German director Florian Fischer, 40, discovered diving at the age of 18, while on a trip in Egypt. Today, he describes diving as his favorite creative playground. « For me, diving is linked to creativity. I like diving but I’m not the typical diver who enjoys just to be there. I need my camera because I always have some visual ideas. » Florian evolved from being a graphic design working in the advertising world to a documentary filmmaker documenting the civil war in Burma to an independent filmmaker. Guided by his creative instincts, Florian co-founded Behind the Mask six years ago in order to shine a light on the beauty of nature and the ocean. « Dealing with conservation with a clear conservation message is important, but we figured out how we could raise awareness differently, » he explains. « Today, we document the beauty of the ocean to bring people want to save it. »

Behind the Mask’s films and stories are loaded with authenticity. Drawing from his experience as a creative mind in a narrow world that didn’t suit him, Florian believes that nothing beats telling true stories with guts. « It’s not about me, it’s not about a production company, it’s more about a community. At the end of the day, we portray authentic feelings. And there is no other way to do it than actually feel these emotions. » Similar to French freediver Guillaume Néry and underwater & wildlife photographer Greg Lecoeur, Florian is surrounded by a global network of creative nature enthusiasts. This community being the masterpiece of his work.

Avoiding compromises, looking for beauty, the collective constantly dives deep in the seven seas. From Azores to California, from Papua New Guinea to Indonesia, across the fjords of Norway or on a recent trip to Antarctica in -1°C water, Behind the Mask managed to combine what all creatives dream of: the perfect balance between a certain kind of creative freedom, a bunch of transparency, lots of passion and a needed touch of insanity.

Tell us more about you and your background..

I’ve always been working as a freelancer in the creative industry, mostly doing websites and graphic design. I studied filmmaking and worked a lot in the advertising industry. At the same time, I was also working for a big advertising agency in the south of Germany as a documentary filmmaker. I worked a lot in Russia (Siberia) and in Central African Republic. Then I spent most of my time working on the issue of the civil war in Burma (Myanmar). I’ve always seen myself more as a documentary filmmaker rather than a scenic filmmaker where you need a lot of people and need to wait a lot of time until something happens. While documenting the horrible genocide in Burma, I realized how difficult it was to raise awareness on something because it’s hard to find the right way to address people, especially when it comes to human rights or conservation. Everyday, people feel already guilty about a lot of things. So it’s difficult to make a difference. After my studies, I worked as a creative director for a company for a year. And I hated it. Then, I had a company with 18 employees for 4 years. It was an online agency where we developed websites. I was in charge of the design and creative part. After that, I did a lot of filmmaking for advertising companies and fashion brands. And I also hated that. The fashion industry is a very bad place for creative people. I decided to use my passion and do it for my own fun.

That’s when you decided to created Behind The Mask?

Yes, it was 6 years ago. I started Behind the Mask with two friends. Nothing serious at the time. We all had our job but thought maybe we could make a few films about diving, and maybe we could go on diving trips for free! That was the whole idea at first. We were 3 guys at the time, a photographer, the other one was a diver, and me as the filmmaker. We first worked with travel agencies and brands. I live in Germany and I know there’s a lot of people living close to the sea and have way more opportunities than we have. So at the beginning I thought it was not something very promising, just something to do on the side. But eventually, 3 years ago, I quitted my job and sold my shares in the company. I didn’t like working as a CEO for the company and preferred to be fair to my partners. So here I am today, working full time for Behind The Mask.

How did you get introduced to the sea, the ocean or the global water element?

Diving is very much connected with the filmmaking. I’ve not been diving without a camera for many years. I like diving but I’m not the typical diver who enjoys just to be there. I need my camera because I always have some visual ideas and I hate when I feel like I miss something I can’t capture. When I don’t have my camera, most of the time I don’t go in the water. For me, diving is linked to creativity. I started diving at the age of 18, more than 20 years ago, on a trip to Egypt with my girlfriend. We had a camera with plastic bags around, this kind of homemade housing. We had to fix it several times because there was water coming in. Slowly, it became a thing! Today, if you look at the diving community, I don’t relate much to it. I have a very specific opinion regarding the diving industry especially in Germany. When I started diving, I thought it was fun. It meant adventure, excitement, being close nature, it was about discovering new things and, at the same time, diving is something you can share with other people. My vision of diving never included any notion of competition. I’ve always enjoyed diving as a creative playground. I see it as a feeling, as a chemistry. Diving is an easy place to collect all the emotions and feelings, it’s also an abundance of stories, people, species, animal and locations. There’s a million things. Diving is the coolest thing on earth. The diving industry in Germany is far behind this vision. So I thought there was a great opportunity to combine all the things unique about diving.

3 years ago when you sold your shares to the company, what was your precise vision of Behind The Mask?

I have been quite lucky since the very beginning. I could have made decisions not based on business only. I don’t have a lot of money on the bank but thanks to my work, I achieved some creative freedom. I can be both creative on one side and be paid on the other. I don’t have to make compromises. Every creative person dreams about doing what they like to do, grow their creativity, and be valued and respected for it. For me, it was clear. I wanted to invest in something bigger. It’s not about me, it’s not about a production company, it’s more about a community. Most of our collective decisions are taken with a strong eye on community, on bringing people together. For example, for most of the projects, we spend 80% of the global budget on the logistics and on paying people. Most of the time, we bring more people than we need on set and during trips, just because we want to have a good time together, and we want to achieve this together. At the end of the day, we portray authentic emotions and feelings. And there is no other way to do it than actually feel these emotions. So it’s been a journey to find people I enjoy working with, who are also flexible and who want to serve that community. We like to make tutorials in order to share experience and knowledge. In the first place, the idea of Behind the Mask was to be very transparent with everything. I always hated it when I saw a picture about a place where somebody obviously tried to make it even more than it actually is, by not telling where it is, or not telling when it is. So I thought it would be pretty cool to give these infos to the viewer. Transparency means we always disclose everything. What we do, how we do and what equipment we use… We show and share everything as we’re not trying to make ourselves super cool or super special. All of that is only possible because of this sense of community. We have enough clients and projects to allow us to do that today.

