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We regularly post short Marine Wildlife Videos an Photographs with a short explanation regarding the subject and the technique used to capture the image.

All videos are made by Olivier Van den Broeck using Light & Motion video lights

and all photographs are by Greet Meulepas unless stated otherwise.

107. Pink Whipray (Himantura fai) leaving a wreck



Subject: A beautiful Pink Whipray (Himantura fai) leaves the wreck of the TUG 2 in Mauritius to go to its preferred habitat: the surrounding sandy bottom. This large stingray species can reach more than 5m/15ft in total length. It is found in the coastal waters of the southern Indian and Pacific Ocean. These rays have a taste for crustaceans, in particular shrimp explaining why shrimp trawlers frequently catch it.


Technique: Lights are not very useful when your subject is far away... in this case the use of an orange filter would have been preferable. Since I was initially close enough my lights were on when I started to film this ray. Little did I know that the ray was going to recede from the wreck. I decided to continue to film with my lights on and without switching to my orange filter since switching to the orange filter would have made it necessary for me to white-balance again and I did not want to miss the shot. Later most colours (99% of this shot is monochrome blue/grey) were revived in post-production. If the scene would have been multi-coloured (corals, sponges and a lot of small colourful fish) it would have been much more difficult to change it into a vibrant clip.


For a more in-depth description about the Pink Whipray please go to our vlog post 176 or click on this link: https://www.beyondscuba.com/post/a-pink-whipray-himantura-fai-swims-over-the-wreck-of-the-tug-ii


Take the plunge and learn to create stunning underwater videos with our online Marine Wildlife Videography course!