Bill Curtsinger

Bill Curtsinger is an American photographer and writer who publishes on underwater photography and natural history subjects.

Curtsinger has photographed thirty-five articles, including six cover stories for National Geographic as well as a cover story for Life.

His photos have also appeared in Smithsonian, Natural History, various scientific journals and a number of books worldwide.

Curtsinger was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1946 and grew up in Mount Holly, New Jersey near the Pine Barrens region.

In later life, he provided photographic images for a book about the sprawling ecosystem at the barrens.

As a teenager Curtsinger was inspired to photograph the underwater arena by reading Jacques Cousteau's book The Silent World: A Story of Undersea Discovery and Adventure.

Cousteau was an award-winning underwater diver who captured exotic underwater videos and photos.

Curtsinger also read his grandfather's National Geographic magazines for additional inspiration.

Further inspiration as a teenager would come in the form of a poem by Robinson Jeffers.

"...Integrity is wholeness, the greatest beauty is organic wholeness, the wholeness of life and things, the divine beauty of the universe. Love that..."

At the age of 16, Curtsinger bought his first camera, a Kodak Retinette 1A 35mm rangefinder.

The first image he took was a Northern red-bellied turtle at Pine Barrens.

During the Vietnam War, in 1967 after graduating high school at 18, Curtsinger attended Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff.

After a year he transferred to Arizona State University in Tempe to join their photography program.

During the transfer of schools he lost course credits and was deemed a second-year freshman.

Because of this, the draft board reclassified him, making him eligible to be drafted into the Vietnam War effort.

Curtsinger preemptively joined the United States Navy to circumvent being drafted into the United States Army.

Due to his interest in photography, the Navy excepted Curtsinger into the elite Navy Photo Unit, Atlantic Fleet Combat Camera Group based at Naval Station Norfolk.

He was made an honorary member of the Red Rippers, U.S. Navy Fighter Squadron VF-11, and is credited as having the first color front and back covers in Naval Aviation News (1968).

As a Petty officer third class in 1968 Curtsinger was sent to Antarctica to photograph the National Science Foundation's Office of Polar Programs at McMurdo Station as part of Operation Deep Freeze, and in 1969 to Palmer Station, for which he was awarded the Antarctica Service Medal.

After six months in the Antarctic, Curtsinger approached Admiral George J. Dufek (Ret.), who at the time was the director of the Mariner's Museum in Newport News, Virginia, and knew of his work with Naval Aviation News and Antarctic Science.

Dufek led the first U.S. science effort in the Antarctic during Operation Highjump.

Curtsinger has stated that during a conversation with Dufek, he made a call to Gilbert M. Grosvenor, President of the National Geographic Society to set up a meeting to meet with Curtsinger.

In 1970 Curtsinger was transferred to the United States Navy Reserve as a Petty officer second class, where he served until 1973, resigning to pursue freelance photography for National Geographic.

Curtsinger is one of the first underwater photographers to capture extensive images of marine life under the polar ice in Antarctica.

He had been a freelance photographer since leaving the U.S. Navy with his photographic imagery focusing on underwater, natural history, maritime archaeology, people, culture, environments and wildlife.

He has photographed thirty-three articles, including six cover stories, for National Geographic.

Curtsinger's photos have also appeared on the cover of Orion, Life and Natural History magazines with stories in a number of other magazines such as BBC Wildlife and Smithsonian.

The subjects of Curtsinger's photographs have included species and natural systems such as whales, walruses, penguins, dolphins, seals, sea turtles and sharks.

His stories have featured locations such as Antarctica, Canada, Argentina, Africa and The Caroline Islands of the tropical Pacific.

Curtsinger's work also includes numerous textbooks, journals and aquarium displays and he has been a contributor to Gulf of Maine Research Institute publications and website.

His very first article was a cover story in the November 1971 issue of National Geographic, "Antarctica's Nearer Side" by Samuel W. Matthews.

He has eight titled published books including Extreme Nature: Images from the World's Edge, a four hundred page retrospective of his career, published in 2005 by White Star Publishers in nine languages.

Curtsinger has stated that he pitched his first assignment with National Geographic to Bob Gilka because he knew the magazine had not published any articles about the peninsula.

Having spent six months in the cold barren landscape of Antarctica he knew that the peninsula was more interesting and more biological diverse than what was previously published in the Geographic.

The camera unit was disestablished in 2018.

After graduating from U.S. Navy Dive School in Key West, Florida, curtsinger earned his Jump Wings in Lakehurst, New Jersey, and attended various U.S. Navy Flight Crew training units around Norfolk, Virginia.

He traveled the world on special assignments for the United States Fleet Forces Command of the Atlantic Fleet, including the Navy's research and development department photographing new launches of submarines, such as the USS Narwhal (SSN-671).

Curtsinger spent most of his Navy career covering the United States Navy carrier air operations.

He qualified to fly in the F-4 Phantom and A-6 Intruder to carry out his photo missions.