Coral pics, haven't posted in awhile!
- Thread starter tektite
- Start date
Michigan Mike
Freedom costs a buckofive
Wow, that's a lot of beautiful pics...what camera/lens are you using?
Michigan Mike
Freedom costs a buckofive
You gotta teach me! I just got a T3i and I love having a DSLR and am learning but could use a few pointers. Part of my problem is I'm not shooting in RAW as I don't have a good photo editor.
tektite
I never finish anyth
You don't need a super great image editor. Check out lightbox free image editor, it has some nice tools in it, especially a few that help you adjust for white balance which is critical in aquarium photography.
First of all, never ever use Auto
White balance is the hard part in this hobby. Cameras are used to conditions like sun and shade, or Kelvin ratings of 5000K - 7000K normally. Most of our aquariums are more around 10,000K (much bluer). Auto white balance will normally on most cameras only go up to ~8000K on its own, still leaving images very blue.
First step, set your camera to use the K white balance setting, and go into the camera's menus and make sure the K value is set as high as it will go (~10,000K). Its a two step process, make sure you do both to get the white balance set properly. This setting will help the camera to compensate a little for the blue tone in aquarium lighting. Also, take pictures when all the aquarium's lights are on. Actinic only shots can be cool, but are also very difficult and take their own techniques to do.
You'll want to take a few test images with your camera at different ISO values. Higher ISO is great to help use faster shutter speeds, as the higher the ISO the more light the sensor captures, but the higher the ISO the greater the noise (graininess) in the image. I'm particular about that, but you might not mind as much noise as I do. Whatever the highest ISO is that you are OK with the noise in the image, set your camera to use that value.
You'll probably want to use the S (sometimes labeled T) setting for the camera, or shutter priority. That way you can use a fast enough shutter speed to get the image you want. If you let the camera set the shutter, it will often set it too low and you'll get motion blurring in your images, especially in areas of high flow or fast swimming fish. If you set the shutter speed, you can make sure you don't get motion blurring. Sometimes this will lead to the images being too dark, however you can always lighten them in an image editing program. There is nothing you can do to fix motion blurring. Typically 1/100 is good for most corals unless they're really blowing around in the current, faster fish may need 1/200 or higher to 'freeze' them to get a clear image. Using the shutter priority setting, the camera will set the aperture for you, so you don't need to worry about that.
Exposure compensation is also something to consider. What a camera considers to be a 'good' exposure, can often be a little on the bright side. It can be easy for it to use settings that will make the lightest parts of the image blown out, or pure white. This situation happens often in aquarium photography, where one image can have very light and very dark areas. Its best to set the camera ~2/3 stop underexposed, that way you'll have detail in the whole image. Some images may be a little dark, but you can easily lighten them just a little in an image editing program. If the image is too light and has blown out areas, there is nothing you can do there. If you shoot RAW you can sometimes recover the information in those areas, but that takes some image editing skill and a good image editing program. Look in your camera's manual to learn how to set exposure compensation.
Lol, didn't mean to write a whole book there Maybe that'll give you some starting off points/ideas. If you have more questions, feel free to ask.
First of all, never ever use Auto
White balance is the hard part in this hobby. Cameras are used to conditions like sun and shade, or Kelvin ratings of 5000K - 7000K normally. Most of our aquariums are more around 10,000K (much bluer). Auto white balance will normally on most cameras only go up to ~8000K on its own, still leaving images very blue.
First step, set your camera to use the K white balance setting, and go into the camera's menus and make sure the K value is set as high as it will go (~10,000K). Its a two step process, make sure you do both to get the white balance set properly. This setting will help the camera to compensate a little for the blue tone in aquarium lighting. Also, take pictures when all the aquarium's lights are on. Actinic only shots can be cool, but are also very difficult and take their own techniques to do.
You'll want to take a few test images with your camera at different ISO values. Higher ISO is great to help use faster shutter speeds, as the higher the ISO the more light the sensor captures, but the higher the ISO the greater the noise (graininess) in the image. I'm particular about that, but you might not mind as much noise as I do. Whatever the highest ISO is that you are OK with the noise in the image, set your camera to use that value.
You'll probably want to use the S (sometimes labeled T) setting for the camera, or shutter priority. That way you can use a fast enough shutter speed to get the image you want. If you let the camera set the shutter, it will often set it too low and you'll get motion blurring in your images, especially in areas of high flow or fast swimming fish. If you set the shutter speed, you can make sure you don't get motion blurring. Sometimes this will lead to the images being too dark, however you can always lighten them in an image editing program. There is nothing you can do to fix motion blurring. Typically 1/100 is good for most corals unless they're really blowing around in the current, faster fish may need 1/200 or higher to 'freeze' them to get a clear image. Using the shutter priority setting, the camera will set the aperture for you, so you don't need to worry about that.
Exposure compensation is also something to consider. What a camera considers to be a 'good' exposure, can often be a little on the bright side. It can be easy for it to use settings that will make the lightest parts of the image blown out, or pure white. This situation happens often in aquarium photography, where one image can have very light and very dark areas. Its best to set the camera ~2/3 stop underexposed, that way you'll have detail in the whole image. Some images may be a little dark, but you can easily lighten them just a little in an image editing program. If the image is too light and has blown out areas, there is nothing you can do there. If you shoot RAW you can sometimes recover the information in those areas, but that takes some image editing skill and a good image editing program. Look in your camera's manual to learn how to set exposure compensation.
Lol, didn't mean to write a whole book there
Maybe that'll give you some starting off points/ideas. If you have more questions, feel free to ask.
Michigan Mike
Freedom costs a buckofive
Thank you very much! Lots of good info. I've noticed the white balance seems to be limited, I'm currently set to the tungsten light setting- it seems to be the best so far anyways.lol
I've also noticed I've set my shutter speed to around 80-250 , f stop 4.5 ish and my ISO is usually 3200 or its pretty dark. I've only been shooting jpegs and using the in-camera settings.
I played with saturation,contrast and brightness on my mac on occasion but I've gotten some decent pics without using the computer for anything but cropping the photos so they will look better and upload to imageshack for posting here on RC. Too large a file if I don't crop it first.
Quite the learning curve, I need to read the manual before asking a bunch of questions but after I read through it I may hit you up if I need some extra help.lol
The main thing im trying now is to get a nice blur and tinker with the spot metering (I think?) and get those great close-ups like you posted without getting a macro lens.
Ill play with the shutter priority setting next, thanks for the help!
I've also noticed I've set my shutter speed to around 80-250 , f stop 4.5 ish and my ISO is usually 3200 or its pretty dark. I've only been shooting jpegs and using the in-camera settings.
I played with saturation,contrast and brightness on my mac on occasion but I've gotten some decent pics without using the computer for anything but cropping the photos so they will look better and upload to imageshack for posting here on RC. Too large a file if I don't crop it first.
Quite the learning curve, I need to read the manual before asking a bunch of questions but after I read through it I may hit you up if I need some extra help.lol
The main thing im trying now is to get a nice blur and tinker with the spot metering (I think?) and get those great close-ups like you posted without getting a macro lens.
Ill play with the shutter priority setting next, thanks for the help!
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