I grew up about as far from the ocean as you can get while still living in the United States. I saw the ocean once during college in Florida and again on a cruise through the Caribbean. Eventually, through a chain of events, I moved to the other side of the country to Southern California.

Even then it took a few years more before I stumbled across a National Geographic article on nudibranchs. A quick google search led me to discover some local photographers, which led to more nudibranch photos, and eventually the realization that Southern California has some really good diving, and that it’s not just tropical destinations that have great marine life!

The rest of the story tells itself. An online PADI course, Amazon order for a cheap housing for my compact camera and an impressive number of blurry and out of focus pictures during my open water dives and I was hooked.

In the following couple years I’ve melted and flooded a camera, upgraded to a DSLR and have added a range of other accessories from strobes, macro lenses, wide angle lenses, snoots, diopters and a variety of lights. I’ve dove as far north as British Columbia, in California from Monterrey to San Diego, glimpsed the Caribbean and explored a handful of locations throughout Indonesia and the Philippines. Future trips include…. just about everywhere!