Sparkles

Description

LOCATION:  Bali, Indonesia

STORY BEHIND THE SHOT: Like staring up at a galaxy of stars, or perhaps down at a field of flowers, this close look at the polyps of this gorgonian sea fan coral reveals the hidden parts that make up the whole. Far more abstract than most art in the SeaScapes Collection, Sparkles is a burst of color that is the result of hundreds of individual animals living together as a colony. Initially, I just meant to take a quick grab-photo that I could use to identify the species later at my computer. But as I looked at the result on the back of my camera, the first thought that came to my mind was, “Done right, I’d put that on my wall as art”, so I dedicated the rest of the dive to getting the perfect shot that was simple, yet full of energy and detail.

I regularly get asked about what a coral actually is. It’s a simple question with quite a complicated answer! Firstly, it needs mentioning that there are over 7500 different species already classified, so any answer is a generalization. Perhaps the most complicated part lies in the terminology – a coral is a singular animal – one of perhaps hundreds or tens of thousands of animals (all genetically identical clones) that make up a coral. Wait, what? Corals make up a coral? Well, we also refer to that huge structure shaped like a bush, a boulder, a bunch of grapes, or a tree, as “a coral”. And yes, they’re both right! I love how Sparkles shows the individual coral animals that make up the coral. Corals reproduce sexually, with sperm & egg, but then when the 1 in a million settles into just the right spot, it then asexually reproduces via cloning into the structure we see as a coral. But put on the readers, and look closer – coral isn’t smooth – it’s fuzzy. Now look even closer – that fuzz is thousands of polyps, each with 8 arms and a hungry mouth!