A few nice all about animals images I found:
All the Colours of the Sea
Image by Boogies with Fish
www.messersmith.name/wordpress/2010/02/08/all-the-colours...
This last Saturday was a banner day for photography. My new Canon G11, which you are undoubtedly getting tired of hearing about, was perking along nicely, grabbing shots with much increased dynamic and no noise whatsoever at ISO 80. The ten megapixels that it offers are more than sufficient for the magazine-size shots that I need to do my work. Don't sniff at ten megapixels. If another camera offers more, but the resulting image is poorer in quality, what good do those extra megapixels do?
Yesterday's post contained images from this Saturday's dive also, as will tomorrow's and the day after. In total, out of about one-hundred exposures, I got thirty-six which I deemed good quality. I've never had a two dive day that was more productive. Part of the reason for that was that my old buddy, Richard Jones, was "spotting" for me. He has amazing eyes and can find the smallest critters. Sometimes these are the most interesting. Tomorrow I'll feature some nudibranchs which Richard found. Your mind will be blown.
But, that's for tomorrow. Today, we're doing colours. The dive at Planet Rock was dark. There was a layer of muddy fresh water from the Gol Gol River floating over the surface down nearly to the top of the sea mount at about 15 metres. I had to take many shots with flash. Though it is my preference to forgo flash when possible, sometimes it is unavoidable - there's simply not enough light. In the first two shots, the effects of the flash are not noticeable. It simply acted as a fill light. In the others, the effect is dramatic, though the colours are, to me, artificially bright. They are, however, very pretty.
Green has been my favourite colour since I don't know when. When I was a small child, it was red. I don't know when I changed to green. I don't even know if guys are supposed to have a favourite colour. I don't talk about it much over the pool table with my mates, though I'm always soothed and mellowed by the green playing field. Maybe that's why I'm such a lousy shot. Anyway, have a look at this lovely green Coral (Acropora tenuis): Click it to magnify and see the lovely details of the polyps waving in the current. Each little ledge on each tower is an individual animal. It is truly a thing of beauty.
Here's another Acropora species with a dramatically different colour: I'm always faintly startled when I run across one of these outlandishly purple corals. They seem somehow out of place. I wonder if a nearby toy store exploded and scattered misshapen shards of bright plastic on the sea bottom.
This shows why we have a pretentious name for the Magnificent Anemone (Heteractis magnifica). You can see a scattering of Pink Anemonefish (Amphiprion akallopisos) chilling out and having a few beers: What a lovely playground they have. There are few sights in the sea which are as calming and wondrous as this symphony of colour displaying a commensal relationship between vastly different organisms. Neither can flourish without the other.
Starfish fans will enjoy this lazy looking Linckia laevigata. This is the same species which often appears as a bright blue variation.
This Coral (Lobophyllia hemprichii) contains the brightest red pigment of any creature that I have seen in the sea: This is a very young colony. They tend to become less colourful as they grow. Young ones, such as this, can often be seen as tiny crimson torches thirty metres away on a day with good visibility.
I'm a great fan of Feather Stars. This is a particularly nice image of some species of Lamprometra. They are difficult for me to tell apart. I've been watching old episodes of Fawlty Towers in the fifteen minutes that I can stop working each day. I can't get out of my mind what Manuel (he's from Barcelona, you see) says when he doesn't misunderstands a command from Basil Fawlty: "Eet ees deefeecult." You can clearly see the "feet" of the feather star in this shot. If you gently tickle a foot with your fingertip, the creature will wildly thrash its arms around, waving madly. It's a most comical sight. I'm going to have to shoot a video clip of it some day.
Here is a close up shot of another individual of a Lamprometra species Feather Star: I didn't think that the shot would turn out to be much. Now I'm simply blown away by it. Beware. If you stare at it long enough you may feel yourself getting slightly high, that is if you recognise "high". Click on it to make it bigger and have a look. It's mesmerising. This is a living thing. How can that be?
I don't recommend it as a desktop background.
A Mouth Full
Image by chefranden
You'd think that one would fill him up, but he ate all the peanuts -- about 20.
Peahen
Image by PictureWendy
Road Trip Florida, September 11 2011.
We started our second day in St. Augustine with a visit to the 'Fountain of Youth Archeological Park'. Strangely, this attraction was not in my Florida guide. I was especially surprised after visiting the park. Because I really enjoyed it! We spent a few hours looking at exhibitions (about Ponce de Léon and about the natives), walking around the park, visiting the Planetarium and listening to all the stories about this historical site. We had a wonderful time and on top of that I got to take some good pictures.
