I have written a few articles for UltraMarine Magazine over the past year or so and am pleased to have my first cover image with them this issue (Issue 33: April/May 2012).  The cover shot is a pink anemonefish that I took at Wakatobi Dive Resort in Indonesia a few years ago.  I've always had a soft spot for the image which I took with a very short depth of field, giving it an ethereal feel with soft pastel colours of the pale blue sky, purple mantle of the anemone and pinks of the fish. 

I'm excited to have the cover image and a feature article in the spring issue of Marine Conservation Society's magazine.  MCS is a UK based charity that does great work throughout the British Isles, protecting our amazing marine life. 

I am pleased to announce that this issue (Volume 2: Issue 1) I have the cover image and a feature article 'The Sex Life of Seahorses' in 72 & Rising Magazine, which is a magazine focusing on marine and freshwater environments and their conservation. 

Check out the article here:

The Sex Life of Seahorses by Richard Smith (© Richard Smith 2012)

I am extremely pleased to announce that my image of mating Denise’s pygmy seahorses (Hippocampus denise) taken at Wakatobi Dive Resort is the ‘Parting Shot’ in the new issue (Winter 2012) of Alert Diver magazine (see attachment below).

I'm really pleased to have my third cover shot in a row for the magazine 'Sport Diving' in issue 150, which is available throughout Australia and Asia.  With this issue, my shots will have graced the cover of Sport Diving for the past six months!  The shot of a nudibranch, Phidiana indica, crawling over a tunicate, Polycarpa sp., was taken aboard Dewi Nusantara last year in the Raja Ampat region of Indonesia. 

The new issue of Sport Diving magazine is available now throughout Asia and Australia.  It is the 150^th issue of the publication and I am honoured to have the second part of my Aussie road trip article 'Heading South: Drive and Dive - Sydney to Tasmania' as well as my third cover shot for Sport Diving in a row.

My scientific publication on the habitat specialisation and population structure of gorgonian-associated pygmy seahorses has just been published in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series (Link to the MEPS page):

Smith RE, Grutter AS & Tibbetts IR (2012).  Extreme habitat specialisation and population structure of two gorgonian-associated pygmy seahorses.  Marine Ecology Progress Series 444: 195-206

With the help of a very kind Taiwanese gentleman, Paladin Liu, I am now pleased to offer a Chinese version of the Code of Conduct for diving with and photographing pygmy seahorses.

Paladin has been seeing pygmy seahorses on some of his dives in Taiwan and wished to help protect them by sharing the Code of Conduct with his dive buddies.  I'm really pleased for his input and helping for this information to reach such a wide audience.

I just found out that I have the cover image of Sport Diving again this issue (issue 149 - December 2011/January 2012).  The shot is of a soft coral porcelain crab (Lissoporcellana nakasonei) on a sea pen, taken in southern Komodo, Indonesia.