I did a spot of macro diving in Sepanggar the other day on the 9th of May. Three dives, to be exact. In truth, all my dives around the Kota Kinabalu area may as well be macro diving. As visibility is rarely crystal clear and waters can be a shade of emerald green.

Given the poor visibility or less than ideal conditions for wide angle, I primarily equipped my Sony A6400 camera with the Sony 90mm Macro G OSS lens. Housed in a Seafrogs Salted Line underwater housing, I did not attach any wet lens.

One of the more obvious macro subjects when diving in Sepanggar are nudibranchs. Whilst more common in the colder waters of January, these macro subjects are around all year. Small and vividly colourful, these macro subjects can be fun to spot and observe. These were found on the day itself.

Aside from nudibranchs, other macro critters we found while diving in Sepanggar included blennies, decapods, and stomatopods.

Miscellaneous Dive Details

Of note, this was the first time using air integration from a Suunto Tank Pod. Now I get a low air warning in addition to the other warnings I get whilst diving. This dive marks the second time I’ve had a run-in with true macro critters, the Costasiella sea slugs. Photo quality isn’t great, didn’t want to spend too long trying to shoot them. But I probably should have given it a fair go. Will try again next time. Overall, visibility was not great but not unexpected given the rain prior. However, it remains a worthwhile endeavour while doing macro photography. The same cannot be said if attempting wide-angle, or at least it provides an unnecessarily hard challenge. I will strongly consider shooting the strobes at full power constantly the next go around given the photo results.