Tell us more about this community gathered around Behind the mask…

There’s a lot of people who are considered to be a member. There are 4 to 5 core members involved with mostly everything. Hamdan Chowdhuri is from Bengladesh, Canada and Singapore and he is our Good Vibration Manager. He also shoots a little bit underwater. He’s an amazing person, everybody loves him. Timo Dersch is the project manager, doing the office stuff, planning things, posting things and writing comments. He’s from Germany and comes from the diving industry. He’s been an editor for a magazine and also shoots photos. We also have Maika Grützediek , she worked as the editor-in-chief of a magazine and resigned a couple of years ago. She’s more experienced in life than the rest of us. She communicates with potential partners and sponsors, and knows all the advertising clients. She has a very good standing in the watch industry for example. Dada Li comes from China, she is a freediver and Padi ambassador. She’s also a very successful blogger in China, she helps us in the Chinese market and is also part of our production works. She is definitely a smart brain. We have Marta from Spain, the newest member of our team. Marta won a competition on Facebook to join us on the project. She is now part of the team. Vanessa comes from Germany and is doing all the tutorial videos about underwater images, she does motion graphic. Peter is also a new member and works as a filmmaker. These are people I communicate regularly the most. Everybody is doing his or her own stuff so that it’s a loose network, but when you look at how much we spent time together last year, it’s maybe more than with our own family. Mario Medarevic is in charge of Dive World Canada, he’s been on a project in the Bahamas with us recently. Whenever we have technical issues, we can relate to him. Then, there are a lot of freelance friends, ready to go on a trip whenever it’s possible but they’re not involved in decision making. Greg Lecoeur is one of the photographers we regularly work with. We’ve been to Antarctica in February and March along with Guillaume Néry…

Tell us more about this recent trip to Antarctica with french photographer Greg Lecoeur and freediving champion Guillaume Néry…

It was a project of 3 different personalities. Guillaume Néry is a freediver and more of a creative mind. He’s also a writer and a multitool creative. Greg Lecoeur is an outstanding National Geographic photographer, and I’m a filmmaker. We thought that doing a project together, we could, from different angles, raise interest of the same place. It was also an experiment to do something together and see how we relate to this special place of Antarctica. None of us has ever been there. Guillaume is wiring about it, I’m doing a film about it and Greg made pictures. We’re thinking of doing an exhibition, a book and a multi series-documentary. The trip was more challenging than expected because of the weather and because we didn’t have enough time. So we’re thinking of going back there and doing it again. It was an interesting experience because it worked well with the 3 of us. We became even closer friends. Now, we’re currently releasing a few videos about this trip.

There was an ecological aspect as well, wasn’t it?

We partnered with Parley and took water samples to see whether scientists can find micro plastics in Antarctica, which is an inhabited continent. It would be interesting to see the human influence on such a continent regarding plastic pollution, but we don’t have any result yet. We took 75 different water samples on different locations that scientists will have a closer look on. The samples are still in Ushuaia, Argentina, as we need to figure out how to send the samples to the US-based scientists. Antarctica is an interesting place with a challenging environment. Swimming in -1°C water in a wetsuit was a thing! We learned a lot about ourselves.

Most of Behind the Mask’s projects seem very challenging indeed. What was the idea behind your « Life is an Ocean » project made in collaboration with Boot?

Behind the Mask is the official ambassador of the Boot show, so we work together with the show as an umbrella company to support what we do. We promote the show because we think they’re doing great. Boot is one of our partners. Life is an Ocean is basically a summary of our four last years. It shows the viewer how we feel about what we do. Life is an Ocean relates to all the emotions that you have, you can mirror those emotions in the ocean. It’s a bit of a philosophical narration. We want to inspire people and get them interested in this world they might not know much about. At the same time, we also want to inspire people who are already divers or content creators. At the end of every year, we create a video that sums up our year’s projects and this video campaign is a common platform your can relate to.

In one of these summary videos, you said « We believe that more people should feel the ocean magic so that we can save it. » Is Behind The Mask a way for your to raise awareness of the ocean?

Well, we’re not there yet as we didn’t find the tool we can use to really promote conservation ever more aggressively. For now, the goal is not to point at negative things. We try not to push people to change their life while providing content that people can make this conclusion by themselves. In the beginning, I thought the idea was a bit weak, NGOs would do differently, but I don’t feel confortable doing that. We’re not scientists and we don’t want to end up in the same box as everybody else. Dealing with conservation with a clear conservation message is important, but we figured out how we could raise awareness differently. Today, we document the beauty of the ocean to bring people want to save it. Everybody relates to the beauty of the ocean and we need to protect it. It gives us more satisfaction and confidence and it acts better than we thought.

What do you like the most in your job today?

I have the freedom and capability of bringing together people, and involving different kinds of people. I like to collaborate with creative minds and like to support and assist people in what they want to do. I also try to include this under Behind The Mask. The biggest challenge is to deal with teams and people, and to give people enough room to grow and do their own things. How I envision Behind The mask in the future? I see it as a lot of different things. We’d like to release masterclass tutorials for underwater imaging for free, so people can learn how to technically do it. We’d like to create a community, giving them the possibility to be part of something. Now that we have a lot of dedicated people united under the same philosophy, I personally need to give some things away. The freedom of creating projects not based on how much money it makes is probably what I enjoy most, as well as the trust from collaborators and clients. For example, we never make storyboards. The way we work is very creative and free. We always keep for ourselves the option to change things. When we go somewhere and realize the conditions are bad, we change our plans. We have a deal with our clients: They don’t have to pay anything if they dont like it, and won’t be able to use it. 

Do you have funny stories to tell about projects that didn’t work out well?

We had a few funny catastrophes where things didn’t work out! We had a project for Mercedes, a story about a small girl and sharks in Scotland. We drove there with two cars, it took us 2 days. We had 12 people around. Greg Lecoeur was there, there was all the logistics planned for 2 weeks of shooting on an island. But the weather was so bad that we couldn’t do anything so we needed to rearrange and move everything to the other side of the UK. We reshot the video about the girl with great seals, which, in the end, the client loved very much. But it’s the perfect example of what challenge means! In the end of the day, this is what make the best memories. I enjoy to collaborate with interesting people like Fred Buyle, amazing freediver and underwater photographer. We stayed in his house in Azores for two weeks and became friends. Stuff like that is the coolest. I love to plan new projects and involve creative people.

What are the new projects coming up for Behind the Mask and its team of creatives?

There’re so many different things going on. Next week, we’re going to Italy, we do an interesting collaboration with a glass artist who is shaping glass, statues and objects out of glass and water. Then, we stay a week in Egypt with our community, a group of 24 people, diving all together. We fly to Philippines a week later for a Chinese customer. After that, we stay in Indonesia for 3 weeks. Then we’re heading to cover the Sardines Run, making a film about this great adventure. Then back to Indonesia, Komodo National Park, as part of our community trip. Then, we work with the Tourism Agency of Papua New Guinea. We have a 7 weeks project there. Then, heading to French Polynesia with Guillaume Néry, one in October then in December. We might be in Norway for the orcas. Then, it will be Christmas and we have to prepare the Boat Show. This year, we gonna have a live studio over 9 days, interview people from the image community and broadcast it live on the internet. Then, April 2020, we have a nice project with a group of handicapped divers in the Bahamas. Our schedule is pretty much busy until June 2020!

