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Finalist Exploration Photographer of the Year

Sirachai Arunrugstichai Thailand

6°49'55.7"N N 99°32'31.3"E N

Staghorn corals exposed at low tide, the Milky Way visible in the distance. It took photographer Sirachai Arunrugstichai a year to capture the image from the time he first visualised it: “I stumbled upon this pristine intertidal reef while working on a story. I wanted to capture the exposed corals during spring tide with the Milky Way in the same frame. I waited for 10 months for the Milky Way and the corals to fit in the same frame.”

BEHIND THE LENS

2020 EPoY finalist, Sirachai Arunrugstichai

Sirachai Arunrugstichai Thailand

ABOUT THE IMAGE

  • Camera: Nikon D850
  • Housing: Nauticam
  • Captrued pre-dawn, at 5:19am
  • Low tide, new moon

Sirachai (Shin) Arunrugstichai is a Thai photojournalist, specialized in marine conservation issues. With his background in marine biology, studying shark fisheries, he shifted his career path toward photojournalism to communicate marine conservation issues with the general public in 2015, and has been loving it. He is an Emerging League of the International League of Conservation Photographers, a talent of 6x6 Global Talent Program of World Press Photo Foundation and a National Geographic Explorer. As an independent photographer, he mainly works with National Geographic Magazine (Thai edition) and has also been working on assignment with several conservation organizations, including IUCN Asia, Save Our Seas Foundation, WildAid, Greenpeace Southeast Asia and more, while some of his photos have been published in National Geographic (online), the Smithsonian Mag, and the Washington Post.