A face only its mother could love/ugly-beautiful - The Lionfish

I have been hoping to see and get an underwater photo of one of these for ages, and today when I went diving I saw 5 of them.
I got new underwater camera in May but still unable to use it as they forgot to provide the cable for the flash and you really need a flash for most underwater photography, they posted it - and it ended up coming the slow way - mail can take 2-3 months to get to us here, I'm told the ship with the mail will arrive next weekend (provided the weather holds). aarrgghhh

[Jennifer C]

saw these in fiji- great shot

[Mcdougall]

This is gorgeous.

[aikimomm (phoebe)]

I love lionfish -- and this is such a great shot of one!

[michael-ann]

Fantastic pic! You must have been pretty close to this guy, aren't they poisonous?

[Robin]

Fabulous shot. They are so ugly they are beautiful!

[alia_801]

Great capture! Such interesting patterns :)

[Renee]

I love these guys! Great shot of him

[Janna E.]

Wonderful underwater shot! How brave of you to get so close - I've heard their stings are nasty but I usually wear my diving suit, when I get close. Where you scuba-diving or snorkelling, when you took this?

[Megan Richardson]

@jannaellen The water temps here are about 27-29 deg C so I don't bother with a wet suit (but the fire coral can cause a nasty rash if you brush it accidentally) - this was taken scubadiving at about 22m - I'm really looking forward to getting the cable for my underwater flash and getting even better underwater shots

[Megan Richardson]

@jenrobcarr @mcdougall @aikimomm @intrepidme @girlie @alia_801 @renelou thanks - yes they are poisonous - but they were all a bit sluggish - hiding under rock ledges and so on, so minimal risk to me, but it made it difficult to get a decent angle for a photo. There were two different species of them out there, I look forward to getting a shot of one of the other species to contrast the patterns on them.

[Shannon Pitton]

FAB! I've never seen of of these outside of an aquarium, this is a good shot, with or without flash.

[Alan Warren]

If you're not wearing a wetsuit, does that mean you're going "Blue Lagoon" style? Bow-chicka-wow-wow! ;)

[Janna Dawn Goldrup]

What a beautiful species this is. It looks to be daring you to mess with it.

[Tanya]

We saw lionfish in Samoa but I havent seen one here. The water where you are sounds just about as warm as it is around Cambodia although it did get up to 35C in the last hot season which sadly caused quite a bit of coral bleaching. Still Id rather that than the 22C we dived at on Great Barrier a couple of weeks ago...bbbrrr!!