Shark attack survivor finds calling in underwater shark photography

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – In 1997, Mike Coots survived a brutal shark attack while bodyboarding at a Kauai beach. It severed his right leg, but it also put him on the path that would lead to his true calling: photography.

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”I think I’m very fortunate. I don’t have flashbacks. I don’t have bad dreams,” he said. “Life’s been absolutely incredible since that morning.”

Now 46, Coots has made a career out of taking underwater portraits of sharks — the aquatic animals that Hollywood often depicts as man-eating predators in search of prey.

He views them in a very different light.

“I’m a firm believer that if you see something beautiful, if you fall in love with it, you want to learn about it and in turn protect it. That’s really the end goal of my shark photography,” he said.

His fascination with photographing sharks began about 15 years ago when he was invited on a shark diving trip. He got in the water with a GoPro camera and started shooting.

”I remember putting the memory card in the card reader and putting that into the laptop. And on my laptop was a photo of a beautiful great white. I thought, ‘Gosh, this is the greatest subject on earth,’” he said.

Since then, he has traveled the globe in search of different shark species to photograph. He estimates he’s taken thousands of photographs of them, applying the same techniques he learned while studying portraiture in college.

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The images are visually stunning.

”You can really pick up on a smirk, a smile, maybe a catchlight in the eye,” he said. ”As a wildlife photographer, I think you’ve got to abide to ethics of telling these true stories. I have my photography gravitate toward those true authentic stories.”

Three years ago, Coots released a book of his work called “Shark Portraits.” It contains 240 pages of photographs aimed at countering the negative narrative surrounding sharks.

People around the world have bought his book.

”I feel very lucky with such a positive response. I get messages on social media almost daily of somebody getting it as a gift, as a Christmas present, as a birthday present,” he said.

Coots is now working on his next project, a black-and-white fine-art collection on great white sharks.

”In a way I feel sharks need a good publicist, and I’m maybe that publicist,” he said.

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