You
I'm fortunate enough to have been able to spend the last 30 years of my life
capturing and sharing the marine environments of the world.
Of all the things I've photographed in my life, I enjoy photographing the ocean the most.
It's my love, it's my passion, the creatures within it, the way the light falls in the sea.
You know, to be able to capture that and to show people what can be achieved
with photography under the water is one of the things I really love to do.
I've been in the water with people that have seen whales for the first time
and their mask has been filling up with tears.
It's been that powerful experience.
You know, every swim with a whale is different
and I'm still in awe of their power and their grace
and their acceptance of me when I'm in the water
and what they offer up in terms of photographic opportunities.
From a young age I've wanted to do exactly what I'm doing now.
Every time I get in the water I just remember how lucky I am.
I've been shooting with Canon since 1986.
The thing about camera equipment is I need my hands to fall in the right place
and I need to know that my gear is going to be reliable
and I've never had a reason to use anything but Canon.
This is the first season for me shooting with the 1DX in Tonga
and that has been a fantastic experience.
That camera is so responsive.
It's great in low light.
I used to just watch pictures disappear in front of me in the dark
but now I can photograph in what seems like total darkness
and still produce images that wouldn't have been seen before.
So I'm putting so much effort into the capture of my images,
using the best gear I can.
It's important then to transition that into final print.
I feel a photograph isn't really complete until it's been printed.
It is the final expression of what my vision was when I took the picture.
The machines that I'm printing on now, the Canon Large Format printers
and the Pixma Pro range, really give me the best prints that I've ever had.
And every time a print comes off the machine, it makes me so happy.
When I exhibit, I'm trying to show images of the moments that are most important to me,
the ones that touched me,
the ones that I feel are the most descriptive of the experience that I have when I'm under the sea.
Whether it's a heat run of 8 or 10 animals dancing in the beautiful sun rays
or intimate mum and calf interaction,
being able to share some of these intimate moments with these animals is a real privilege.
Every photographer wants their work in a book
and short run books are no longer a compromising quality thanks to the DreamLarvo.
It's an amazing print device as good as any large formatting chip printer.
So the vision of the original photographs can be delivered on the printed page now.
After 27 years shooting Canon, it's an integral part of my photography
and the point at which I am with my career.
So that journey now is just getting better and better.
Imagine swimming from the boat over a bottomless sea,
shafts of light dancing through the water
and then the lip of a cave which opens up into a huge cabin the size of a cathedral.
It's like another world and it's the sort of place that you can photograph
for hours and hours and hours as the light transitions.
Time just disappears, you're just in there, you're photographing,
everything's changing before you and you just don't want to leave.
If you picture in your mind what a Pacific paradise would be,
Tonga is it.
The water there can be crystal clear,
there's a visibility like I've never seen in the ocean anywhere else.
The thing about the sea is that it's usually pretty silent.
So to have the sea full of whale song is like nothing else,
there's no other experience that I can think of that's like it.
It vibrates through your body, literally you can feel the sound.
It's probably one of the most poignant experiences you can have in the ocean.
The best encounters with whales are the ones where they're interested and curious
about the swimmers in the water and they'll come right up, look you in the eye
and that's quite a profound moment when a whale looks you in the eye.
It's like no other feeling that I've ever had before.
If you've got a passion for photography, there's no reason why you can't make it your life.
It's a fulfilling career, it gives you so much.
You just need dedication and you need persistence.
Even after 30 years of seeing these amazing creatures in the ocean,
sometimes I still have to remember to take pictures because I'm too busy
being in awe of what's going on in front of me.
I can't imagine a time where I would stop doing this.
As long as I'm fit and able to be in the water, keeping up with whales, I will be.
I can't see any reason why you would want to stop.
