Getting the best out of a Canon G10

[Canadian]

I have seen a few members post pics of their tanks and mention they used a Canon G10. Their pics are far better than mine.

Does anyone have recommendations for settings (manual or otherwise) for getting the best out of my Canon G10 camera when taking full tank shots? I can do a little post-processing in Aperture to try to get things back to reality but I'd really appreciate any insight with respect to taking nice pics with this particular camera both for FTS and specimen shots.

Here's a pic I took the other day and it just doesn't look good even after some adjustments in Aperture (I don't have Photoshop).

 

[Octoshark]

What is it about other people's pictures that you think makes them better? Is it the sharpness, color, etc, etc?

 

[Canadian]

My two biggest problems are white balance and exposure.

The corals near to top of the tank invariably become washed out/overexposed in a FTS and I lose the vivid coloration let alone the more subtle coloration. The color of the picture above is overly blue despite fiddling with the white balance in Aperture. When I try to correct the white balance to more accurately represent the tank I lose a lot of the depth of color in the corals often making the ones near the top even more washed out/overexposed.

Admittedly I'm not much of a camera guy and while I generally tank reef pics in manual mode it's more trial and error than anything else.

 

[Canadian]

Here's a better attempt with a lowered exposure, shot in manual with some correction in Aperture:

 

[Octoshark]

Yea the second one is MUCH better, IMO

 

[IPT]

second one looks good to me too. Cool aquascape too.