Dive Photos

Columbia Shallows

May 9, 2013 by Justin Balog 2 Comments

For the long time visitors here you know that I have a passion for SCUBA diving, and that passion manifests itself as encouraging others to do it! Trust me, you will fall in love with it instantly. SCUBA diving is the closest you will come to being an astronaut. Although, private space travel is making it easier. The cool thing about diving is you don’t have to go very deep to see really cool things. I shot this image around 15 feet. When you are diving at 15 feet, you can stay underwater for almost two hours, or as long as your air will last. Being weightless, surrounded by amazing creatures for that long is an experience you will never forget.

Also, I thought this image might make a cool desktop for the ocean fans out there. Just click it, then click the size you would like about the image, the set it as your desktop. I hope you enjoy it and it brightens your day!

Filed Under: Cozumel, Dive Photos, Mexico, Nikon AW100, Travel

Safety Stop

January 23, 2013 by Justin Balog 0 Comments

When you’re diving, you take a 3 minute safety stop 15 feet from the surface. The safety stop helps eliminate any excess nitrogen in your system. On the surface Nitrogen bubbles can expand in your body causing intense pain and possibly death. This is what we call ‘The Bends’. Nothing in the rule book says anything about taking your safety stop upside down. It’s totally legit…as my buddy Murph demonstrates here.

Free Webinar Announcement: Jan 29th

The good folks at NIK Software have invited me to share the magic of Snapseed in a special webinar that is free for all of you. This will be a very unique opportunity for all of us. I will be processing images fresh from this trip. It should be fun and I hope you to see you there.

YOU MUST REGISTER and it’s limited to 1000 participants!

Click Here To Register!

Free Snapseed Webinar

Filed Under: Cozumel, Dive Photos, Mexico, Nikon AW100, Travel

Big Jack

March 29, 2012 by Justin Balog 5 Comments

When you’re approaching a dive site, you will often have large schools of fish surrounding the boat. I’m not sure if they are looking for a free handout or curious about all the commotion. Either way, once you roll off the side of the boat and hit the water…you get real personal, real quick. They dart around from diver to diver checking everyone out. Once you start to drift, they seem to disappear. That’s not the case at all. These curious little guys will follow you for quite a while. If you have ever had an interest in scuba diving, I can’t encourage you enough to try it. Like I have said before, it’s as close as you will get to being an astronaut, unless of course you are an astronaut. Then I’d tell you it’s as close as you will get to experiencing life on another planet.

This photo was taken on the backside of the Molokini Crater off the coast of Maui.

Filed Under: Dive Photos, Hawaii, Maui

The Splendid Toad Fish

February 29, 2012 by Justin Balog 4 Comments

Splendid Toad Fish

I do my best to keep things interesting around here. Partly because I hope your visit here provides an adventure break in your day, and party to encourage you to try something new. As you might or might not know, I’m a fairly avid scuba diver. If you are new here, and missed our ‘Big Fish Story’ you can read it here. Diving is as close as you will ever get to being an astronaut. Unless of course you are an astronaut. I don’t carry much gear with me underwater, but enough to make few images every now and again. Today I thought I would share with you the Splendid Cozumel Toad Fish. Consider yourself lucky if you see one. According to my observations, they spend 100% of their time under rocks. This is as exposed as you will ever encounter one. The quirky thing about the Splendid Toad Fish is that it makes….you guessed it….a ribbit sounding noise underwater. It’s bizarre. The underwater world is pretty much totally silent. When that silence is broken at 100ft below the surface, by what you think is a toad, you start to look around.

….did you catch the ‘Leap Year’ theme? Toad…leap….I guess it was kind of reach.

Filed Under: Cozumel, Dive Photos, Mexico, Travel

A Fish Story

March 8, 2011 by Justin Balog 8 Comments

Last night I was catching up with a friend over at Nik Software. We touched on the normal topics of photography, but more importantly we swapped a few Cousteau stories. Apparently both he and Tony Corbell are divers and planning on getting back in the water. The story I told was about a recent wreck dive in Cozumel. We dove a 140ft ship who’s entrance was guarded by large green moray. Seriously, he was big and here are the photos to prove it!

Processing Note: To keep things in the Nik family, I used their new Nik Silver Efex Pro 2 to perform the B&W conversion. Don’t worry, Silver Efex Pro 2 is incredible, it’s my old noisy point and shoot that is lacking. I just can’t justify the cost of a housing for my terrestrial camera for 2 weeks of diving a year.

Nik Silver Efex Pro 2 has a cool new feature for selective color using their signature U-Point technology. Worked perfect on the green moray!

Note: Eels, although you don’t want to provoke them (or anything for that matter), are pretty mellow. Not much to worry about when you come across one. Just be psyched that you saw it, eels this big are pretty rare.