Learn more about Behind the Mask on their website.

The post Behind the Mask with Florian Fischer appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

On a trip across California this winter, our editor Elisa Routa stopped by the Long Beach Museum of Art, currently paying tribute to godfather of surf photography LeRoy Grannis, top surfer in the ’30s, co-founder of International Surfing in 1964 which later became Surfing Magazine.

»Born and raised in Hermosa Beach, California, American photographer, LeRoy Grannis (b. 1917 – 2011) documented the evolution of surfing from its humble beginnings that grew into a global sport and lifestyle, witnessing first-ha,d its epochal development in the history of American surf culture. Organized by the Long Beach Museum of Art, Cult to Culture: Photographs by LeRoy Grannis explores the artist’s mastery in the medium and his ability to capture iconic images that played a profound role in shaping the world of surfing during its golden age of the 1960s and ’70s.  Shooting images from San Diego to Malibu, California, to Oahu’s North Shore, Hawaii, Grannis frequently travelled to document a migration of Californian surfers venturing across the Pacific to take on giant waves. The exhibition reveals the innovator within as he pushed technological boundaries to capture the free-spirited essence of the evolving sport.«

Behind glass windows of the main room, the visitor is lucky enough to see the lens that legendary photographer LeRoy Grannis used at the time and mainly used in surf photography in the ’60s, better known as the Century lens. There’s a heavy waterproof wooden box, fiberglassed and sealed with rubber built by George Greenough for LeRoy to keep his cameras safe from water, and transport film and lenses on his surfboard.

Photographing the beauty and power of the ocean for over 20 years, LeRoy Grannis captured the generational changes of surfing during its so called Golden Age of the 1960s and ’70s. Similar to iconic shots like »The Malibu Wall« (1966), Grannis captured the spirit of early surf lifestyle of Southern California. The gallery showcases »lifestyle” photography and surfing shots like Midget Farrelly surfing Shore Break Makaha in 1968, Gerry Lopez and Rory Russell in Pipeline, Oahu in 1972, the Duke Contest in Sunset Beach, Greg Noll Surfshop in Hermosa Beach in 1963, San Onofre Parking Lot in 1964, Miki Dora in 1963, Dewey Weber in 1966 or Bob Beadle in Sunset Beach in 1962…

The show “Cult to Culture” at the Long Beach Museum of Art is open to the public until April 21st.

Photos: LeRoy Grannis Courtesy of the Long Beach Art Museum

Photos Long Beach Museum of Art (inside):  Elisa Routa & Angèle Debuire

More infos here.

The post Cult to Culture with LeRoy Grannis appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

Working as a deckhand in Alaska since more than two decades, Corey spent seven years aboard a Bering Sea crabbing vessel. Today, he is the captain of a wild sockeye salmon fishing operation based out of an abandoned cannery complex called Graveyard Point.

Earlier last year, renowned photographer and commercial fisherman by trade Corey Arnold  went to the icy archipelago of Svalbard, meeting those people lucky enough to live at 77° N. From March 21 – April 27, 2019, he will present his latest body of work, entitled »Hornsund«, from his arctic expedition in Svalbard, halfway between Norway and the North pole. His solo exhibition will take place at Charles A. Hartman Fine Art in Portland. 

Words by Corey Arnold: »In 2013, I landed by ship at the Polish Polar Station, an outpost maintained by Polish scientists located on the remote Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard in a fjord named Hornsund. At 77˚N latitude, the station is a rare human outpost in the far North, on an island with few year-round inhabitants aside from native polar bears, arctic foxes, and an abundance of tiny reindeer. In early September the sky never grows dark, and I spent long days trekking across chossy valleys and crumbling mountains, exploring the many glaciers that rest and rumble within a 24-hour walk.

Some days I’d join a glaciologist on their mission across vast glacial landscapes to check their field instruments and on other days, I would walk alone hauling a heavy backpack of camera equipment with an old WWII rifle strapped to my back for protection from white bears.«

More infos on Corey Arnold’s website.

Read our interview with Corey Arnold.

The post Hornsund by Corey Arnold appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

Magazine founder and surfer Joran Briand puts it simply: »West is the Best offers an experience of surfing through tale and travel.« For this third edition, they booked a ticket for Mexico, »a country where surfing presents a conquest,« he says. »And yet, underneath its rigorous facade, the Pacific coast divulges ample surprises for those knowledgeable enough to seize them. This is the case for all the creative women and men to whom this edition gives voice.« French designer Joran Briand tells us more about this newly-launched magazine, made with love along the Pacific coast this past winter.

Every two years, the Paris-based Studio Briand & Berthereau looks for creators, artists and entrepreneurs passionate about the ocean and fascinated by surfing. »Whether they’re designers, architects, or stylists, their testimonials serve as sources of inspiration. From Puerto Escondido to Costa Careyes and in passing by Zihuatanejo, they learned resilience in order to create tailor-made lifestyles where work and pleasure are one in the same,« he explains. »Their lives orbit around surfing in just a balance between hedonism and spirituality, and in the heart the Third-Place – and in their image – ecosystems open allowing us to dream together. They share their backgrounds and projects with a single, yet elegant, motto: work with passion, but with your feet in the sand. In Mexico, some utopias have become realities.«

After a first volume focused on California, out in 2013, and a second edition created about France launched in 2016, the publisher Pyramid offered to present West is the Best Mexico. In this third issue, Joran Briand wanted to pay tribute to women, »so rarely visible in this resolutely masculine world.« Going beyond clichés, transcending the expected from La Saladita to Costa Careyes, this new edition displays common visions able to gather a whole lifestyle, »where surfing unveils a spirituality that reconnects us to nature.«

This West is the Best 3 Mexico will be officially launched in Paris on May, 18 and in Biarritz on June 28. 

Photos: ©Joran Briand

Find more infos on West is the Best

The post West is the Best in Mexico appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

Meeting place for a long list of sailors and sailing amateurs, the 6th edition of the SAIL IN festival took place in Bilbao earlier last month. The occasion for Panthalassa to meet sailing legend Carlo Borlenghi. Building a bridge between sailing and people, Carlo Borlenghi creates a powerful connection with the sea through his lens only.  »I’m not a sailor, not a swimmer but I like to shoot everything about the sea.« Growing up in Lake Como, Italy, Carlo Borlenghi is considered a pioneer in sailing photography today. « My main house is still situated in Lake Como, I feel lucky living near the border where I have a private beach with a small boat. That’s nice place. I also have a small flat in Milan.«

Thanks to his long-time valuable experience and distinct knowledge, the Italian photographer shares with us some pieces of wisdom about the vital need for a photographer to learn to adapt. »I didn’t change my vision and concept too much, I just use the technology to create the shot that was impossible before. It’s good to know exactly how difficult it was before to appreciate how easy is today.« Before going back to his native city by the sea, the 78-year-old world-renowned sailing photographer found time to talk to us about the evolution of sailing photography. »When we first used a drone, it was like putting up a tripod to the sky.« From analog photography to digital, he evokes the end of an era for the magazine industry, the use of social medias in the communication process today and a balanced vision between pioneer skills and the need to use new digital technology to take better photos.

