Jellyfish at the Tennessee Aquarium
Of all of the different marine life that we saw at the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga, my favorite to photograph were the jellyfish. Strange, isn’t it? After all, I have had some run-ins with jellyfish at the beach before, and that definitely wasn’t my favorite thing about the beach. Because a jellyfish sting can hurt like all get out, if not worse. So if we ever see jellyfish out in the ocean, we are sure to go the other way.
However, these jellyfish were safely enclosed behind glass. And they were lit with interesting light, which really showed off their transparent-ness. They almost looked otherworldly as they floated around. Looking at them like this, it is strange to think about how much they can sting, and how much those stings can hurt.
Actually, jellyfish don’t seem to be aggressive at all. They don’t come charging after you saying, “Hey you in the funny shorts! Yeah you! I’m going to sting you until you scream for mercy! That will teach you to come invade my ocean!”
They just float around this way and that. You only get stung if you brush up against them. And I wonder if they would then say, “Oops! Sorry about that! I don’t really have a way to quickly control my motion, or I would have tried to avoid you!”
But then that raises another question: How would they say that, when they don’t appear to have mouths?
About the photo:
A single RAW exposure, processed in Photoshop. Read more about the photo software and gear I use at the camera gear page.
Camera: Olympus OM-D E-M10
Lens: Olympus 14-42mm IIR
