National Wildlife Photo Contest Winner
The National Wildlife photo contest is the only one of the “big three”** in which I have not had any luck — until now. After taking a hiatus from contests for about 8 years, something possessed me to enter this year. Lo-and-behold the image below caught the judges’ notice and won first place in the professional division of “Connecting People and Nature”, and is featured along with 17 other super images in the December/January 2010 issue of National Wildlife magazine.
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| Mesa Arch, Utah. An exuberant hiker greets the dawning sun from atop Mesa Arch. Image ID: 18036 Location: Island in the Sky, Canyonlands National Park, Utah, USA  View this Image in Google Earth! |
This is a self portrait. I was alone this morning at Mesa Arch in Canyonlands National Park. It was a cold but clear January morning with some snow on the ground. I used a Canon 1Ds Mark II camera and 15mm fisheye lens. I put the camera on timer, quickly walked up on the arch, raised my hands the way I do when my daughter scores a goal, and click. The view from atop the arch, looking down the wall to the canyon below, was exhilirating.
**The “big three” photo contests, at least for wildlife, outdoor and nature photographers, are the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, the Nature’s Best photography contest and the National Wildlife photo contest. For ocean-oriented photographers, Nature’s Best also sponsors the Ocean Views contest.
Note: Performed by a trained professional stunt photographer. Do not try this at home. Photography is an inherently dangerous and frustrating pursuit. You can and will die photographing landscapes.
Photoshelter’s Featured Photographers for September 2009
Cool: I was selected as one of Photoshelter’s Featured Photographers for September 2009. For those of you that aren’t photographers or don’t yet know about Photoshelter: Photoshelter is the leading photo-hosting service for pro and serious amateur photographers. I’ve had a personal website for many years, and it does well as far as visibility and search engine ranking goes. But I finally decided Photoshelter has some features I’ll just never figure out how to add to my own site. Plus Photoshelter has some very good search engine presence, in fact it is one of the features they stress most highly. So a few months ago I started an account with them and have slowly been adding my natural history stock photography to my Photoshelter site.
I just learned that I am one of Photoshelter’s 20 Featured Photographers for September 2009. Photoshelter choose one of my wave photos to add to the Featured Photographer slideshow. Check out all of the images, there is some real talent represented in this group and I am glad to be included. I like Brian Cleary’s in-your-face photo of a dog biting a toy the best:
Zoology Cover
One of my hammerhead shark photos was chosen for the cover of Zoology to accompany the article “Response of juvenile scalloped hammerhead sharks to electric stimuli” by Stephen Kajiura and Timothy Fitzgerald.
Hammerhead shark photo copyright Phillip Colla / Oceanlight.com
See lots more scalloped hammerhead photos (Sphyrna lewini).
Great White Shark Photo on NG Channel
The National Geographic Channel recently produced the television documentary “Great White Odyssey”, and choose one of my great white shark photos (Carcharodon carcharias) to use as the main background to the web page publicizing the program. Here is a link to NG Channel’s page for the Great White Odyssey. The original image was made in September 2008 at Guadalupe Island, Mexico aboard my favorite dive and adventure boat, the Horizon out of San Diego.
I was fortunate to have another credit for the National Geographic Society (in the magazine) recently.
Background image by Phillip Colla, great white shark at Guadalupe Island, Mexico
Blue Whale Photo in National Geographic Magazine
I am very fortunate to have one of my blue whale photos (Balaenoptera musculus) appear in the March 2009 issue of National Geographic Magazine. It is an image of a whale’s dorsal ridge and fluke, taken underwater, in the “Inside Geographic” section near the end of the magazine which describes an upcoming NG television special about blue whales and the researchers who study them. It is related to the excellent article on blue whales appearing earlier in the same issue, written by Kenneth Brower and beautifully photographed by the world’s foremost whale photographer, Flip Nicklin.
Blue whale, National Geographic Magazine, March 2009, copyright Phillip Colla
Marine Mammal Commission 2007 Annual Report to Congress
Each year, the Marine Mammal Commission prepares its annual report to the United States Congress. For the 2007 edition of the report, which is the most recent, all of the photos on the front and back cover are mine.
When the report was presented at a special Joint Session of Congress, the entire Senate burst into immediate thundering applause while several top-ranking members of the House were seen high-fivin’ in the aisles!
OK, that last part is a lie.
Seriously though, this is one of the most solemn, and inside the beltway at least, one of the most noteworthy publication credits I have had.
 Cover of Marine Mammal Commission 2007 Annual Report to Congress |
Pictured on the cover are three images of blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) and a single image of a Northern fur seal (Callorhinus ursinus).
The Coronados Islands, Their History and Environment
Yesterday a copy of the new book, The Coronados Islands, Their History and Environment (Las Islas Coronados, una Historia y un Entorno Natural) arrived in our mailbox. It is very well done, the best treatment of the Coronado Islands (Las Islas Coronados) I have yet seen. Although I was contacted by the editors of the book for images related to the ecology and animal life at the Coronado Islands a couple of years ago, yesterday was the first time I had a chance to actually see the publication, which is printed in both Spanish and English with high quality printing and binding.
The book has some history. In 2003, Chevron proposed installing a $650 million liquified natural gas receiving terminal near the Coronado Islands, which are only about 8.5 miles from the Tijuana coast and just a 1-2 hour boat ride from San Diego. The book is derived from a large body of data that was collected during the permit process and includes interesting material about the history and ecology of the islands along with many photographs. Chevron received approval for the project but ultimately withdrew for economic reasons. Fortunately, the book was still produced and is now a publicly accessible distillation of all that research data. It is being distributed at no cost to many educational institutions in Mexico.