Carlo, let’s start by talking about your collaboration with the SAIL IN festival. When did it start?

They first contacted me 10 years ago. They wanted to meet me but I was pretty busy with America’s Cup at the time. I ended up sending a selection of pictures and they used one of them for the poster of the very first edition of the SAIL IN Festival. We kinda lost contact until this year when Javier Sobrino invited me to join them. I was available and free from work at the studio so here I am today in Bilbao.

How did you work on this selection of pictures?

These photos are a little bit what represent both me and my job. For example, the »Brava« shot with the upside down boat was taken during my very first regatta. Some other pictures represent some good moments of my job, like »The big cloud« taken in Australia. Whenever I go out, I try to get one shot, not just for business but for me. Priority is obviously given to the client but I try to come back home with one single good shot. If I eventually have 4 or 5 different good ones, I’m happy. It’s hard to find good angles. When I go to bed, I think and dream of an angle. It’s easier to shoot when you have a picture in mind. You go out and just wait for the best moment and create the shot you have in mind. The picture is there. Shooting outside is not like shooting in studio where you can just put the light on or move the model as you like. You have to play with nature, with the sea, with the ocean. You never know, it can be flat, it can be huge and full of waves. I’m only scared to miss a picture for technical reason or regarding the focus. I want to stand out among other photographers, making different pictures.

Your shots are not only about people sailing, but there’s some real tragedy in there. Are you looking for stories?

Yes, story first. Now that the magazine industry is done, there’s no room for story. Magazines used to give us like 8 pages to play around one story, but now is different. The approach is different depending on the client and depending on the regatta, but 90% of the time today, I look for the single shot. A good and strong one. Nobody cares about the story on the regatta anymore. For an event like America’s Cup when we can eventually create a book, in this case, yes I look for the story. Otherwise, it’s hard to look for a story by yourself, in the sea, everything is expensive. You need to charter the boat, the helicopter and go to remote places. It costs a lot to reach nice places. For example, I’m planning to go to Australia today to cover the migration of the crabs to one special island, but it’s so expensive to go there and there’re only two flights each week.

Why considering to cover the crabs migration and move out of the sailing field?

Because it’s incredible! The crabs go out from the forest and go to the sea, crossing the village. crawling down the cliff. So the island, the village, the streets and the cliffs suddenly become totally red, moving. It feels alive. I try to do some different and unusual photography. This crab thing could become a series I could sell at Paris Photo or in Italy.

Tell us about the techniques you use…

Today, I’m working only with digital. Digital gives you more chances to do pictures that was impossible to do before. Drone is a good example. When we first started to use things like this, we put the drone up, it was like to get a tripod to the sky. Before you had to shoot from a helicopter, and then it was difficult to find a client that would pay the expenses. then you have to push film up to 2000 ISO to get rid of all the grainy… the quality was not very good. Now with the drone, you go up, you shoot with the long exposure, you put the ISO, you stay there and get the perfect picture.

Are you working in respect of the technological advances?

Yes because there are so many new ideas, new angles and new cameras! For example, we also like using the drone while shooting a boat going full speed. Today, you can follow it. It was impossible before, there was a limit. Today, you can use these new toys to get new angles and new pictures. I didn’t change my vision and concept too much, I just use the technology to create the shot that was impossible before. It’s good to know exactly how difficult it was before to appreciate how easy it’s today. In the past, when you did black & white and when you had a black sky, you had to make a mask at the lab, you had to do it manually, because there was no correct picture, there was no reality, you played with the dark or with the lighting in the face or this kind of things.

You mentioned working with black & white… Tell us more about that.

Yes, I like black and white a lot. The thing is that, when I started to do this job, I used the go around like a street photographer, I wanted to go into the heart of things, move from my country to another one and come back with different stories to tell. In the past, it was easy. I remember being in England to cover a regatta and ended up making a story about Stonehenge. I spent two or three days in Stonehenge in order to see the crazy people there. I shot only black & white, even for the sunsets and sunrises. This was my dream – use sailing as a mean to travel and create other stories. Then the sailing thing became bigger and bigger for me and there was no time left.

What are the few places you like the most for pictures?

One the best places is South Africa. Because in 300 km2, you get everything. You start from the forest with all the animals like lions and giraffes, then you go to Cape Town where you get to see whales and penguins. Then you can go to the desert of Namibia very close. In the center town, you also have some good wine and vineyards. It’s a really nice place. I have never been in a cage but you can go out to see the sharks in the cage. South Africa is nice. I also love Australia, especially for the regatta. It is one of the best places in the world, especially during Sydney Open. For us as photographers, it’s very good for the action part. Sardinia is also good, you can get good pictures there. But sailing changed recently. Now, they don’t do long-distance races anymore. For me, they used to be the best ones, because I could use the light in the night, capture sunrise and this kind of light. Now they start at 12 o’ clock and are back on the dock at 3pm.

Over the years, you became one of the most famous sailing photographer indeed. What’s your relationship with the sea?

I’m not sailor nor a swimmer. The first regatta I made was a nightmare for me I had no idea what was going on. I started to do the regatta at the Lake with a friend who owned a boat. I observed those sailors going different ways and didn’t understand anything. Then later I realized it’s a very intelligent sport, I like the strategy it needs. In one way, I think it’s better for me not being a sailor because I don’t look at the technical things. I’m just out to shoot the aesthetic aspects. My mind is free mind. I realized it quickly. People who go to the photo fair are not sailors. So I’m bridging two worlds.

What do you like shooting the most?

I like to shoot everything about the sea. For many years, I used to cover a windsurf regatta in Maui, Hawaii. At the time, Robby Naish or this kind of surfers were there. You could sell the picture of a surfer at the time, now you cannot. Nobody care about surfing anymore. There is just maybe the big wave in Nazaré, Portugal, if ever you’re lucky to be there in this period. This is the problem. You could go to Maui for yourself and make very good pictures but it doesn’t pay the bills. Now, you have to work for sponsors to survive.

The job of sailing photographer evolved. Would you say your job relies more on sponsors than on print publications today?

