# Aquarium Photography



## KnaveTO (May 13, 2007)

So my question is to those of you that get such great pics of your tanks. I was curious about how you get the pics you do. What settings do you use on your cameras? I have a Sony DSLR camera that I bought off Tabetha and would like to try getting some nice pics of the tanks. However I am not sure what f-stop to be using, and all those other weird settings that are on the camera.

Thanks


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## I_dude (May 9, 2008)

I have this strange suspicion that gunnerx dives into his aquariums with scuba gear and takes pictures of his fish.

Nothing else explains it


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## Tabatha (Dec 29, 2007)

Big aperature, fast shutter speed if you're taking pics of fish that just won't stay still! On the Sony, I'd just set it to macro (the little flower icon) for close-ups.

The little Canon point and shoot TDF bought me (early b-day present) has an aquarium setting!!!


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## KnaveTO (May 13, 2007)

Tabatha said:


> Big aperature, fast shutter speed if you're taking pics of fish that just won't stay still! On the Sony, I'd just set it to macro (the little flower icon) for close-ups.
> 
> The little Canon point and shoot TDF bought me (early b-day present) has an aquarium setting!!!


That is the rub... as long as I have had digital cameras (this is my 3rd) I have never learned what is what... which setting is a fast aperature... what is a fast shutter, which ISO do I use etc.


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## Tabatha (Dec 29, 2007)

For aperture, the higher the number the smaller the aperture. For shutter speed, the higher the number, the faster the shutter.


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## gunnerx (Mar 20, 2008)

The most important part is proper metering. If you have a DSLR, there's a meter that you will see in the viewfinder. You want the object you're taking a picture of to be in the middle. However, you can get away with -2 to +2. The best way to meter is to find the darkest part (underexposed -ve) and metre that as close as possible to 0 and then find the brightest point (overexposed +ve) and also make that as close as possible to 0.

The 3 most important settings that affect each other are Aperture (f-stop), Shutter speed and ISO. Based on the camera, the entry level DSLRs are usually good for 400 to 800 ISO. Higher than that you will get a lot of noise. A good lens will have a larger aperture but the downside is that it will have a shallow Depth of Field (DOF). 

Aperture is measured by 1/f. The largest aperture you can have is 1.0. So when the aperture is 64, the actual size is 1/64 so the larger the number gets, the smaller the aperture is.

So, if you have a perfect picture with everything at 0, here's how each setting is affected to keep everything at 0:

-Increasing the Aperture means you can increase the shutter speed or lower the ISO
-Decreasing Aperture means you have to decrease the shutter speed or increase the ISO
-Increasing the ISO means you can either decrease the Aperture or Increase shutter speed

The most important part with any camera is the lens. A good lens with good glass will take better and sharper images. You also need a lot of patience and lots of practice. 

I take pictures without any flash due to the reflection from the glass. I usually set my ISO at 1600 and use the largest Aperture available to the lens then adjust the shutter speed accordingly. Hope this didn't confuse you more.


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## gunnerx (Mar 20, 2008)

Tabatha said:


> The little Canon point and shoot TDF bought me (early b-day present) has an aquarium setting!!!


Is that the icon with the fishy on it? That's actually an underwater setting if you have the underwater case. That would work great as you can get really up close and personal with the fishes.


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## Tabatha (Dec 29, 2007)

gunnerx said:


> Is that the icon with the fishy on it? That's actually an underwater setting if you have the underwater case. That would work great as you can get really up close and personal with the fishes.


Yes, it is, then I select macro + turn the flash off.  Unfortunately it doesn't always want to focus on what I want it to focus on but with a little trickery, I can get it to work.


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## ameekplec. (May 1, 2008)

I have one of them point and shoot underwater cameras too, and it's great. I've tried a few times to take shots in the aquarium, and generally it works better than my attempts to take pictures from the outside.

Other than that, I am inept at photography, and can only dream of being able to properly use a SLR


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## Ciddian (Mar 15, 2006)

I take a billion photos and play with all the setting till i get at least two good ones. LOL


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## planter (Jun 9, 2008)

Check this link out it's filled with useful info

http://www.kwas.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=7235


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## Zebrapl3co (Mar 29, 2006)

gunnerx said:


> The most important part is proper metering. If you have a DSLR, there's a meter that you will see in the viewfinder. You want the object you're taking a picture of to be in the middle. ...


