Tonga - Swimming with Whales - Photos
Aurora_b
Mike and Liz Downing
Wed 15 Dec 2010 08:49
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It's taken a little while to process the pictures. We used a
standard digital camera in an underwater housing. It's good for taking close up
pictures underwater with lots of light, but if there is any distance from the
camera to the subject, it loses the colour and it all comes out blue. The
problem with taking pictures of whales is that being just a little on the big
side, you have to keep your distance to get enough of it in to be
recognizable. Also, being just a little on the big side, you don't want to get
so close that you can't get out of it's way! So the pictures
are all a little blue. Luckily with our masks on we could see the true
colours. The whales are Humpback - mother and calf.
 Eye to eye with mum!
 The calf twisting and turning - it
seemed keen on aquabatics, showing off what it could
do.
   Mum and calf surfacing
together.
 Breathing out before reaching the surface - the
white marks in the middle are air bubbles.
  The calf's tail
  Mum's tail
 Mum resting on the bottom while the calf plays
above her.
    Top right - the fins of one of the 2
other swimmers allowed in the water, Liz and I being the other two
(there being a maximum of 4 at any one
time).
    Mum comes to the
surface
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