Wall Dives in Cabilao, Bohol, Philippines

I went to Bohol on November 7, 2014. Because I have dived around Balicasag Island near Panglao for three time, I decided to go to Cabilao Island which is located in the west of Bohol Island. I stayed at La Estrella Beach Resort with Cabilao Dive Center. I will share about the resort and the dive center later.

 

Day 1

1st dive

I arrived in Cabilao Island in the afternoon. I had nothing to do so decided to do one dive to check my gears. The dive site was Gorgonia Wall which is 5 minutes away from the beach by small banca. Like the name, it's a steep drop-off. We went down to 29 meters and the dive master found a pygmy seahorse on a sea fan. And it's also lucky that I shoot a yawning Scorpion Fish afterward. 

Day 2

2nd dive

We departed from the dive center at 8am and reached to the dive site named Fallen Tree after 15 minutes. It starts with the slope and changes into the wall in around 20 meters. The wall is covered by many soft and hard corals, however, I didn't see many big fish swimming in the coral reef. There are only two sanctuaries around Cabilao Island, and other areas are open for fishing. We swam back to shallow slope after 25 minutes dive time. DM found a big Hairy Squat Lobster, so I could take a clear shoot by my 14-42mm kit lens.

3rd dive

This dive was in Light House. I had more interest in this site before I went there, because according to the internet, this dive is for muck dive and the slope reaches to 20 meters deep. However, the muck dive here is different from Dauin because there are many corals scattering on the sandy seabed. During this dive, DM found two candy crabs as what I requested.

4th dive

The dive site is Germany Ave. which is 10 minutes away from the shore. It's also a wall dive. I didn't see something very special(or say I wasn't able to take some good pictures).

5th dive

This was a night dive in Night House. We stayed in the shallow sandy slope which maximum depth was 18 meters. Night dive is always more attractive to me, because not only can see some sleeping fishes, also can see some nocturnal creatures. The special stuffs we saw were Volute, Mantis Shrimp, Decorator Crab, and Reptile Snake Eel.

Day 3

6th dive

Another two divers joined our group on that day, and they requested to have wall dive. No problem! Most of the dives there are wall dives. I set my lens on 14mm and planned to take some pictures of the corals since it's a wall dive again . The dive site was Looc Pier. When I was waiting for another two divers to jump on the surface, I saw two Napoleon wrasses swimming next to the reef. The scene was so beautiful even though they were far away from me. We reached to 25 meters during this dive, and the visibility was not too good which was 15 to 20 meters.

7th dive

This dive was in Current View Point. DM said it's the place for searching Hammerhead Shark 20 years ago. Let me say it again, it's 20 years ago. There is a sandy flat area after the wall in the depth of 30 meters. We used the air tanks, so we just stayed in the flat for about 10 minutes and ascended to the shallower coral reef. Aside from some coral pictures, I didn't take too many during this dive. According the DM, the school of Jackfish or Barracuda shows up in this dive site sometimes.

8th dive

This dive in the afternoon was in Three Coco which was a wall dive as well. DM said he would find another Pygmy Seahorse, so we went down to 25 meters. He searched on couple of the sea fans but wasn't able to find one. During the dive, we saw a turtle swimming to the surface in distance. I felt my camera was so empty, so I took few shoots of Anemone Fish to finish the dive.

9th dive

This dive was a night dive in Fallen Tree. We only stayed in shallow area above 16 meters. We saw a decorator crab and a sea cucumber crab at the first, and my camera ran out the battery after 20 minutes. Haha~ And then, I saw Long Nose Shrimp, Cuttlefish, Sponge Crab, and more. What a pity!!

Day 4

10th dive

This morning we dove in Talisay Tree which is also a drop-off coral reef. The maximum depth of our dive was 30 meters. DM found a small cowrie on a red soft coral. It's very small and hard to be focused, so I applied manual focus to take this shoot.

11th dive

The dive was in Cambaquiz 1. This site starts with a long sandy slope. I expected to see something different from the coral reef, however, we only found a flounder. There is a small boat wreck in 20 meters. I felt there must be something unique and small in it. In fact, there was a big turtle resting in the boat. We see things bigger underwater, but I believe this one is about 2 meters long. It's kind of exciting to see a big guy unexpectedly. After the boat wreck, we ascended and met the coral reef. I took few more shoots and finished this dive.

12th dive

This night dive in Light House was my last dive of the trip. We also stayed in the slope above 18 meters. DM also guided us to the mantis shrimp for another diver. He said it was already there 5 years ago when he started to be a guide in Cabilao. Because of the encounter of that long nose shrimp last night, I was focusing on every reflection from creatures' eyes. Unluckily, I couldn't find one anymore. Some interesting stuffs I saw were Hydroid Decorator Crab, Stargazer, Reptile Snake Eel, and Hinge-beak Shrimp.

Conclusion

I didn't go to the sanctuaries during these 12 dives, so I don't know if there are a lot of big fishes(ex. Sweetlips, Batfish, Grouper). I feel there is no extremely unique stuff to see, however, the coral reef in Cabilao is nice. It might be a good choice if you enjoy wall diving and want to see beautiful corals. If you are a macro critters lover, you may need to go there in a right season. For your reference, April and May are the best according to the local dive master.

