Half a century of going to look.

Joel Bergsma first went around the world in 1975, as a student aboard the World Campus Afloat, and has not really stopped since. He began photographing underwater in 2009, and in the years that followed worked his way through the great dive regions of the Pacific and the Caribbean: Palau's Blue Corner and German Channel, the WWII fleet on the floor of Chuuk Lagoon, the shark dive at Vertigo in Yap, Sipadan and the muck sites of Kapalai, the currents of Komodo, Lembeh and Bunaken, and the Philippines again and again, from Tubbataha to Anilao, Puerto Galera, Dauin and Verde Island.

Closer to home he has returned to Cozumel seven times, swum with whale sharks off Isla Mujeres, and swum with the sea lions of La Paz in the Sea of Cortez. Bonaire, Curacao, Belize's Turneffe Atoll, the Cayman walls and the Kittiwake wreck, and the Galapagos round out the map.

He founded Blue World of Wonder Videography in 2018 to cut and share the footage that stills cannot hold: a frogfish yawning, a hawksbill feeding on sponge, a spotted eagle ray lifting off the sand in slow motion. Topside, the same curiosity has taken him on safari at Marataba and Thornybush, up the Mekong, down the Amazon from Iquitos, and across Europe.

Joel's archive holds more than eight thousand frames and several hundred film clips, keyworded by species, site and date. Every photograph on this site is his own work unless credited otherwise. Prints and editorial licensing are available by inquiry.

Elsewhere

joel@joelbergsma.comPrints and licensingFilm