Ocean Art: winning shots from underwater photo competition

From octopus eggs to otherworldly blackwater scenes, the 11th annual Ocean Art Underwater Photo Competition has brought a fresh wave of outstanding images from across the world.

Organised by Underwater Photography Guide, the latest instalment of the contest featured a total of 14 categories, including a newly launched Mobile Phone category. “I expected an ‘instagrammable’ moment to steal the show,” said the guide’s editor-in-chief Nirupam Nigam, but “instead, each image is that of photographic excellence or poetic reflection of the world around us” .

The judges – who included renowned underwater photographers Tony Wu, Mark Strickland and Marty Snyderman – reviewed thousands of submissions from shutterbugs in 96 countries before choosing the winners, announced this week.

The winning Best in Show image was taken by Kat Zhou off the coast of West Palm Beach, Florida. During four underwater dives, Zhou observed a female octopus protecting her eggs. Watching the mother “was a bittersweet feeling”, Zhou said, because “like all other species of octopus, this mother does not eat while she tends to her eggs, and she will die after they hatch”.

Below are some of the top images from the various categories, which included Underwater Conservation, Cold Water, Underwater Art and Marine Life Behaviour.