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An underwater image taken by Ryohei Ito, a hairdresser living in Yoshikawa, Saitama Prefecture, has won first prize in the Portrait Category of the world-famous Underwater Photographer of the Year (UPY) Competition 2021.
The 36-year-old is the first Japanese who has ever been ranked first in any category of the UPY contest. Thrilled at the news, Ito said, “I am overjoyed to win this prize and honored to be lined up with the prominent overseas photographers who I have looked up to for so long.”
The prize-winning photograph is an image of an Asian sheepshead wrasse, known as
kobudai in Japanese. Ito shot the fish, a member of the Labridae family, in the Pacific Ocean off the city of Tateyama, Chiba Prefecture. The moniker of the fish comes from the big bump on its head, after which it has been named