Nicholas More: Anilao

Issue 28 of Anima Mundi magazine is available to download. It features articles about clouded leopards, the Kaziranga National Park, Namibia’s Sossusvlei, the winners of the 2016 Global Article Awards and China’s cavefish.
Nikon has released the details of the new D850 FX SLR. It features a 45.7-megapixel CMOS sensor married to the EXPEED 5 processing engine. This gives a native ISO range of 64 to 25,600 and a frame rate of 7fps. Autofocus is the 153-point, Multi-Cam 20K systems from the D5/500 and the camera captures full frame 4K UHD at 24/30fps. There is a thread on the Wetpixel forum discussing the new camera.
Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, and a search team from the Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC) in Washington D.C. found the resting place of the USS Indianapolis last saturday. The wreck is considered the “last great naval tragedy” of World War II. It was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine and came to rest more than 18,000 feet below the surface of the Philippine Sea.
The results of the 2017 Ocean Views imaging contest have been announced. Rather than existing as a stand alone, the competition has been incorporated into the Windland Smith Rice International Awards as a category. A gallery of all the winning and highly honored images has been posted, along with two bonus galleries (1)(2) of images that “* are too stunning to miss*.” Congratulations to overall winner Andy Sallmon and to all the members of the Wetpixel community that are among the placings.
Western Digital has announced their My Book Duo storage system. Available in capacities up to 20TB and interfaced via Type C USB 3.1 Gen 1, it also has two USB ports that allow it to be used as a hub. The My Book Duo offers native support for RAID 0 and RAID 1.
An entirely pink dolphin, known at “Pinky”, has been spotted off the coast of Louisiana. The dolphin was originally spotted in 2007, but hasn’t been photographed since then. This most recent sighting was in Calcasieu Ship Channel near Hackberry, Louisiana by Bridget Boudreaux, who also stated that she two pink dolphins that day. Scientists think the pink coloration may be more than just albinism, as all white dolphins have been seen before, it may be a genetic mutation.
A study published in the journal Fisheries Research investigates the beliefs , attitudes and behaviors of land-based shark anglers. The authors studied posts on an online fishing forum. The posts show that there is a widespread disregard for legal regulation of what they catch. The authors counted 389 examples of “illegal fishing activity” being openly discussed on the forum between 2010 and 2015. ((Image from Shutterstock.)
Underwater Photographer and Canon Explorer, Franco Banfi, has written a comprehensive review of the EOX 1D X Mark II camera for the Canon Professional Network. He compares using it on assignment with sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) in Dominica and with hammerhead sharks (Sphyrna mokarran) in Bimini, Bahamas. In his review, He praises the 1D X Mark II for its autofocus, speed and ISO performance.