Jim Hellemn - Underwater Landscapes

Jim Hellemn is an underwater imaging specialist and digital artist. His work has appeared in National Geographic Magazine, at the American Museum of Natural History and is featured in several public attractions across the country.

"My personal hope is that my images and the exhibitions that we do will help people begin to appreciate the ocean as a vital part of our world and begin to take realistic steps to protect and preserve marine environments for our future generations." – Jim Hellemn

You can only see a coral reef well up-close, and you'll need to bring some light with you. Back up enough to see a wider view, and it disappears in blue.  Jim has spent a career developing new ways to capture the essence of these special places, developing equipment and techniques that enable him to photograph an entire reef. His first coral reef image "Great Wall West", published in National Geographic in 2001, was the first "stitched" image, and the highest resolution coral reef image ever created. Jim spends days or even months on a reef, taking hundreds of precise photos up close with specially designed light sources. In post-production, he uses high-power computers to assemble all the individual images into a seamless super-wide landscape that captures all the true colors and detail. The images are more than just a photograph of a beautiful landscape -they document an important ecosystem that is vital to our planet.