Totally. Magazines don’t commission you anymore. The only way to collaborate with magazines is showing behind the scenes shots of the regatta. But you definitely have to work for sponsors to survive. For example, I work for Rolex. As a freelance photographer, it’s quite impossible because you need to chart the helicopter. For a 27-hour helicopter tour, it costs approximately 45K AUS$. Impossible for one single freelance to pay. The good compromise is to do the best you can for the sponsor because the priority remains the client. Then if you have the chance to get some free minutes for you, you can do one picture for you.

What about analog photography?

Nobody want analog photography anymore, especially for commercial projects. Clients want the picture for… yesterday! Today, you need to shoot and sent the shot right away. Everybody became crazy about the bloody Instagram and social things. Social medias go way more faster than magazine. People post pictures quickly because using an iPhone helps you shoot quickly and post it straight away.

As a photographer, do you feel you needed to adapt to this new era of social medias and all-things digital?

It’s just another challenge. I have my Instagram account but I use it for myself. However, sometimes it’s too much. There’re so many posts and so many stories that don’t say anything. They’re just here to fill the space. To me, if there’s no good picture, there’s no reason to post it. But for most people, it you didn’t pos anything, you didn’t exist that day. If you post a rubbish, it remains rubbish. I know I may be wrong because there’s some rubbish that work, but I stay with my concept. I don’t want to publish just for the sake of publishing. I’m not in the rush. When working on regattas, I have two assistants. They often want to publish a picture quickly but I say « wait, wait… » We get our name under the picture and nobody cares, nobody knows there was no wind this day, nobody cares if there was rain, or… forget it. Give space for the other ones. If there are good conditions the day after, we’ll publish a picture. Our picture must be different than the others’.

Do you also make videos?

Just taking photos. I’m not trying to do both but I work with a guy at the studio who’s in charge of the video part. We sometimes do our post-production ourselves as well cause I find digital a bit flat. There’s no depth. During a race, we just work on the contrasts of the pictures and equalize the horizon. In the big sea, it’s not easy to get the balance. Then if we have five or ten good pictures , we can play a little bit more after the regatta. When it comes to printing a sailing picture in limited edition, we look more at the details in order to make it a little bit more accurate. But we don’t change the subject, we just clean up the color a bit. Normally, we just spend one minute for each picture. Otherwise, you’ll not survive.

We, at Panthalassa, are working around projects that take care about the ocean, around themes like sustainability, overfishing, plastic pollution like with the Plastic Family displayed here at the Festival. You spend a lot of time in the ocean, on boats,  did you witness any changes?

Of course, you see some environmental differences. Dirty things are happening. There are a lot of dirty deals in the water, and when you are in the helicopter you can see big ships throwing all kinds of things in the water. They clear out the tank in the open sea. When you do the long distance races, you can witness this kind of things. The only thing I can do is publishing pictures about those things to show the problem but I’m just a tiny guy and it doesn’t work. They do what they want, and it’s a shame. The short film entitled « Albatross » has been one of the first pieces of art able to touch these issues in a beautiful and powerful way. When I see these kind of things, I do want to make a movie. Because it was a really good story. The more I talk to people about pollution, the more I realize people care more than 10 years ago. We destroyed so many things in the past and nobody cared. Now the moment comes to talk about plastic. But for me, cleaning up the beach from the plastic bags is just for aesthetic purposes. You have to civilize and educate people to avoid putting plastic on the beach. If you watch “Albatross”, you realize there’s plastic everywhere, even in the birds. It’s part of the ocean. We eat plastic every day. This is the huge problem. And you cannot solve this problem with a “Save the Ocean!” slogan or by picking up the plastic trash from the beach. We need to educate people again and then the rest will come. Maybe slowly, but it’ll come.

Follow Carlo Borlenghi’s work on his website.

 Sailing Photos: Carlo Borlenghi

Portrait Photo: Xabier Aldazabal / SAIN IN Festival

The post Stories and wisdom from Carlo Borlenghi appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

Fun fact. Nantes-born photographer Thomas Lodin doesn’t call the ocean, the ocean. « We call it the sea, it’s always been like this. » Thomas discovered surfing thanks to his brother when he was 16. Before that, he was playing around with his BMX bike, dreaming of becoming a pro and traveling the world. « But since I got my very first surfboard, I never stopped. I quitted my graphic arts school a year before getting my diploma and I moved to Biarritz. It was 5 years ago. »

Today, Thomas belongs to the small network of artists whose work and adventure are great to watch and follow. « In Biarritz, life is a bit different everyday. Beyond the simple fact of checking the forecast, planning some photoshoots or photos just for fun, I spend a lot of time behind my screen, never far from my notebook. Treating the images, planning the next shoots with clients depending on our schedule, developping pictures, sending orders and thinking of future ideas. That’s what my weeks are about. » We sat down with French photographer Thomas Lodin to discuss his art, the process that he uses to make it, his shared love for digital and analog photography, his passion for old surfboards, his trips around the world, collaboration with France-based Oxbow brand, and his coming projects like « Impressions », a printed book project gathering a selection of 150 pictures taken along these past years.

Either in the basque country, in California, Australia or Mexico, Thomas has this peculiar way of capturing the inner spirit of surfing. Inspired by the greatest icons of the 60s, his steady, unflinching passion for surfing remains relatively unchanged since the first time he took a camera. As art aficionados, ocean lovers and design amateurs, that’s what caught our eyes the first time we met. Thomas has a true fascination for images. « I have the same approach with surfing as with photography. I usually spend more time on the aesthetic aspect of a camera than on the technical side. It’s like when choosing a surfboard, » he says. « Most of the time, I opt for cameras that carry an interesting history and unique design. »

Digital or analog? That’s a question we dared asking. Fortunately for us, Thomas didn’t choose. Digital for work, analog for fun. We asked him to go back on this precious selection of 35mm shots displayed in this article. « These last rolls are mostly black and white pictures I took last year in Biarritz and during trips. The black and white rolls allow me to develop them myself cause it’s quite easy to do and I can save a bit money as well. I shot around 25 rolls and developed some in September. But the rolls ended up stating on top of my desk, » he explains. « So once the rain season arrived, I started to develop the 13 rolls left! These rolls represent generally the off moments while on shoots, on trips or just when with friends. Some have been taken during surf sessions in Biarritz, some others in Paris or during Baiona Bestak (Fêtes de Bayonne, France). Most of them were shot in California during my last trip, from Venice to San Onofre and Malibu, including a short visit in Mexico. I also got some pictures from the opening ceremony of the Blue Factory in San Sebastian and there are some views from New York as well while a shoot for Oxbow. » Thomas has been working as a staff photographer for the french brand called Oxbow for the last 3 years. « My mission is to create most of their visual content and bring a little thing to their brand image. That’s why I collaborate a lot with their ambassadors, especially with French surfer Clovis Donizetti. Before every new season, I also organize the collection photoshoots for their catalogue and lookbooks. We tend to head to coastal cities in order to link up clothes to the ocean, and bridge city and surfing. It’s always great to discover interesting places and see how humans adapted and developed their lifestyle ad activities depending on the continents and cultures. »

