a humpback whale

Magical Images Reveal the Beauty and Raw Power of the Ocean

This photographer lives by the tides, the swell, and the wind–championing the natural wonder of our world’s oceans.

Photographer Michaela Skovranova says swimming with humpback whales in Tonga helped push her to focus primarily on underwater photography and filmmaking.
Photograph by Michaela Skovranova
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Michaela Skovranova jokes that her first underwater photograph was actually made through a glass tank at an aquarium.

While Skovranova was a university student, the Australia-based photographer worked as an education officer at Wildlife Sydney. Her job often required that she work at SEA LIFE Sydney Aquarium, based in the city’s Darling Harbour. On those days, Skovranova would arrive to the aquarium early, at six or seven in the morning, and wander around with her camera. “I wondered what it would be like to swim with the animals and to document them,” she says.

Her favorite animals to photograph at the aquarium were the fur seals. She recalls how engaged they were with her, staring back when she’d look at

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