![\"Seahorse-Pygmy](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-13-750x500.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nBut photographing them is not easy. A real challenge, even...<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The first thing to worry about with these miniature sea horses is that they're not just \"pygmy\", they're downright half-naked! To observe them, some divers even take a magnifying glass underwater with them. That's saying a lot...<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With their size in the centimetre range (sometimes less), pygmy seahorses are really hard to spot. They can be found by patiently scanning the branches of the huge gorgonian sea fans in Weda Bay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The quest is a bit like looking for a needle in a haystack, sometimes... But you get there. The proof.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fortunately, I am helped by the eagle eye of my Indonesian guide, Radyal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It helps me to see them, in the huge coral fans, and then, above all, to find them again, when, with my mask stuck to the viewfinder of my tank, I moved a few centimeters and lost sight of the branch where the little sea horse on which I had set my heart on is hiding. Patience and calm are needed to succeed in photographing pygmy seahorses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We met two species during our dives at Weda.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The one that has pink or orange bumps, which serve as camouflage in the gorgonians of identical color, is a seahorse bargibanti<\/a>. The little yellow boy with the bald head goes by the sweet name of Denise<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second concern: the little seahorses do not like to be photographed at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Every time I point my macro lens at them, I get the same acrobatic act around the gorgonian branch. Here they are, slowly swiveling on their coiled tail, until they pass on the other side, ostensibly turning their back to me...<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n I take a deep breath, walk around the gorgon, take up my position, readjust the angle of my flash and the opening of the camera. And zut! I missed again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The development is very delicate to succeed, on such small creatures, it is played to the millimeter. But their shyness adds to the difficulty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And I really feel like they're taunting me... \" Hup! I'll turn my back on you again, I don't like photos.\"<\/p>\n\n\n\n \ud83d\ude05<\/p>\n\n\n\n The repetition of this subtle camouflage manoeuvre - once, twice, three times - is getting very annoying!<\/p>\n\n\n\n But, by dint of perseverance, I still manage to draw the portrait.<\/p>\n\n\n\n My photo equipment<\/a> : the Eos 7D and the lens Canon 60mm f \/ 2.8 EF-S Macro<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And I am the stubborn type, I must say... Able to stay stuck in front of a gorgon for long minutes, under the benevolent eye of my guide, who patiently spins out his string of bubbles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He waits for me to finish, to lead me to another coral fan, a few meters away. He even made a small round trip, to check that the gorgonian is still inhabited, since his last visit, while I am complaining in my regulator about the lack of cooperation of my tiny model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On one of the gorgonians we visited, we found a small family of sea horses. But here, I don't try anymore. Impossible to have everybody on the picture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I just took a few shots, for memory, with two seahorses in the frame. It's not that common to capture more than one at a time!<\/p>\n\n\n\n When it's time to sort out the images, in the evening, on my MacBook Air, I eliminate a lot of them, without any qualms. But I have come a long way since my very first images of a seahorse-pygmy with a compact camera, in 2008 (see right here<\/a> and the<\/a>)...<\/p>\n\n\n\n I've been doing a lot less \"macro\" since I got my new toy, the fisheye lens. Tokina 10-17<\/a>It's great for underwater photos. But at Weda, the tiny sea horses gave me a taste for the \"small\".<\/p>\n\n\n\n \ud83d\ude0d<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nothing more annoying to photograph than a seahorse-pygmy. Too small. Too well camouflaged. Too shy. But its delicate plastic is well worth some efforts.