Photographer: © 2014-2016 Dave Waselle · All Rights Reserved.
Rose/Cup Coral | Maldives
It’s amazing how many divers don’t even notice these clusters of coral. They don’t cover the bottom but they can be found in most oceans and seas. They particularly prefer the bottom of the upper lip of cave entrances, taking advantage of currents which bring in and feed them the nutrients necessary for life support. This supports my theory of “shoot almost everything”, you never know what you going to see on the screen and it could be impressive.
This particular species have slightly longer tentacles than most. I have seen these literally lining the entire inside a lava tube underwater cave off the island of Lanai in Hawaii.
They work the same way a sea anemone does to get food. Anemones are large and capture and eat fish. These guys are small (about the size of a pencil eraser) and eat planktonic matter. They have stinging cells on there tentacles and ultimately pass the paralyzed food morsel to the mouth in the center for the days cuisine.
To capture a cluster like this, you need the larger area a 3:1 or 2:1 set-up would provide you. Or, if shooting digital, the distance equivalent. You want just one, use a 1:! or 1:2 set-up as I did when I shot the photo “Feed Me”.
