Blackwater Diving in Anilao, Batangas

Blackwater diving has become very popular in underwater photography circles. This was my second time doing it (first time was in Cozumel, Mexico) and boy was I rewarded ✨ 🤩 🔥 .

Blackwater diving is done in the middle of the ocean often with depths of thousands of feet. We set out at 7 pm for our destination of Balayan Bay.

When we reached our spot, the boat team lowered a buoy with floodlights set up at 5 meters, 10 meters and 15 meters. These lights serve as our reference point and also attract various ocean nightlife.

Towards the last 10 minutes of our dive, our guide spotted a paper nautilus aka argonaut which is a type of octopus typically found on the deeper side, closer to 100 feet. He spotted the critter at around 85 feet so my buddy, Linda Elliott and me swam down to capture photos of this guy 📸 🎥 🎉.

Many of my scuba diving friends have done blackwater dives for over a year without seeing one so we were truly lucky!

Photographing this guy and other critters is not easy as they move so quickly. Fortunately I captured the nautilus on video.

Other photos that I captured include this sort of catfish.

And this salp of what looks like tiny baby nautilus.

Check out the other interesting stuff from this blackwater dive.