Thomas remembers his very first travel for the brand. A 10-days surf trip to the French island of Guadeloupe, just a month after signing with them. « We also left to California in 2017 before discovering the rough winter in Oregon. No sun for 9 days. We’ve also been chasing waves in Italy and our last trip was in Sweden in order to shoot the next winter’s collection. A nice discovery in terms of both landscape, culture and lifestyle. » The french photographer shoots with all that passes through his way. « I mainly shot this series (seen in this article) of analog pictures with a Canon AE-1 with a 50mm, as well as with a point-and-shoot Olympus mju camera including a 35mm lent by a friend. I also have a Nikonos II to shoot in the water, famous design coming directly from Cousteau’s mind in the early 60s, then Nikon bought it back. I also recently acquired a Russian camera, called Horizon, panoramic style that I can’t wait to try. I also shoot with a Pentax 6×7, quite massive but amazing. It’s not easy to carry it especially on trip due to its weight and format (120mm). »

Weight and format are no big deal for Thomas as he draws inspiration from surf culture legends like Leroy Grannis who created some of the most memorable images that surfing has ever seen. « I remember the DVDs of the X Games and of « Nuits de la Glisse » (Night of the ride). At that time, as a teenager, surfing made me dream but I missed something. I didn’t look further than that at the time. I was hooked by this freestyle culture of BMX and its hectic aspect created from scratch by this american culture. I read the magazines and looked at those guys touring across the US. At age 13,in my teenager’s bedroom in Nantes, I imagined myself riding my bike and taking pictures of these crazy spots, » he says. « Later, I stumbled upon One California Day, which came out 10 years ago. It was probably my first  introduction to the story of longboarding. I wanted to dig into archives, portraits of unique characters in order to learn more about this historical grace of surfing. I discovered the work of Leroy Grannis, through Ron Stoner, Don James and Leo Hetzel. I’ve been blown away by their work. I remember the beach, the light and unique atmosphere from California and Hawaii, the crazy cars with amazing designs, testimony of a past era. Pictures from Arnaud de Rosnay in France in the 60s are also iconic shots. I like the soul of these shots and films, that’s why I slowly try to go back to these cameras, as well as with my surfboards, they both embody this era. I try to do it my way though. »

His way, that’s what makes Thomas’s work stand out. Recently he worked on a book project entitled Impressions. « Last year, I started to search in my external discs of these past 3 years, ended up with 4000 images that I found potentially interesting to use. Choosing the final selection has been a long and difficult process but I managed to gather 150 pictures, » he explains. « Then, I started the layout listening to some jazz to get inspired. After trying among 30 covers and starting from 300 pages, I finally have a final version. The book will be ready and out next week (mid-March, 2019)! » Biarritz-based Thomas Lodin photographer reminds us the aesthetics appeal of surfing and it feels good. 

More of Thomas Lodin’s work on his website.

The post The aesthetics appeal of surfing by Thomas Lodin appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

The SAIL IN FESTIVAL embodies the perfect combination between nautical culture and sailing innovation. Created in 2014, the European festival blends the past, present and future of the sailing culture.

Starting on the 7th of March, 2019, the 6th edition of the SAIL IN FESTIVAL will be the occasion to celebrate sailing through a series of 20 screenings made out of stories, adventures and races, as well as 15 conferences with international speakers, 3 art exhibitions and a workshop.

Urtzi Sagarrubay, director of the SAIL IN festival, says: »We’re creating a unique ecosystem able to combine two essential lines; the educational and sociocultural aspect with the festival, and the innovation aspect and economical development with this special day dedicated to professionals (SAIL INN PRO).« 

Many legendary sailors  have shared their stories on the stage of the SAIL IN. Legends like  Sir Robin Knox – Johnston or Loick Peyron, who once said of the SAIL IN: »You feel the whole team’s desire to share their passion with others. It’ something very beautiful, very pure.«

This year is not different. Among the many incredible guests and presenters will be  Jean-Luc Van Den Heede who needs no introduction. Aged 74, recently spent 211 days at sea and became the winner of the Golden Globe race, a solo world tour, without assistance, without stop and without GPS. He will receive the very first price entitled SAIL IN. For this 2019 edition, art remains a central element.

Another of the this years highlights is the photo exhibition by renowned Italian photographer Carlo Borlenghi whose artworks convey the balance between humans, boats and maritime stories.

When we first met the founders at the Blue Factory and heard the story of their festival,  their vision and dreams for the future, we knew we wanted to sail along. It was love at first sight. Now we are proud to announce Panthalassa will be supporting the SAIL IN  as an official collaborator. We will be helping them spread the word through all our channels, and our Plastic Family will be part of the SAIL IN art exhibition  at the BBK space. We warmly invite you to this 4-day event held in Bilbao on the Bay of Biscay, one of the most popular and important maritime cities in Europe. 

The post SAIL IN FESTIVAL appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

Based in the South-West of France since 2004, French-German artist visual artist Louisa Raddatz’s work is predominantly based on memory: »My personal and individual memories, as well as my family story through which I want to distinguish myself from history,« she says. »Another important feature of my work is about creating imaginary landscapes based on organic materials as aim to sensitize people of environmental protection – pollution, endangered species – and ecology.«

Inspired by nature, halfway between autobiography and fiction, Louisa uses different surprising natural materials such as hair, horse hair, clay, sheep whole and latex. »Latex is an interesting ephemeral material because by time and a long process, latex is getting blacker and blacker«, she explains. For her 2016-Dark flight project, the France-based committed artist shaped plants »trapped and engulfed by latex as marine animals affected by these disasters« in order to reveal the impacts of oil spills on marine ecology.

On the occasion of her art installation »Atlas« part of the global »Vaste Monde« exhibition in Anglet (France) at the Villa Beatrix, we had a chat with the artist. Let’s meet.

Hi Louisa, how did you get introduced to art?

I always knew that I wanted to do something creative, like being an artist. How I played as a child was already different and imaginative. For example when I was six, I created an animal cemetery with my best friend and I had already created graves for my future pets that I never had until now. I didn’t realize it but it was already important for me to work around memories and learn to preserve them. My passion for art has his origins rooted in a family’s cultural inheritance. My father loved collecting things. He was passionate about space and he collected everything he could find in newspapers. I created an installation entitled « Raumzeit – Welt t traum » about his collection and I was brought to interrogate his personal story (through photos of my father) and his history (Cold War). My story works hands in hands with my family’s, so it’s about my own identity as well as my human identity.

