Bioluminescent Fungii

[Bibhav Behera]

What you see here is NOT a scene out of the Predator movie and is not Photoshopped.
Read on to find out more!!!
This is an image I took of Bioluminescent fungii in Agumbe. In the night, we found an area where we switched off our torches and headlamps. Sounds like a strange thing to do in the middle of a rainforest in the night. Right? But in a matter of minutes, the place lit up magically as our eyes got accustomed to the darkness. These fungii grow in rainforests dead plant matter and on tree barks. They are virtually invisible to the naked eye and can be seen only once they glow at night.
I used a very long exposure and was able actually capture the glow of these fungii.
I used the red LED (1 mm sized) on my camera trigger and that lit up the scene while the fungii were glowing and got this surreal image (a la Predator blood in the movie). I also took a few images in complete darkness which you can see here to get a feel of how it actually looks.
However images cannot do justice to the scene itself.