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4305,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tpgb_global_settings":"","_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[193],"tags":[195,196,197,657,24,26,36,295],"class_list":["post-4270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-voyage-indonesie-weda-halmahera-bangka-sulawesi-2013","tag-moluques","tag-halmahera","tag-weda","tag-moluques-du-nord","tag-hippocampe","tag-indonesie","tag-photographie","tag-plongee"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26.jpg?wsr","tpgb_featured_images":{"full":["https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26.jpg?wsr",1200,800,false],"tp-image-grid":["https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26-700x700.jpg?wsr",700,700,true],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26-250x250.jpg?wsr",250,250,true],"medium":["https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26-390x260.jpg?wsr",390,260,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26-770x513.jpg?wsr",770,513,true],"large":["https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26-780x520.jpg?wsr",780,520,true],"default":"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/plugins\/the-plus-addons-for-block-editor\/assets\/images\/tpgb-placeholder.jpg"},"tpgb_post_meta_info":{"get_date":"12 May 2013","get_modified_date":"9 September 2025","category_list":{"category":[{"term_id":193,"name":"Indon\u00e9sie : Weda [Halmahera] + Bangka [Sulawesi] - mars 2013","slug":"voyage-indonesie-weda-halmahera-bangka-sulawesi-2013","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":198,"taxonomy":"category","description":"Voyage en Indon\u00e9sie. Plong\u00e9e sous-marine \u00e0 Weda Bay (Halmahera, Moluques) et \u00e0 l'\u00eele de Bangka (Nord-Sulawesi).","parent":0,"count":9,"filter":"raw","term_order":"27"}],"post_tag":[{"term_id":195,"name":"Moluques","slug":"moluques","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":200,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":11,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":196,"name":"Halmahera","slug":"halmahera","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":201,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":8,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":197,"name":"Weda","slug":"weda","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":202,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":6,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":657,"name":"Moluques du Nord","slug":"moluques-du-nord","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":662,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":7,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":24,"name":"Hippocampe","slug":"hippocampe","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":24,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":15,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":26,"name":"Indon\u00e9sie","slug":"indonesie","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":26,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"Entre oc\u00e9an Indien et oc\u00e9an Pacifique, au c\u0153ur du Triangle de Corail<\/a>, l'Indon\u00e9sie est \u00e0 mes yeux la plus belle des destinations pour la plong\u00e9e sous-marine. Impossible de se lasser de cet archipel immense, s'\u00e9tirant sur trois fuseaux horaires. Je vous emm\u00e8ne explorer ces fonds d'une richesse extraordinaire, de Bali<\/a> \u00e0\u00a0Sulawesi<\/a>, de Komodo<\/a> \u00e0 Raja Ampat<\/a>, de Born\u00e9o<\/a> aux Moluques<\/a>...","parent":0,"count":182,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":36,"name":"Photographie","slug":"photographie","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":36,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":35,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"},{"term_id":295,"name":"Plong\u00e9e","slug":"plongee","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":38,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"La plong\u00e9e sous-marine est votre passion ? Moi aussi. Ici ou ailleurs, de la Bretagne \u00e0 l'Indon\u00e9sie, je vous emm\u00e8ne sous la surface faire des bulles et d\u00e9couvrir les merveilles de l'oc\u00e9an. Plongez \u00e0 travers l'\u00e9cran !","parent":0,"count":171,"filter":"raw","term_order":"0"}]},"author_name":"Corinne Bourbeillon","author_url":"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/en\/author\/cbourbeillon\/","author_email":"corinne.pbda@gmail.com","author_website":"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/corinne-bourbeillon\/","author_description":"Journaliste, plongeuse et\u00a0photographe sous-marine, Corinne adore faire des bulles avec les\u00a0poissons\u00a0! La beaut\u00e9 du monde et\u00a0de\u00a0l'oc\u00e9an lui ont inspir\u00e9 ce blog. \r\n\r\nEn savoir plus<\/a>","author_facebook":"","author_twitter":"","author_instagram":"","author_role":["administrator"],"author_firstname":"Corinne","author_lastname":"Bourbeillon","user_login":"cbourbeillon","author_avatar":"![\"Gorgon.](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/gorgone-10-750x500.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Seahorse-Pygmy](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-16-750x500.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Hippocampus](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-23-400x600.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nShy people<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Seahorse-Pygmy](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-17-750x500.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Seahorse-Pygmy](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-11-400x600.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Hippocampus](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-26-750x500.jpg\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Hippocampus](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-28-750x1125.jpg?wsr\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"Seahorse-Pygmy](\"https:\/\/petitesbullesdailleurs.fr\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/hippocampe-19-750x1125.jpg?wsr\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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