New to the Site, Diving in the Red Sea

[eggie]

Nice pictures and awsome tank

 

[acronautical]

Beautiful pics. Where were you staging from?

 

[reefingbuddha]

Thanks guys!

I'm doing well GSM. I finally have my visa and without any further problems I should be back in Florida on August 2nd. Wish me luck!


And finally the Videos. It took forever to load them up on YouTube and then swap out the audio.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCNGMRsyZFY[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yy0RPcYJd2Q[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBXHhu3OYqM[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylMdL0Y6fQE[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPZ51rTjv_U[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50bLnodk_P4[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0QKhSL707s[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_AkPA6oYdQ[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pI4b7bJxd-4[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viuQYzvQQ2o[/youtube]

 

[reefingbuddha]

Beautiful pics. Where were you staging from?

If you are referring to the diving, both trips I was diving with "Sinai Blues". An AWESOME outfit out of the Four Seasons Hotel in Sharm El Sheikh.

Thanks for your interest.

 

[revhtree]

Great pics and vids bro!!

Can you explain the similarities or differences in the flow around the coral while diving versus the flow in our aquariums?

 

[GSMguy]

Good luck Bro!

when does the tank come down?

 

[FiReBReTHa]

Oh em gee


thanks!!!

 

[starfish]

Thank you for the underwater adventure.Absolutely amazing shots of the reefs. Kudo's to you. Only another photographer can really appreciate your work!!!!

 

[Garth Schafluetzel]

very nice picks can i use some for my background on my desktop?

 

[reefingbuddha]

Great pics and vids bro!!

Can you explain the similarities or differences in the flow around the coral while diving versus the flow in our aquariums?

Thanks Rev!

Flow while diving is highly variable. For example one location can have very slow steady current one day and intense directional current the next. The directional current can also switch from one day to the next.

If one "genre" of coral is attempted to be examined it gets confusing when comparing flow, light, and even temperature to aquarium conditions. Stags can be found anywhere from 2 to 35 meters. In very high flow (think 12" from the output of a MP40w) to what we would consider to be severely inadequate flow for a SPS. Furthermore the light intensity ranges considerable from 2 to 35 meters even though the same stag can be found in any of these locations. Temperature also varies considerably when for example you hit a stream of water that I can only assume comes from deeper waters and the temperature drops 5 to 10 degres.

The short answer from my relatively limited knowledge and experience is that flow changes considerable during the course of a day or 2 on a reef. The extremes of this range may be detrimental to the corals in some situations but the consistant parameters and constant availability of nutrients most likely makes up for this.

I believe that in our aquariums we are not really trying to reproduce as close to 100% natural conditions. What we are trying to reproduce are the ideal natural conditions. As a aquarist I spend a good amount of time diving looking at flow, lighting, and where corals choice to naturally grow. In my SPS tank I currently have close to 110x turn over per hour.... in a 360g Display tank and I do think this is overkill but it does get rid of dead spots almost everywhere in the tank. In general I believe that the trend of intense water movement in modern SPS tanks is probabily a little over enthusiastic but necessary in the way we traditional setup flow to minimize deep spots within the rockwork.

If I had the chance to setup the tank all over again I would attempt to create a "rolling" flow that starts along the back wall, under the rocks, up along the front panel, over the top, and then back down again. In a sense this is basically a gyre which IMHO is the most efficient and natural flow pattern availalbe with a reversible gyre having the most potential. I had a 55g BB hexagon tank that I ran with a reversible gyre for a while and the consistant steady flow was great.

I hope that at least answers your questions a little bit. Its definetly a challenging point and one that does cross my mind requirely while diving.

 

[reefingbuddha]

Good luck Bro!

when does the tank come down?

Thanks man, I'm going to need it!

Tank is coming down on Monday and will be completely gone on Tuesday. Hopefully on to bigger and better in Florida but it might be a while.

Cheers!
Tom

 

[reefingbuddha]

Thank you for the underwater adventure.Absolutely amazing shots of the reefs. Kudo's to you. Only another photographer can really appreciate your work!!!!

Thanks starfish! Very much appreciate to get a positive peer review!

 

[reefingbuddha]

very nice picks can i use some for my background on my desktop?

PM sent.

Also a reminder that a native resolution JPEG can be purchased for either personal or commercial use from my website. Then you doing have to bother with that annoying watermark and you get full resolution which is a whole different ball game to seeing them this small.

Thanks for your interest!
Tom

 

[reefingbuddha]

I just checked my smugmug pricing and I noticed that the pricing have almost triple since I last set it. I'm not sure what happened but I apologize for this and have corrected the problem. Anyone who has purchase a print in the past 2 months will be contacted shortly and will be receiving a refund.

Cheers!
Tom

 

[GSMguy]

dang, thats a nice move bro!

 

[reefingbuddha]

Well I want to make sure I take care of the very few customers I've had.

Prices are very reasonable in my opinion. I order my prints from smugmug myself as I can't find cheaper printing for anywhere near the same quality either in London or Orlando.

Judging by the Zoa picture in your avatar it seems like you figured your camera out. Looks great!

 

[reefingbuddha]

And yet another pricing announcement!

I don't know if its me or the website provided but I went back again to check my price listing again for a potential client and noticed that the prices has returned to their previous state without me changing anything.

Once again I apologize, the prices have been corrected, and customers contacted and refunded.

Prices have returned to their portfolio wide low. Please have another look if you are at all interested and let me know if you have any complaints about my site.

Cheers!
Tom