot at the second site (Ithsmus Reef) -- had to call the dive early due to my buddy's equipment issues. The warm waters have sure been wreaking havoc on the vis with all the decaying kelp, as you can see here.
Third site was Crane Base, where we were all in search of the famous Scythe Butterfly Fish. A few of us found them, but I don't think anyone got any photos as they stayed deep in their holes. But I did get to shoot this lovely Rainbow Scorpionfish, who kindly posed for me on a rock.