Check out the cover. The top photo showing all three islands was made by Alfonso Caraveo Castro, who contributed most of the images in the book. The middle photo, of fishes swimming in a kelp forest, and bottom photo, of a huge blue whale raising its fluke out of the water before diving, are mine.
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Tidelines Calendar 2008
This year’s edition of the Tidelines calendar is especially nice because one of our photos appears on the cover (duh). Can you guess where it was shot? Hint: it rhymes with “ledge” and lots of bones are broken there. Order your Tidelines calendar now so you too can time all your ocean functions to take maximum advantage of the tide. By the way, a big swell arrives tomorrow, if you have a Tidelines calendar on your wall you’ll know when to go.
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Surfline : West Coast Wonderland
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 33° 5' 11.82" N, Longitude: 117° 18' 54.34" W, Coord: 33.086617°, -117.3151°
Filed under: Surf, Tear Sheets on 12/18/2006
Surfline picked up my shot of Carson Smith getting barreled at Ponto for their latest slide show about the swell that hit last week.
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| Carson Smith, Ponto, South Carlsbad, morning surf. Ponto, Carlsbad, California, USA. Image: 17828 Location: Ponto, Carlsbad, California, USA View this Image in Google Earth! |
Blue Whale Photo in BBC Wildlife
BBC Wildlife is the finest wildlife magazine in the UK and Europe, and one in which I have enjoyed seeing my images occasionally appear. The November 2006 issue has a nice article about blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus), authored by Anna McKibbin, leading with a two-page spread of a shot I took some years ago while flying over the ocean in a small plane.
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See also:
blue whale photos, Balaenoptera musculus photos, blue whale aerial photos.
Surfline : Rocktober
View this blog entry in Google EarthLatitude: 33° 4' 59.37" N, Longitude: 117° 18' 47.09" W, Coord: 33.083161°, -117.31308°
Filed under: Surf, Tear Sheets on 11/2/2006
Surfline picked up a shot of mine for today’s ROCKTOBER slideshow, check this page out.
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| Breaking wave, Ponto, South Carlsbad. Ponto, Carlsbad, California, USA. Image: 17679 Location: Ponto, Carlsbad, California, USA View this Image in Google Earth! |
Nurse Log Photo
A “nurse log” is a tree that has fallen and, in the process of decay and rotting away, provides nutrients and a substrate for other plants, including seedling trees, to root and grow. Eventually these plants overwhelm the nurse log which rots away and is completely replaced by the new growth. This photo of a nurse log in Olympic National Park, near Sol Duc Falls, was recently selected for use in a permanent exhibit at the Oregon Zoo to illustrate Pacific Northwest temperate rainforest natural history.
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Wonders of America Stamps — Redwood Photo
One of our redwood tree photos was used as reference for the redwood tree stamp appearing as part of the United States Postal Service’s new commemorative issue Wonders of America :: Land of Superlatives. Released on May 27th, 2006, this stamp pane features 40 natural and man-made wonders of the United States. These remarkable places, plants, animals, and structures were selected from every region of the country. The stamp art is by Lonnie Busch, who illustrated the 50 GREETINGS FROM AMERICA stamps in 2002. On the front of each stamp, in large letters, are words that describe the superlative nature of a particular place or thing. Smaller type gives the name or location of the featured wonder. Text on the back of each stamp provides relevant statistics and other interesting information.
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Sport Diver Cover
Our photograph of an ocean sunfish alongside drift kelp appeared on the June 2003 cover of Sport Diver magazine:
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Keywords: Mola mola, ocean sunfish photos.
Freediving and Spearfishing Cover
Our photograph of expert freediver, spearfisherman, long range boat captain and all-around-good-guy Chris Thompson was taken at Guadalupe Island in July 2001 shortly after he speared his ginormous yellowfin tuna (not his first mind you). It then appeared on the Summer 2002 cover of the International Freediving and Spearfishing News:
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Journal of Morphology Cover
Still another academic journal cover — too bad these guys don’t pay the big bucks.
Our photograph of a scalloped hammerhead shark appeared on the June 2005 cover of the Journal of Morphology, to accompany Olfactory Morphology of Carcharhinid and Sphyrnid Sharks: Does the Cephalofoil Confer a Sensory Advantage? (Kajiura, Forni and Summers):
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Biological Sciences Cover
Here’s another “scientific journal” cover, we’ve had a few of these in the last three years. Our photograph of schooling jacks in the Sea of Cortez appeared on the cover of the January 2006 issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society: Biological Sciences to accompany The principles of collective animal behavior (Sumpter):
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Baja California to the Bering Sea Cover
Our photograph of a schooling jacks in the Sea of Cortez appeared on the cover of Baja California to the Bering Sea, a report on marine priority conservation areas issued by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation of North America and the Marine Conservation Biology Institute (Morgan, Maxwell, Tsao, Wilkinson and Etnoyer):
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All Animals Cover
Our photograph of a neonate gray whale calf underwater near the Monterey Peninsula appeared on the Summer 2002 cover of the All Animals magazine, the official publication of the Humane Society of the United States:
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Ecology Letters Cover
In addition to the cover of Nature a few years ago, we’ve had interest from other scientific and peer-reviewed journals recently. Our photograph of a scalloped hammerhead shark appeared on the October 2005 cover of Ecology Letters, to accompany Direct and indirect fishery effects on small coastal elasmobranchs in the northern Gulf of Mexico (Shepherd and Myers):
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Updated: March 20, 2010
