Exploring the murky depths of a freezing Scottish loch in the dead of winter might not sound that appealing but it is Ross McLaren’s “happy place”.
A chemistry teacher by day, the 31-year-old says floating 40ft below the surface for 60 minutes in his spare time to capture underwater life is where he finds peace.
He learned to dive a few years ago in preparation for a longed-for trip to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef.
The trip didn’t happen due to family illness but the hobby turned into a passion after he started taking photographs of the exotic creatures and vibrant plants he is “privileged” to see.
His stunning images might look like they have been taken in a tropical island but are captured below the surface of Loch Long and Loch Fyne where he once spent 15 minutes observing an octopus.
“We are world famous for mountains, castles and landscapes but so so few people understand that our underwater world is just as rugged, just as untamed and just as vibrant,” says the 31-year-old who lives in Kilwinning with his wife Rachel and 11-month-old daughter Hannah.
“Sadly my trip to Australia didn’t go ahead because my father-in-law fell ill but I ended up falling in love with diving in Scotland.
“Okay, it’s not quite the Great Barrier Reef but it opened up a whole new side of Scotland to me.
READ MORE: Were Iron Age Scots already fans of the fish supper?
“We look out onto our waters and all we see is a steely grey. You might just imagine there’s a couple of shopping trolleys and a car under there."
While he says he initially used a basic underwater camera and his photography was very much a “point and shoot” approach, his technique has been refined with night classes and experience built up over the last six years.
“The first thing is you are there to observe the marine life,” says the teacher. You should not be impacting on it.
“That means you have to have really good buoyancy, you have to be able to keep yourself level in the water.
“It’s not the easiest and I’ve learned through trial and error and talking to other underwater photographers.
“It’s expensive too. I don’t think I’ve ever told my wife how much I’ve spent on equipment,” he says, laughing.”
READ MORE: The incredible life of Scotland's seabed revealed
The 2020 Oscar-winning film My Octopus Teacher followed filmmaker Craig Foster forging a relationship with a wild common octopus in a South African kelp forest and the 31-year-old says he was lucky enough to have his own experience with the enigmatic sea creature.
“For a good 15-20 minutes it was pretty happy to sit on the seabed,” he says.
“The octopus was pretty special but even looking at crabs...we all know what a crab looks like but watching them interact in their own environment is incredible.
“You’ve got the things you don’t expect like Bobtail Squid and little Cuttlefish which you see on programmes like Blue Planet and you don’t expect to see them in a Scottish Loch or in the Clyde.
“It sounds cheesy but it is a privilege to see these creatures in their own habitat."
The most challenging aspect of underwater photography in Scotland is visibility.
“It can be hit or miss,"he says.
“We had a spell in May when the visibility was 15-25 metres and that’s generally what you expect abroad.
“Normally in Scotland you are looking at five metres in front of you. It can get down to one metre at time and it can be so claustrophobic.
“This is where people say, how can that make you feel better but it's the unknown, that’s what keeps me coming back.
“I think if I was diving abroad somewhere like the Maldives and seeing these creates every day I would get bored.
"In Scotland you go for a dive and you never know what it will be like.”
He says he has noticed an increase in shoals of fish in the past couple of months in and around the lochs.
“I’m not saying there has been an improvement in water quality, it might be nothing but I’ve certainly noticed more,” he says.
The 31-year-old, who teaches at Garnock Community Campus in Beith, says he has suffered from anxiety in the past and diving has improved his mental health.
“If I got a headache it would be a brain tumour, I fixate on the worst possible things," he said.
“I think a lot of people see water and there is a sense of fear but for me, being weightless for 60 minutes, cut off from the world is a release.
“It’s had such a big impact on my life.”
Little was known about marine life before French naval officer, ocean explorer, filmmaker, and author Jacques Cousteau pioneered the aqualung in 1943, which set divers free to explore to depths of 100 feet and beyond.
His explorations were the subject of award-winning documentaries and TV shows as well as popular books.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here