Daniel Sly, Pygmy Pipehorse Portraits (ANIMAL 2024)

The Sydney Pygmy Pipehorse is an endemic species of syngnathidae that is found only within the waters surrounding Sydney. These cryptic creatures can be incredibly difficulty to find due to their excellent camouflaging abilities, they typically inhabit algae encrusted rocks on the sea floor. In this series I have utilised a narrow beam of light to illuminate these amazing creatures whilst panning the camera with a open shutter. The strobe light freezes the subject in place whilst the camera movement creates an ambient blue water background.

Images have been resized for web display, which may cause some loss of image quality. Note: Original high-resolution images are used for judging.