The winners of our readers poll of images from our Big Shots underwater photography competitions of 2024
We asked our readers to vote for their favourite images from our most recent Big Shot underwater photography competitions. Here are the top six, as published in our Winter 2025 magazine.
Way out ahead on the poll was Catherine Holmes’s stunning image of a marauding tarpon surrounded by silversides, with nearly 20 per cent of the votes cast. It was closely followed by Jenny Stock’s fingered dragonet.
We’ll feature a portfolio of Catherine’s work in our Spring 2025 magazine, and if you haven’t already done so, make sure you enter our first Big Shots competition of 2025 on the theme of Portraits.
The winner, selected by DIVE’s editorial staff, will receive a liveaboard trip to the Similan Islands onboard the Thailand Aggressor, courtest of Aggressor Adventures.
Big Shots Portraits – enter here!
OVERALL WINNER: SOLITARY HUNTER, by Catherine Holmes
(Highly Commended in the Summer 2024 Big Shots Caves, Caverns & Overhangs)
Location: A huge hunting tarpon appears at the centre of a school of silversides, Eden Rock, Grand Cayman.
Shot with: Olympus EM1 Mk11, 8mm LUMIX G Fisheye 8/3.5, Nauticam housing, x2 Inon Z-330 strobes; f8, 1/125, ISO 500
SECOND – BLACK SAND GEM, by Jenny Stock
Highly Commended in the Autumn 2023 Big Shots Kaleidoscope
Location: While muck diving on black sands, I found this fingered dragonet and I tried to capture as
symmetrical a portrait as possible. Lembeh, Indonesia.
Shot with: Canon 5D Mark IV; 100mm lens; Nauticam housing; f16, 1/100, ISO 640
THIRD: SQUID SQUAD, By Catherine Holmes
Winner in the Spring 2024 Big Shots Cephalopods
Location: I spent many days getting to know the school of squid in the warm shallow
water around Cement Pier in Barbados.
Shot with: Nikon D500; Sigma 17-70 macro lens at 17mm; Nauticam housing; Retra Pro strobes; f13, 1/250, ISO 500
FOURTH: THE DESCENT, by Tom St George
Highly Commended in the Summer 2024 Big Shots Caves, Caverns & Overhangs
Location: A diver descends through a magnificent column of sunlight and crystal-clear waters at Cenote Maravilla, Yucatán.
Shot with: Sony α7R III, Sigma 15mm fisheye lens, Nauticam housing and ports, 1 x Scubalamp PV32T focus torch; f10, 1/200, ISO 200
FIFTH: INTO THE FLAMES, by Miguel Ramirez
Highly Commended in the Autumn 2024 Big Shots Bright & Beautiful
Location: An emperor shrimp camouflaged in the gills of a Spanish dancer, Réunion Island, Indian Ocean.
Shot with: Nikon D500, Nikon 85mm lens, Hugyfot housing, 2 Inon Z-330 strobes, f11, 1/250, ISO 100
SIXTH: COMING OUT TO PLAY, by JillAnne McCarty
Highly Commended in the Spring 2024 Big Shots Cephalopods
Location: A coconut octopus plays with a scallop shell while tucked securely inside its beer bottle hideout on the sea floor in Anilao, Philippines.
Shot with: Nikon D850; Nikon 105mm lens; Nauticam housing; Retra strobe; f10, 1/60, ISO 200
Related articles
- DIVE’s Big Shot Bright and Beautiful – the winners
- DIVE’s Big Shot Caves, Caverns & Overhangs – the winners
- DIVE’s Big Shot Cephalopods – the winners
- DIVE’s Big Shot Kaleidoscope – the winners
