The most compelling whale images tend to show the majestic leviathans in full breach, lunge-feeding on schooling fish, or revealing their flukes.
But last Thursday a vastly different image was captured in California’s Monterey Bay by Eric Austin Yee, showing a remarkable closeup of a humpback whale’s face and eye.
“A curious humpback whale with its eye wide open doing some people watching,” Yee, who was with Blue Ocean Whale Watch, wrote for his Facebook description.
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Open-eye shots are difficult to capture, but what helps set this image apart are the vivid patterns and surreal facial markings.
“It almost looks like a watercolor,” one person commented.
The circular marks are scars left by acorn barnacles, Alisa Schulman-Janiger, a California-based whale researcher, told For The Win Outdoors.
But it doesn’t require a vivid imagination to conjure a sea jelly, or jellyfish, with its tentacles draped around the whale’s blue eye.
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Or the billed creatures – one with what looks like a duck’s head – positioned in front of the eye.
“I think this is my favorite photo of a humpback that I have ever seen,” another commenter wrote. “Like, I want this in full print on my wall.”
Yee was working as a naturalist aboard the High Spirits, which was returning to port at Moss Landing when humpback whales were spotted.
“We were heading home but couldn’t resist turning around to a group of humpbacks that originally was two humpbacks, but became four,” Yee told For The Win Outdoors.
The whales swam to the boat after it had been idled, allowing Yee to capture the closeup, and Capt. Kate Cummings to capture her own images of the same whale, as well as video showing three of the whales engaged in “friendly” behavior alongside the vessel. (Images and video accompany this post.)
Cummings said the whale photographed by Yee stood out because of its extensive white markings, especially along its throat pleats.
Schulman-Janiger agreed with Cummings that they were likely part of a skin disease, but the whale seemed as playful and active and as the others and did not seem bothered by the skin condition.
Cummings posted her video to Facebook along with this description:
“Incredible experience today with friendly humpback whales! Three whales spent nearly a half hour circling and rolling around the boat and getting super close! One whale got a little too close and swiped the side of the boat with its flukes when it was twisting! For a whale, it was a gentle tap.”
Yee said he was shooting from the upper deck with an 80- to 200-millimeter lens.
–Images and video are courtesy of Blue Ocean Whale Watch