Born in Germany, raised in France, what did you dream of as a kid?

I’ve always been a dreamer but with time, every adult loses some part of magic and innocence. When I was a little child I dreamt of becoming an art teacher or working with pottery. I ended becoming an artist and I have already worked with clay, especially with my »Vestiges« (Remains) piece that questions the destruction of coral reefs. Today when I create, I feel like a child who is playing, and I’m returning a bit back to my childhood.

Where do you draw your inspiration from?

When I was a student, I kept a personal diary where I drew one drawing every day, including the date of the day. So by doing so, I could liberate instinctively my feelings and emotions in an obsessional and abstract way.  For a long time, I didn’t see my drawings as an artwork but only as simple sketches and a research tool linked to my imaginary.  I never shared these drawings to anyone. Working with organic materials, I felt these drawings weren’t enough »alive« for me. In 2016, a series of drawings named »Métamorphoses« was born. This set of drawings was finally animated and lively, constantly in transformation, changing, and moving as a »flipbook«. One drawing followed by another one, reproducing a same shape and adding new elements on it. In this way I created an evolution over time.  My goal was to offer infinity to this piece as well as to my work, more globally. Transformation over time lets us think of the artist Roman Opalka who, for decades, has been writing numbers on the walls of a room every day. At first the wall was all white. Today, despite the ink of the writing, the wall is becoming more and more black. I was also inspired by the works of Michel Blazy, which are sentenced to decompose, transform over time in order to reach the eternity of existence.

»Métamorphoses« is actually a set of more than a hundred of drawings, always in progress, unfinished… Step by step, new shapes arise, evoking living systems like the animal world and the plant world. Many of my drawings are inspired by the underwater world. That’s out some strange jellyfishes appeared on my paper. As a result of these drawings, I created a piece called “Méduses cailloux« (Pebble jellyfish) in 2018 (see pictures). This work is a reference to the only living species in this world called »turritopsis dohrnii«. Turritopsis dohrnii, is officially known as the only immortal creature that can live forever. The secret to eternal life, as it turns out, is not just living a really, really long time. It’s all about maturity, or rather, the lack of it. The immortal jellyfish propagates and then, faced with the normal career path of dying, they opt instead to revert to a sexually immature stage. So they don’t die but transforms back into their juvenile polyp state. »Méduses cailloux« are special jellyfishes that have some pearls on their filaments, it can remember mermaid’s tears-plastic pellets. You can find a lot on the beach of Les Landes in France.  

Tell us more about this »obsessive family archaeology«? Why intimacy, relationships and family are such important subjects?

My personal story is not an ordinary story. The family is union, you are linked by blood. My grandparents are gone. When my last grandfather died, it was the end of a big generation and I created »Marche Blanche«, a homage to all the people who unfortunately left us. This work can make us think about the work of Christian Boltanski. I didn’t really know my grandparents. Two of my sisters are touring the United States by bicycle since 2008. They will probably never come back. I didn’t see them since 2008. I realized a photo album entitled »Sisters« and an installation entitled »Sisters on the road« as an attempt to remain connected. These creations are called »atlas« in reference to the work »the Mynomsyne atlas« made by art historian Aby Warburg (1866-1929); a puzzle of »constellations« that created a family inheritance from his intimate space, documents and archives forming a collection.

Your body of work tends to question not only texture but also space and time. The notion of »past« is also an important topic. Tell us more about the importance of the past in your process of creation.

I’m attempting to reconstruct things from the past by fragments of memories. I present an accumulated quantity of memorabilia. It’s my starting point. Keeping it allows mine to return back to the past to be finally able to preserve it for maybe… eternity? In doing so, I rely on tracks, archives and documents. In order to not forget or »lose memory« of the past, I attempt to resuscitate the past by the means of accumulation. I’m connecting the present with the past. In my work, I interrogate material, space and time (past and present). In order to capture the uncatchable, time and space, I use my artworks as my passageway into the past. I create art that has at its core »survival«.

What kind of mediums do you use? Tell us more about your stunning art installation »Atlas« part of the global »Vaste Monde« exhibition in Anglet (France) at the Villa Beatrix. 

I’m using a lot of different mediums. I have already worked with hair, horse hair, sheep whole, and clay, latex as well. When I’m creating installations with organic materials, it is hard for me to stop, I want to do more and more, in an obsessional way (accumulation) because my pieces are like growing things. I’m always working with the same process starting and resting on a “ritual” based on sorting, ranking, assembling, adding, accumulating, invading, repeating, unifying and finally, living. At the Villa Beatrix in Anglet for an exhibition, I presented two of my works: One entitled »L’envol obscur« (Dark flight) and the other one »Sans titre« (Untitled). »L’envol obscur« was created out of plants (vegetal from the forest) and latex. I transformed the original shapes of plants in something different to be able to speak about the ocean and pollution.

Looking at the art installation, we can guess a reference to the issue of oil spills. Is it?

Exactly. »L’envol obscur« (Dark flight) is about oil spills and oil disaster. When I was younger, I saw a lot of oil spills on TV. In my souvenirs, I  remember harmed and killed seabirds in great numbers, destroyed by oil floats. I’m a vegetarian and this has had a big impact on me. For »Dark flight« in 2016 I worked with different plants from the forest and latex. Latex is an interesting ephemeral material because by time, long process, latex is getting blacker and blacker. I added some black acrylic painting into the latex. Here these plants are trapped and engulfed by latex as marine animals affected by these oil floats disasters. It’s all about the impact of oil spills on marine ecology. The ocean is getting more and more polluted today. Nature lost its original beauty. My approach is to talk about pollution in a very aesthetic, poetic and fairy way. A kind of imaginary landscape which lets us dream and question ourselves.

You’ve also been using plastic trash and remains trying to give them a new life. Tell us about this amazing art project.

This project entitled »RVB« (Rouge/Red/Vert/Green/Bleu/blue) was created in 2010. It represents three monumental trash islands in primary colors. For the green one, I have created an outfit of trash so I can animate the trash with my body by doing performances as I did in Bilbao, Spain. The idea is that all the trash gives a new life to a new creature. I was inspired by the seventh continent that is a third of the size of the United States and consists of an accumulation of plastic waste in the oceans. It would cover an area larger than France – nearly 640.000 km2.

In 1997, the American oceanographer Charles Moore discovered the first vortex of waste in the sea: an area of 3.4 million square kilometers contaminated by floating plastic waste, accumulating in the North Pacific gyre, a giant swirling mass of water formed by the ocean currents. Similar pollution can be observed in other gyres in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Recently a whale has been found dead with six kilos of plastic in his stomach. My work »Vestiges« (Remains) represents damaged white reef corals realized with clay. Coral reefs are increasingly threatened by coral whitening, caused by the death of unicellular algae that live in symbiosis with coral, resulting in coral death. Coral reefs have survived tens of thousands of year of natural change, but many of them may not able to survive the havoc brought by humankind.