 

Why Double Strobes for Underwater Macro Photography

I have two strobes which are INON S2000 and Sea & Sea YS-D1, however, I had never used both of them at the same time. The main reason was there is only one hole on 10 Bar GF1 Housing for fiber optical cable. Eventually, I bought a Double Hole Rubber Bush Set from FUN-IN. 

Actually, it's just an adapter for two fiber optical cables attached on the original hole of the housing by 3M double-sided tape. It's very simple but I know I am too clumsy to make one by myself. Why not just buy one?! Anyway, the set matches to my housing is just USD6.

Why use double strobes for UW macro photography? The following two reasons are my humble opinions about it:

1. Reduce shadow

It's very easy to create shadow when we use only one source of lighting, like the picture shows below. I don't mean shadow is totally wrong or bad for the UW pictures. Shadow can bring more contrast and stereoscopic, however, many details will be lost in shadow.

Last time, I used double strobes to take the pictures of Porcelain Crab. As what we see below, there is less shadow on the subject and the picture is softer.

2. Various Strobe positioning

To avoid the shadow problem I mentioned above, I usually place my strobe on the top of the lens when I use single one. But sometime, the strobe can't illuminate the objects under rocks or corals like the picture below. I don't like to change the position of the strobe too much underwater, so I usually give up taking these kinds of pictures.

There are many ways to position strobes. I use the basic way which is placing two strobes on the two sides of the lens and toward to the center. Thus, I can light up the objects under rocks or corals and reduce shadow at the same time.

The following pictures were taken by double strobes. Whenever I had the difficulty to focus, I also used the Manual Focusing way I shared before.

Remark:
After testing the strobe, I attached the Bush Set by the instant glue to avoid it falls underwater.

MANUAL Focus with Mirrorless Camera

Out of focus

Out of focus

Out of focus again

Out of focus again and again!!!

Can't focus underwater by auto mode, why not try MANUAL FOCUS?

I believe many divers who use mirrorless cameras and newly started to take macro pictures have the difficulty to focus on subjects. Using a mirrorless camera without a viewfinder, we have to take pictures by LCD monitor. This is one of the disadvantages of using mirrorless because it consumes battery faster. However, I take it as an advantage because it makes me apply manual focusing more easily.

I went diving couple of weeks ago and practiced manual focusing with my Panasonic GF1. The picture below doesn't show clearly what the subject was, but it's a good example of manual focusing. Actually it's a crab hiding in a hard coral. If I used auto focus, I believe it would have focused on the coral, not the crab. In other words, it's easier to focus on your desired spot by manual if that subject is not the closest object to your camera.

I am not talking about adjusting the focus ring, but moving my camera forward or backward to the subject a little bit to change the focus zone. Because of using the LCD monitor to take pictures, I can see the changes easily when I move the camera. The better targets for practicing this method are the creatures not moving a lot, like the small conch below.

I also took some pictures of Anemone Fish by this manual focus way. Even though Anemone Fish don't stay still, they usually don't swim far away from the anemone they live. Besides, some of the individuals have the behavior to demonstrate to the objects near them. So I placed the focus point at one random spot and kept looking at the monitor. When I felt the fish was going to fall in the focus area, I pressed the shutter bottom immediately (remark 1). Honestly, the fish was out of the focus most of the time because the focus zone is not so wide while taking macro pictures. Thus, I took one or two more shoots right after the first one as long the recharging of my strobe was fast enough (remark 2).

Indeed, it's a little difficult to take pictures by manual focusing because our eyes are not sharp as machines. Sometime I thought the shoot was vivid when I checked the camera monitor underwater, but actually it's out of the focus when I checked it on a computer monitor. For example, I was supposed to focus on the Goby on the left shows on the picture below, but turned out the eye of the Goby on the right is much more clear.

But It's alright! It's not possible to stay still underwater even though there is no current at all. Just take few more shoots and maybe we will have some good pictures. Sometime, wonderful UW pictures came out by good lucks, right? Moreover, I suggest not to set aperture too big when you practice this manual way in the beginning to avoid your subjects are easily out of focus like the Squad Lobster I took shows below.

The followings are also the pictures I took while practicing manual focus. Yes! The pictures I share are all edited and sharpened. However, I won't have too much room for editing if the basic qualities of these shoots are too terrible, isn't it?

Remark 1:

Some cameras don't release shutters if objects are out of focus. When using Manual Focus Mode, users can still press shutter bottoms even no object is focused.

Remark 2:

Strobes are usually connected by optical fiber cables and triggered by inner flashes while using mirrorless cameras. Unless you use big GN, recharge time of strobe usually is faster than inner flash. Thus, strobe can be triggered again right after the frist shoot as long inner flash is recharged. In order to have faster recharge time of the inner flash of my camera, I set the Flash Adjust as low as possible(GF1 is -2EV). After all, the purpose of inner flash is just triggering strobe, not lighting up subjects.