"Deep Dive"

Preserved on a Kodak Ektachrome slide, this image takes you somewhere most cameras never went — beneath the surface of the ocean, where everything is blue and everything is quiet and the ordinary world above simply ceases to exist.

A scuba diver moves through a rocky coral landscape, tanks and regulator visible, fins trailing, leaning in to examine something in the reef with the unhurried curiosity of someone who has learned to breathe underwater. The Ektachrome film renders the whole scene in the most extraordinary deep blue and teal tones — luminous, otherworldly, and completely alive.

There is a particular kind of peace that only exists below the surface. No noise, no rush, no sense of time passing in the ordinary way. Just the diver, the reef, and the slow pulse of the ocean around them.

Some places require extraordinary effort to reach. This one was worth every bubble.