What are your up and coming projects?

Actually, the exhibition »Vaste Monde« is always open for visiting until 9th of March 2019 at Villa Beatrix, Centre d’art contemporain Anglet, France. I invite you to discover »Dark flight«. I will participate in a festival »La magie dans tous ses états« organized by a local association in Jonzac, France. I will show one work at Cloitre des Carmes in Jonzac  from the 10 to the 29th of February. I also have some upcoming projects like another artist residency in Charente Maritime, France.

Discover Louisa Raddatz’s work on her website. 

The post Louisa Raddatz presents “Atlas” appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

« Art has always been a testbed for a notion of the real » says the first line of the Chronus Art Center’s website introduction (CAC).

Signals by Biarritz-based visual artist Nicolas Sassoon (lives and works in Biarritz, France, and Vancouver) & Brazil-born artist Rick Silva (lives and works in Eugene, Oregon) belonged to the twenty-three works exhibited during the unReal. the Algorithmic Present, « an exhibition that attempts to confront the digital present through the very means of technological intervention both as critical examination as well as alternative prospects. »

Recently exhibited in Anglet at the Georges Pompidou center (France), Silva and Sassoon’s 3 web-based works presented there as large video installations have been conceived as an immersive environment inviting the viewer to question the human footprint on the planet. 

Indeed, through digital processes, the two artists created a series of video works that reflects upon their relationship to their natural surrounding. Through immersive projections, they examine the resulting human alteration on our oceans. Each computer generated video work contrast an ocean view infused with digital effects – digital carpets lying on the ocean floor as well as digital cylinders looking like drilling machines – that simulate a seemingly oily substance reflected on the surface of the water, thus replicating the impending visions of an oil spill in open waters.

The natural liquid environment and computer-generated landscapes are combined to a humming soundtrack suggesting technological presence, creating a contrast between technology and a natural setting.

« My name is Nicolas Sassoon, I’m a visual artist based in Vancouver. My practice revolves mainly around animation and video projection. I’ve always been drawn to a type of imagery, images or artworks that really create that magical moments when you look at them and you are transported somewhere else but you also baffled by how it was possibly made, » explains french-american artist Nicolas Sassoon. « I work with this very simple overlapping of two images. It’s something that’s really close to analog animation in a way. I don’t use coding, I don’t use programming, I do everything by hand. I stretch things, I change the speed, motion, and through these experimentations, I reach a result that I find to be a good result. »

Produced by pairing complementary fields of research in computer imaging, each video work « bring to life a simulated ecological ruin as a gesture of contemplation towards an environment subject to perpetual human alteration. » About nature, Nicolas Sassoon says: « Nurturing hobbies is really key to me to keep a curious mind. Working on the garden, weeding, planning stuff, doing anything that involves taking care of the garden, is super grounding. It’s a nice complement to being in front of a laptop ten hours a day. »

Silva and Sassoon’s mutual contemporary project entitled Signals have been exhibited across the world, from Dublin (Ireland), Toronto & Vancouver (Canada), Berkeley (USA), Biarritz (France), Shangai (China), Belgrade (Serbia), Basel (Switzerland), among other places.

Discover Nicolas Sassoon and Rick Silva‘s works.

The post “Signals” by Nicolas Sassoon & Rick Silva appeared first on PANTHALASSA.

Marine biologist, conservationist, freediver and entrepreneur Ocean Ramsey.

What it’s like to lock eyes with a great white as it slowly and directly approaches me is a feeling I’ve been fortunate to experience many times before but how’s the rough toothed dolphin escort too. I can’t say enough about the importance of sharks for healthy marine ecosystems, for the ocean, we need sharks and yet, perhaps because of the negative and inaccurate way they are portrayed in mass media many people do not care that they are being killed at a rate of 70,000,000-100,000,000 every year. What’s worse, they are killed mostly just for shark fin soup or for shark fishing as shark sport fishing. I would encourage you to see the cruelty and waste and compare it to this reality of peaceful and respectful coexistence. I do not encourage people to do this. I’ve been working with sharks for over 15 years, over 30 species including white sharks all around the world. They are apex predators not monsters nor puppies, but this was the gentlest grandma great white shark I’ve ever met. Deepest gratitude for my team and the incredible shot I will cherish forever 

We really need to all be working together. Put the egos aside and let’s work together to help save sharks for the next generation if not for ourselves.

Professional conservation photographer and shark photographer Juan Oliphant.

The first great white shark I ever swam with was in 2005 off my home Haleiwa with a similarly large great white shark who also rocked the boat I was on at the time working with sharks. I guess I am lucky that history repeats and not much has changed. What has changed though is shark populations are severely declining but for the first time ever I’ve seen this huge shift in perception in the last 5 years mostly due to imagery and the work that Ocean Ramsey and the team at One ocean diving and @oneoceandivingprogram and conservation and research division does.

In this shot, Ocean Ramsey is in the right place at the right time. The reality is that this moment took years or even decades to play out this way and I’m going to say it is due karma for Ocean. I spent the last decade trying to keep up her. Ocean is always working late into the night and getting up super early for work, writing papers for permits, shark research, conservation, leading dives, training safety divers, creating non profits, writing to senators and CEOs, doing educational out reach, organizing reef and beach clean ups, creating shark conservation designs and a clothing line all for shark conservation.

Ocean has dedicated her life to sharks and that is the biggest part of why I love her so much. She doesn’t do it for ego or fame, purely for love and hope that people can see that. She actually is a shy person that would rather keep to herself but the only reason she speaks up and gets in front of a camera is for them, the sharks. She learned early on after finishing her marine bio degree that there will be nothing left to study if we don’t speak up for these animals.

I hope my conservation images like this help people to question their perceptions and realize the beauty, and importance of sharks. I also hope that they inspire the kind of compassion and connection we need to have with nature and sharks, to help protect them and coexist along side them. You don’t have to love them but they do need to exist, they are absolutely critical for the health of marine ecosystems which all life relies on. Everyone has a part to play in shark and ocean conservation.

Education is the key. The only sad thing in all of this is to see other conservationist and scientists waste their valuable time attacking other scientists and conservationist. We really need to all be working together. Put the egos aside and let’s work together to help save sharks for the next generation if not for ourselves. Focus on the sharks and save them is what Ocean is about and I wish more people were like her. This amazing photo is not mine. The photo has been taken by @camgrantphotography, also in in the right place at the right time.

Photo: Cam Grant.

The post One picture, Two stories with Ocean Ramsey & Juan Oliphant appeared first on PANTHALASSA.