Wow gunner, you've just condense then entire photo taking 010 in to one paragraph. Nice work.

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## Mr Fishies (Sep 21, 2007)

Gunner did a good job of hitting the big parts for sure - without overwhelming with minutiae. When you have a DSLR you have (IMO) two major concepts to think about...

- The technical capabilities of your camera and lens. Aperture size, shutter speed, ISO, white balance etc...this you only have to learn once and it's really not that daunting if you break it into bite sized chunks.

- The art of photography. Time of day to take the picture, lighting, exposure, angle, composition. This is where you have to know the stuff above, and learn what you can do by manipulating settings in relation to each other to achieve different results taking the same picture.

Yes, don't forget patience and practice and practice and practice... No matter how good your camera gear is - crummy photos are always possible. (I'm proof of that - after 3 years my "entry level" D70s is *still *a much better camera than I am photographer! ) Ciddian made a good point about shooting in bulk and discarding the bad shots - this is how digital has brought "professional quality" photography to the consumer, it costs nothing to delete bad pics, so we don't need to blow $X hundred on film and processing to get a few good shots so fire away!

If you don't have a tripod, that's a good place to start - your patience will not last if you have to sit in front of your aquarium and hold a camera waiting for a good shot.

Don't be discouraged if you don't get magazine quality results right away though, remember for most, photography is a hobby or something we do at parties, family gatherings, kid's plays, vacation...but it is also a profession that people invest years learning and studying and some buy tens of thousands in gear to do. If you are truly interested in getting better, read lots and maybe think of taking a class, some camera stores organize classes and some photogs teach part time.

A really good book I've read that talks about how to do different types of shots is the "The Digital Photography Book" by Scott Kelby (_look at Volume 1 first, Vol 2 gets into studio shooting and other advanced stuff_) . As the author describes it, the book is a collection of 1 page answers to the question "How do I take _this_ kind of picture". It's kind of situation specific expert advice on paper.


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## KnaveTO (May 13, 2007)

That link is almost exactly what I needed. 

Thanks!


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## MrAL (Feb 28, 2008)

http://www.photoxels.com/digital-photography-tutorials.html

Might help you with the lingo.


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## MT-ED (Apr 4, 2006)

I'm not sure about DSLRs. I used to use regular film SLRs and never quite got the hang of it. Too much delay between pic taking and seeing the results.
Digital makes the learning curve almost a straight line.
I can give people settings for Canon point and shoots that will instantly improve their pics. I've proved it in the past.
Any DSLR gives you a theoretical head-start but I've had people comment on my P&S pics that they thought they were on a DSLR forum. I liked that!
Experiment, experiment. Unlike film all it costs is time. Once you get good pics you have to learn to edit and crop in a way that makes the best of what you got. That's half the problem with pics you see on most forums.....few get much editing. It takes familiarity with an edit suite program and ultimately an inherant artistic eye.
Aquarium photography has some curved balls for you. Glass in the way for starters 

Check out here: http://aquatic-photography.com/forum/index.php be amazed....be very amazed.

Martin.


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## KevD (Mar 2, 2008)

There's one other thing that a lot of people forget to do first....read the freakin' manual!  

There are some other good aquarium photography articles up on the interweeb. If interested, let me know and I'll post some links.


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## Sunstar (Jul 29, 2008)

I find a tripod works quite well for pics. but my cam's a borrowed one currently.


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## twoheadedfish (May 10, 2008)

KevD said:


> There's one other thing that a lot of people forget to do first....read the freakin' manual!
> QUOTE]
> 
> THIS.
> ...


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## gunnerx (Mar 20, 2008)

The manual is only good for telling you what your camera is capable of doing technically. I highly doubt you can get amazing results just by reading the manual. The manual on my camera is 300 pages and I don't think I will be reading it page by page.

If you have the eye for photography, that really helps a lot too.


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## Riceburner (Mar 14, 2008)

It's also in the eye of the beholder. Some "art" I'd consider junk, but ppl buy it.


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