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If you have ever encountered the photographer species known as the macro shooter, you’ll understand what I am going to talk about. Part diver, part photographer, and part lab technician, the macro shooter type might tote a magnifying prescription mask, a camera that has so many gadgets attached to it that it looks like a portable microscope, and, is ultimately, the slowest, most painful dive buddy on the planet. 

But regardless of their oddities, macro shooters do a great service to the world, for they showcase the nuances that are often overlooked and underappreciated. One such specimen, Photographer of the Week, Lionel De Landtsheer, is absolutely guilty of driving a Christmas tree camera/microscope around underwater (see rig photo below); however, when you observe the creative range of the images he produces, most would agree his setup is justifiable. On the flipside, one would hope that his dingy driver has been lifting weights, and that his dive buddy is a member of the most patient dive species on the planet!
 

Tiger shrimp on a tunicate, Bali, Indonesia (105mm lens, 1.4x teleconverter)
 

A tiny (4mm) Costasiella sp., Bali, Indonesia (105mm lens, 1.4x teleconverter, Nauticam SMC-1 wet lens, Retra snoot)
 

A blue-ring octopus, Bali, Indonesia (60mm lens)
 

Face to face with a garden eel, Bali, Indonesia (105mm lens, 1.4x teleconverter, Nauticam SMC-1 wet lens)
 

Juvenile harlequin shrimp, Bali, Indonesia (105mm lens, 1.4x teleconverter)
 

Porcelain crab and sea fan, Bali, Indonesia (105mm lens, Subsea wet lens)
 

Batfish under the jetty in Padang Bay, Bali, Indonesia
 

Jawfish young ready to hatch, Bali, Indonesia
 

Lionel’s rig
 

Retra snoot, one of Lionel’s favorite pieces of equipment for macro shooting
 

Lionel, a member of the macro shooter species group

To see more of Lionel’s work, visit his facebook page, Beyond the Reef.