Keen diver Yusuke Fukami fulfilled a personal dream by snapping a cartoon-like Costasiella sea slug while in Bali in the last decade of December 2024. (Photo by Yusuke Fukami/South West News Service)

I had to stay late at work, Chubut, Argentina. “South sea elephant in Patagonia (Isla Escondida) They adopt very curious gestures!”. (Photo by Luis Burgue/Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards 2020)

I'm born in Russia in a village on the coast of the Sea of ​​Japan. The sea itself that always catches the attention of divers and underwater photographers from all over the Soviet Union.

I started with underwater photography recently, in 1998, with a simple underwater "boom box" "Canon" and "Epic".
Then a "Nikonos-5", complete with wide-angle and close-up.
The first trip to the Red Sea, with colorful fish .. The first attempts to make the macro and the knowledge that this equipment was not good.

Lake Assal is a crater lake in central-western Djibouti. It is located at the western end of Gulf of Tadjoura in the Tadjoura Region, touching Dikhil Region, at the top of the Great Rift Valley, some 120 km (75 mi) west of Djibouti city. Lake Assal is a saline lake which lies 155 m (509 ft) below sea level in the Afar Triangle, making it the lowest point on land in Africa and the third-lowest land depression on Earth after the Dead Sea and Sea of Galilee.

Patients from Rady Children's Hospital hug a bottlenose dolphin after being invited to swim and interact with dolphins at Sea World in San Diego, California August 27, 2015. Sea World has hosted Dolphin Interaction Program for seven years. It was started by dolphin trainer Joy Soto who battled and overcame non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. (Photo by Mike Blake/Reuters)

Ismail Mustafa, seen in 2007. “I was collecting mushrooms on the hill near here. I didn’t see the mine. There was a huge explosion. When I woke up I saw that both my legs were gone; I thought my life was over. My brother and another guy were with me. They made a stretcher from sticks and tied it together with clothing. It took two hours to get off the mountain. ‘My daughter has also been injured. She found a shell and brought it into the house and put it on the fire. She didn’t know what she was doing at the time – she was only three. She is blind and has lost an arm”. (Photo by Sean Sutton for the Mines Advisory Group/The Guardian)

“Kumbh Mela is a mass Hindu pilgrimage in which Hindus gather at the Ganges river. The normal Kumbh Mela is celebrated every 3 years, the Ardh (half) Kumbh Mela is celebrated every six years at Haridwar and Prayag, the Purna (complete) Kumbh takes place every twelve years, at four places (Prayag (Allahabad), Haridwar, Ujjain, and Nashik). The Maha (great) Kumbh Mela which comes after 12 “Purna Kumbh Melas”, or 144 years, is held at Allahabad.

The last Ardh Kumbh Mela was held over a period of 45 days beginning in January 2007, more than 70 million Hindu pilgrims took part in the Ardh Kumbh Mela at Prayag, and on January 15, the most auspicious day of the festival of Makar Sankranti, more than 5 million participated. The previous Maha Kumbh Mela, held in 2001, was attended by around 60 million people, making it at the time the largest gathering anywhere in the world in recorded history”. – Wikipedia

Photo: Sadhus (holy men) smoke at their camp near the ritual site at Sangam, the confluence of the Ganges, Yamuna and mythical Saraswati rivers during the Ardh Kumbh Mela festival (Half Pitcher festival) January 18, 2007 in Allahabad, India. Millions of Hindu pilgrims have flocked to the largest religious gathering in the world which lasts for 45 days in northern India. The festival commemorates the mythical conflict between gods and demons over a pitcher filled with the “nectar of immortality”. Devotees believe that taking a holy dip in the Ganges at this time washes away their sins and paves the path to salvation. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Talented French artist, Pierre Beteille, is skillful in manipulation of portraits (specially his own self portraits) using Photoshop. This is how he describes himself: “I am not a photographer or an artist, I just make images… I shoot very average or even bad photos that I try to improve thanks to Photoshop”…

Photo: “En attendant d'avoir des balles”...., 2007 (Photo by Pierre Beteille)