2nd Place Macro

Sayaka Ichinoseki

"Baby Anglerfish"

Sayaka Ichinoseki won a gift certificate from Bluewater Photo and Bluewater Travel.

The Story: For the past two years, I've been fascinated in the underwater world of Hokkaido. I visited there last summer. When I jumped in the water, I immediately found a lot of baby angler fish... I was wondering if there must be nearby mature embryos. I found there was a 2 square meter of sheet-shaped eggs with each just 2mm in size. It was extremely tough to photograph them as the babies moved and rotated in the eggs and the entire sheet of eggs shook in sync with the tide. It took a total of 4 hours to shoot as I kept in perfect synchronizing with the tide. After hatching, they should grow up through the planktonic stage of life and will set out for the deep sea while changing shape significantly.

Location:  Hokkaido Shakotan Peninsula, Bikuni, Japan

Equipment Used: Canon 7D Mark II, Canon 100mm EF F2.8L Macro Lens, Zillion Housing, Nauticam SMC-1 Wet Lens, Dual YS-D2 Strobes

Camera Settings: 1/125, F25, ISO 1600

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