Neither one is really optimal. I don't think there
is shore diving at Utila Lodge since it's in town - someone reading this please verify that.
Laguna Beach has a nice sandy beach entry and if you swam to the right, you would come to 5 different named divesites starting with Laguna Beach and ending at Pretty Bush in front of Deep Blue resort relatively quickly. Pretty Bush is a little farther but it's all good through there, we stayed next door to LB at Deep Blue last March. There's a lot of channels and good coral formations in really shallow water dropping down a sort of vertical face to around 90' or so. And lots of cuts through the reef at a site our DM called Labrynth although I can't find it on the map.
Both sites are in a heavily traveled (for Utila) boat area but you'd be fine if you stay down. Or go later in the afternoon. One of the diveops from town held classes there just about every afternoon we were there. Usually two boats full of divers so that might cause some stuff to hide.
To the left from Laguna Beach is the boat channel for the mangrove lagoon that is behind both Laguna Beach and Deep Blue Resort. It's really shallow - like 5-6' in some areas so boat traffic there is a factor - although there's not a lot of boats - Deep Blue's, the 2(3?) from Laguna Beach and a couple of local outboards. The other boat from Deep Blue does go tearing through there a couple times a day, it's how they move their guests/staff to the resort. I assume it's similar for Laguna Beach since they're both on the other side of the channel from town and there's no road.
On the town (left from LB) side of the channel we had one of the best creature dives - saw seahorses, one of those red-lipped batfish and an electric ray on the same dive. But it was off a sandy slope and the viz was pretty bad. We dove it from a boat. It might have been Lighthouse Reef. It would be a long surface swim from that side of the Laguna Beach property but doable if the current wasn't too bad. As I recall, that was part of the problem with the viz - high current in that area.
Black Hills would be a good
boat dive for photos, it's a seamount south of town that rises to about 40'. On one dive we saw Turtles, Oceanic Triggers, about 100 Barracuda and 6 or 7 3-4' Grouper. None were too excited to see us, I could've touched the Grouper, I filmed them till they gradually moved off. There can be a lot of other divers there though since it's close to town and a great site w/o a lot of depth. Here's a decent map of the divesites in that area:
http://www.utopiadivevillage.com/pdf/Utila-Dive-Site-Map.pdf
There's just not a lot of shorediving anywhere off Utila. Along a lot of the west end the water is really shallow but it's mostly sandy. And there's no roads to get you to the north side which is where the deeper drop-off is. Except for town there's not a lot of roads period. Lots of ATV's if that gives you any idea.
Even off our resort, it was easier to take a 5min boat ride to the deepside of the reef - in some areas I don't think you could swim to shore due to all the ironshore/coral formations in the water. Off Deep Blue there's only one cut in the reef that allows access from their beach to the reef.
Seriously, for shorediving maybe consider the south side of Roatan. Lots of macro there around Cocoview. And it's a lot easier to get to from our side of the country. Although if you can get to Houston in time for the morning CO flight that arrives around noon on Roatan, it's possible to be on Utila by 5 reasonably - we did via two ferries. Otherwise it's a series of flights through San Pedro Sula, La Ceiba and on to Utila. For us it meant a red-eye through Newark which is why we did the ferries. Also saved about $500pp. PM for details if interested, I may not read this post again.
If you do go to Utila in early April, that's optimal Whaleshark season. But you can't dive with them - only snorkel. And out into deep water to spot them. We swam with 6 over two days - it was pretty epic.
