Brian Skerry Appreciation Post

One of the catalysts for my ocean friendly movements was seeing sharks in South Africa. Another was discovering the photographer Brian Skerry. He would crop up on my insta-feed, when National Geographic would share his wonderful shark photos. The captions were always about how we should be respecting these magnificent creatures and adjust the fear mongering narrative we've associated with them. Naturally I followed his account and got major heart eyes over all the underwater photography showcased.

So don't expect there to be any actual content to this post, it is literally going to be: "Look at this picture 😍"

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This is a photo of a Mako Shark, taken off the coast of New Zealand. I really like this picture because you can feel the motion of the Mako, one of the fastest fish in the sea. Despite being a static image, it manages to create the feeling of movement. The only time I create movement in my photos is when they are blurry! (But then again, I am not an award winning underwater photographer.) And just imagine how incredible it felt getting this close and capturing this image. I reckon there is a fish just off shot.

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This is a North Atlantic Right Whale, flipping its tail to the sunset. I love the colouring of this image, it's very warm when ocean photographs often feel cold. I actually love the image of whales diving and flipping their tale. I have a vague memory of someone having a similar picture at the top of their stairs - I used to love looking at the freeze frame of such a majestic movement. I need to get one for my house.

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This is a Harp Seal off the coast of Canada. I think this picture is accidentally hilarious, because of the seal's face. It's so deadpan! But this post was addressing how climate change is affecting their breeding season and how melting ice is dropping unprepared pups into the water. The more we address these issues, the more likely someone is to listen. So it gets a "Yas Queeeennn!" from me. (Along with a giggle at the seal's expression.)

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I think my favourite thing about this picture of a Black Tip Reef Shark swimming about the Millennium Atoll is how calm the image is. It's easy to show a picture of sharks which are all teeth and foaming water, because that is what we expect. It is the common media representation because of course sharks are killing, eating machines. Except they are not. And this image of one chilling in the near the islands in the Central South Pacific ocean is just perfect. 

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Yes, I bought his book. It was a present to myself for getting a new job a couple years back. So I don't even have to log onto the Internet to go all 😍😍. And it's not just amazing pictures, either. They are coupled with essays on how sharks are awesome not scary, by Skerry himself and others. It's a great coffee table book, to dip into with a brew. In fact, that might be how I spend the rest of my afternoon!

I hope you liked the pictures and that you check out more of Brian's Skerry's stuff.

Bonus Fact: Brian Skerry took the first underwater picture of a US president. The website didn't specify which!

Which underwater photographers do you like? Who else should I be checking out? (Read: insta-stalking.) Lemme know below!

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Listening to: This is: DNCE