Winners of the Ocean Photography Awards 2021 are announced, with Aimee Jan bagging the highest honour for her image of a Chelonia mydas surrounded by glass fish. “I was out snorkelling when during a ll|one amongst|one in every of”> one among my colleagues told me there was a turtle under a ledge in a school of glass fish, about 10 metres down,” Ms Jan said of her image, taken in Australia. “When I dived right down to look, the fish separated round the turtle perfectly. I said to her: ‘I think I just took the simplest photo I even have ever taken’.” Aimee Jan was named Ocean Photographer of the Year.
Besides Ocean Photographer of the Year, there have been seven other awards within the competition. Henley Spiers took home the second prize for her picture of seabirds, while the third place visited Matty Smith for his stunning shot of a turtle hatchling. The winners are on display as a part of an exhibition in London, UK.
Diving in amidst the barrage of gannets, I witness the violent synchronicity of those impressive seabirds as they start fishing dives,” said photographer Henley Spiers. “They hit the water at 60mph, an impression they will only withstand because of specially evolved air sacs within the head and chest. The bird’s agility transfers from air to sea where it also swims with incredible speed.”
A hawksbill hatchling just 3.5cm long and a couple of minutes old takes its first swim in Matty Smith’s photograph. “It had emerged from an egg just minutes earlier with approximately 100 of its siblings. They quickly made their way into the ocean to disperse as rapidly as they might and avoid predation from birds and fish. I had to figure quickly for this shot,” the photographer revealed.
Ben Thouard won the Ocean Adventure Photographer of the Year prize for his shot of a surfer catching a wave referred to as Teahupo’o in Tahiti.
The title of Ocean Conservation Photographer of the Year visited Kerim Sabuncuoglu for an image of a dead moray on an abandoned cord in Turkey.
Galice Hoarau won second place within the Conservation category for a photograph of a gull caught on a ghost cord .
Martin Broen’s hypnotic shot of Speleothems casting long shadows at cenote Dos Pisos won him Exploration Photographer of the Year.
Steven Kovacs photographed a rare trouble cusk eel larva to require home the second prize.
The Female Fifty Fathoms Award was won by Renee Capozzola. A lone blacktip reef shark lines up its fin with the setting sun in Moorea, French Polynesia . “This over-under image was achieved by employing a fisheye lens , an outsized dome port and strobe flash to illuminate the underwater portion of the image ,” she said.
Meanwhile, Hannah Le Leu was named Young Ocean Photographer of the Year. “A green marine turtle hatchling cautiously surfaces for air, to a sky filled with hungry birds,” is how she described her photo.
