Fishies fishies

I have just started editing underwater shots, so bear with me, but I thought I would throw in a few for those who are asking. You have no idea how difficult underwater photography is--NO idea. Not only are fish fast, light is dispersed at an amazing rate underwater--if you get past 20 feet or so, the sunlight does nothing for your photo, and flash is pretty useless unless you are within 4 feet of the subject. Since it was overcast most of our trip, even the shallow pics are pretty dark as we did not have sun to light it up. If you are shooting at 10-20 feet below the surface but there is no ground directly before (going down 60-10000s of feet below you), first of all, you will not see much, but there is nothing for the sun to bounce off of to help light your shot. Any use of flash highlight backscatter, or gunk in the water, of which there was plenty since the tropical storm had just gone through.

In normal circumstances in this area of Belize, 70-100 feet of visibility is the norm, but the most we ever had was 50 and it was not good visibility.

So I give you just a few of the shots I have started on--hang tight for more over the next few days as I get caught up
This is a monster of some sort. I have no idea, as I did not take this picture. Look at dude's speckled legs though--pretty neat huh?
I honestly do not know what this dude is. I was going to say Grouper, but I am not so sure looking at him now. I do have some great grouper pics though, if this is not one.
These are crabs. Or one crab from different angles--hard to say, since we are not best friends are anything--they all look alike to me (except when they are blue and chasing me across a parking lot that is)

This is a Rock Beauty fish--for some reason, I like them. I think it is the bright colors, plus they are kind of a pretty shape. This is an adult. Juvenile rock beauties are mostly yellow with a black dot near their back end, which then takes over the whole middle of their body. I see them at virtually every dive site, but I still like them a lot.