Turtle Leap and Ladyfingers

I finally slept in until a decent hour.  Which is fine because I didn’t think I had too many nudis to go through from yesterday… but I still did pretty well.

I got a nice email back from Bluewater Photo.  The support technician didn’t have any earthshattering ideas to help me, but I felt like at least I tried.  Now I need to figure out if I try to get a new Olympus E-M10 camera body or if I just go for it and get a new setup.

We had Ladyfingers for lunch.  To me that means a kind of cookie/pastry.  Here Ladyfingers mean okra!  And they made them in a spicy way.  They were very good.

Erap was back today for the first three dives.  Bobby is our guide for the night dive.

We saw a turtle on our first dive which is pretty rare for the Philippines.  Erap was scared when I pointed it out because it was so big.

On the third dive my camera behaved pretty well.  I think the flash didn’t fire only once.  That is wild.  Why?!?!?!?

I photographed a shrimp that goes yellow with f-stop change.

F-Stop 7.1:

F-Stop 6.3:

F-Stop 5.6:

F-Stop 5.0:

This is probably one of the most dramatic series of F-Stop images I've taken!

Nudis today slowed down…

134 - Tenellia melanobrachia

135 - Phyllidiella pustulosa

136 - Goniobranchus fidelis

137 - Phyllidia coelestis

138 - Liloa mongii

 

Cuttlefish Pop

I’m feeling so bummed that I can’t be as into my photography as I want to.  I need to make it through this trip without falling apart and then decide for the next trip if I want to try to get another camera body or if I scrap it and get a whole new setup.

Uh oh, Erap has some congestion.  He still led the first two dives but is not going to guide the afternoon/evening dives.  Since Shen, the Chinese diver wants to go on these dives too, they are going to find a different guide (same boat).

My green Tevas are falling apart.  They are really old so I don’t mind… but I want them to hold together until I am done diving in Anilao.

Bobby was my guide for the afternoon and evening dives.  He found some squid (his words - I actually think they were cuttlefish) still in their eggs and I got to see one hatch!  Of course, I wasn’t ready with my camera so I missed it!  I did get some video of the seconds old newborn cuttlefish and the egg casing.

And Bobby showed me another one with the cuttlefish still in it.

Here’s the list…

123 - Okenia liklik

124 - Phyllidiopsis fissurata

125 - Hypselodoris decorata

126 - Tenellia sp. 11

127 - Goniobranchus leopardus

128 - Phyllidiella annulata

129 - Phestilla minor

130 - Phyllidiopsis pipeki

131 - Pleurobranchus peronii

It was so big and there were too many bugs in the water, so I did an artsy shot of just the rhinophores.

132 - Pleurobranchus forskalii

It was so big and there were too many bugs in the water, so I did an artsy shot of just the rhinophores.

133 - Elysia sp. 24

Camera Swap

They had fried banana for breakfast today.  OMG. It is sooooo good!!!  My favorite here in the Philippines.  I stole a couple for an afternoon snack.

Kati joined me for breakfast.  She is thinking about joining me for the night dive.  Yay!  We talked nudibranchs for a bit. 

There is a group of young Thai divers here now.  And also a female Chinese diver traveling alone.

OK, so it happened.  The whole blackout thing with the camera is driving me insane.  I need to try to fix it.  I came up with a whole list of options on my dive on what to do.  Then I messaged Mike to get some camera counseling.  He sent me this link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7jXUBl41LU

It sounds like it will fix the EXACT problem I am having.

I tried it and then rest all my basic stuff… let’s see if this works on the third dive.  There is another female diver with us from China traveling alone.

It didn’t work.

That’s it.  I am switching back to the other camera body.  That one has an issue with the flash, but maybe it won’t rear its ugly head.

No dice.  The other camera works, it just often doesn’t fire the flash and therefore the strobes do not go off.  No rhyme or reason why.  Ugh.  I wonder if THAT can be fixed by the hard reboot.  I will try.

Kati did not join me on the night dive.  

I did a little Pros/Cons list to figure out which broken camera to carry.  I cannot believe it has come to this.

Camera                 Problem                                 Pros                                                     Cons

Camera PAM #1 Blackout happens frequently Don’t have to scrap all the dark photo     Left thumb has to go off/on to reset and Last setting doesn’t seem to save

Camera PAM #2 Flash doesn’t always go off Don’t have to manually change anything   When editing have to delete a ton of dark photos

For now, I'm carrying #2.

OMG.  I feel like I am in an abusive relationship with my camera(s).  I get the shot all set up perfectly and then it doesn’t fire.  WTF?

The list

109 - Chromodoris strigata

110 - Phyllidia sp. 2

111 - Phyllidia elegans

112 - Phyllidiella lizae

113 - Jorunna sp. 6

114 - Elysia sp.

115 - Hypselodoris skyleri

116 - Chromodoris cf. strigata

117 - Jorunna sp. 9

118 - Coryphellina sp.

119 - Odontoglaja guamensis

120 - Nembrotha cf. sp. 5

121 - Marionia sp. 4

1

22 - Aplysia parvula (brown)

Three's Company

It seems so quiet here now that the group of Japanese divers have left.  Piera collects sand from all the places she has traveled.  She went on a mission to find some but all she found was mud.  So, she asked me to bring her back some from the dive this morning.  She gave me a little container but I asked Erap to collect and carry it.  We even did the dive site called Sandy Slope.  So when we got back I told her it was fresh sand from Sandy Slope.  She was so excited to have it and she gave me some of her leftover nescafe coffee in return.

The morning dives were ok.  There were four of us.  The other three were from Switzerland.  I got few new ones, but not too many.

There were seven yachts moored up in the area.  I wonder what was going on there.

I took a nap right after lunch and wasn’t really feeling it, but I pulled myself together and went.  I am so glad I did.

The afternoon dive was at Bang-on 1.  Erap calls it Bang-on 1, The Only.  Yes.  It did not disappoint.  He found two Melibe colemani and one Melibe engeli.  He helped me set up my shots and I adjusted my strobe and f-stop.  I am getting more willing to try different settings.  I also got many new big nudis that I did not have on my list yet.  Whoa.  I would go back to this dive site any day.

My camera did do the blackout thing several times on the dive but it still seems that turning the camera off and back on seems to do the trick.

On the night dive (Bang-on 3), we saw the biggest Marionia ever.  Whoa, was I blown away!

I also found a new-to-me nudi.  The Goniobranchus rubrocornutus.  The Corn Nut Nudi!  Yes, please!

Oh yeah, we also found THREE pygmy seahorses together... they are infamous for not looking at the camera.  This was the best I could do.

The species count keeps growing.

87 - Godiva sp. 2

88 - Dermatobranchus sp. 8

89 - Pteraeolidia semperi

90 - Phyllodesmium rudmani

91 - Atagema sp. 2

92 - Coriocella hibyae

93 - Favorinus tsuruganus

94 - Chromodoris magnifica

95 - Chromodoris sp. 7

96 - Tenellia sp. 71

97 - Murphydoris cf. maracabranchia

98 - Phylldia cf. ocellata

99 - Phyllodesmium jakobsenae

100 - Trapania palmula

101 - Phyllodesmium poindimiei

102 - Tritonopsis alba

103 - Goniobranchus rufomaculatus

104 - Marionia arborescens

105 - Goniobranchus rubrocornutus

This is the Corn Nut Nudi!

106 - Marionia sp. 2

107 - Pleurobranchus grandis

108 - Phyllodesmium magnum