Sharks: Face-to-Face with the Ocean’s Endangered Predator

Lights, cables, and teeth: The ocean s endangered predator as never seen before Michael Mullerhas carved a career out of impressive encounters. Famed for his portraits of the world s most elite actors, musicians, and sports stars, he has in the last ten years built up one of the mostspectacular portfolios of underwater shark photography.

Muller s quest is to document sharks with an unprecedented proximity and precision, bringing the Hollywood portrait session to the ocean predator. In ocean depths around the world, he approaches the sharks with apatented seven-bulb, 1200-watt plexi-encased strobe lighting rig, developed with NASA engineering, andno cage. This unprecedented collection of Muller s images, including thefirst-known photograph of Great White breaching at night, is a catalog of adrenalin and awe.

Arranged geographically, it follows Muller’s ocean adventures from Black Tip and Sand Tiger sharks in South Africa to Great Hammerheads in the Bahamas, with thrilling narratives from each trip documenting the challenges and near-misses along the way. To compliment Muller s work for advocacy organizations such as WildAid and EarthEcho, the images are contextualised with essays from Philippe Cousteau, Jr.and marine biologistAlison Kock, who discuss exploration and conservation of our oceanic kingdom. Culture writer Arty Nelsonadds an overview of Muller s work, while a technical section explains the precise equipment behind these spectacular shots. Together, these insightful texts and awesome images offer a record of breathtaking photographic feats, a tribute to the beauty and might of the shark, and a rallying cry for its fragile future.”