Marine Depot Forums / TEAM Marine Depot / Marine Systems and Husbandry – by Anthony Calfo / Aquarium Photography / single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs / Latest Posts

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Spracklcat — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 07:18:02 GMT

Post the pre-and post production photos (and how you processed them) in a new thread, and we'll start deconstructing them and going over methods.

Christine

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 04:12:37 GMT

Spracklcat (4/10/2007)

Regarding post-production: what program are you using? I'll be happy to coach you on good techniques (read: subtle ones that don't scream "I altered my photo!"). The goal should be to make your photos look like your real animals, in color, sharpness, contrast, etc. If you like we can make a new thread or resurrect the old one where we can post unaltered and then altered photos, and we can offer critique and methods to make those photos look great AND natural. But I don'twant to steal this thread

I am using photoshop I would appreciate any help

Anthony Calfo (4/10/2007)

I must admit my friend... the pic looks very bad... even for web only viewing. The color of the clowns, Fungiids on the sand and the hepatus tang are not even remotely close to natural. And the image overall looks badly corrupted by (all due respect) by someone that had no idea how to use post-processing tools.

Without exaggeration, if this came across my desk I'd delete it unceremoniously in a blink (nothing about this is printable on a page). It is badly goosed.

Most keepers and viewers are aspiring for the most beautiful natural colors. We reject dyed corals, dyed fishes, etc... and we reject photoshopped images of the unreal too.

Please rest assured that manipulations of color, saturation and hue by amatuers categorically do more harm than good. I count myself in the amateru category and do no manipulations of images. Only when needed, I even then leave it to the pros. Rarely (I mean rarely) is a great photopgrapher also a great post-processing artist.

Have you tried the coffee filter or white cap trick yet in contrast to your gadget? Do consider a gray card from a photoshop too. It could be very illuminating.

Lets make me the Science Project I have as you can see a very hard time taking good photo's I will today take new 100% untouched photo's on auto and then custom and post other than cropping and sizing and let the experiment begin. I look forward to learning anything I can. I have invested in the equipment but am not getting the results.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 19:25:33 GMT

Without exaggeration, if this came across my desk I'd delete it unceremoniously in a blink (nothing about this is printable on a page). It is badly goosed.

Most keepers and viewers are aspiring for the most beautiful natural colors. We reject dyed corals, dyed fishes, etc... and we reject photoshopped images of the unreal too.

Have you tried the coffee filter or white cap trick yet in contrast to your gadget? Do consider a gray card from a photoshop too. It could be very illuminating.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 14:36:58 GMT

Spracklcat (4/10/2007)

If I may, let me jump in here, as a magazine editor and layout artist.

First, regarding the white balance: if you edit the photo after you've taken it with a new white balance technique how can you or anyone tell if the changes are due to the white balance or the post-production editing? You need to shoot one with no white balance, then one each with the different white balance techniques you are trying out (coffee filter, white plastic). A trick I learned from my dad, an old hand at good photography, is to put in your photo a paper with a number or your shot parameters, so when you look at them later you can tell which shot is which.

That would be great!

Anthony feel free to clean up any posts in this thread of mine to not drift from the intent of the thread

Thanks

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Spracklcat — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 06:18:42 GMT

If I may, let me jump in here, as a magazine editor and layout artist.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 18:15:24 GMT

I reposted pict without the last step (auto correct) any better?

Thanks

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 18:07:57 GMT

It was because no flash very low light so I just raised the mids brightness and hit auto correct you really think it looks that bad? I thought it was just a bit muddy but color is close

What can I do for a clearer better shot?

Thanks

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 17:24:40 GMT

something(s) are very, very wrong with this image, bro. Please advise how/if this pic was post-processed?

Saturation for starters is through the roof. If you manually tweaked it... it was too heavy handed. If you used a generic pos-processing program... its awful (read: unnatural colors). Such programs generally ruin aquarium pics regardless (like the "auto adjust" in PS... yikes)

Just trying to help you and others here my friend... please advise what happend with the original image?

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 17:14:38 GMT

CTReefer (4/4/2007)

Looking forward to seeing a few photos. Have you tried using another white source besides that filter? Let's say you just took something like a very sheer white cloth & placed that in front of the lens & aimed it at the tank & took a WB reading, what would be the difference between that & the filter? How about a piece of plain old white plastic? Have you tried doing those comparisons? Just curious

Steve

Here is one using the Expodisc

Notice the nice whites

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Thu, 05 Apr 2007 10:18:56 GMT

a very good/cheap DIY fix for this same issue is to take a paper coffee filter and hold it up to the glass (with the aquarium light shining through) as a reference for setting white balance.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

CTReefer — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 18:40:57 GMT

Steve

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 16:34:56 GMT

CTReefer (4/4/2007)

Hey PCIALF: What is the difference between that ExpoDisc & simply using a white piece of plastic, or a grey balance for that matter? Also, how do you use this thing & can it be used for any camera including simple point & shoot models? I noticed that they had different prices on it depending on lens sizes? Any info will be appreciated.

Steve

The difference is this attaches directly to the lens the ambient light shines through it and it gives a much more uniform and accurate light sample when setting custom WB. When you shoot a white piece of anything unless it is underwater it is not totally accurate colors but with this aiming it at the tank gets the correct white settings

I will post some sample picks with and without it. I have had difficult issues getting correct WB till I got one of these.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

clsanchez77 — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 12:19:36 GMT

hey calfo,

quick question about white balance.....i am using a sony DSC-W1. it does not have a manual white balance. it does however offer a few choices.....Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Fluorescent, Incandescent, and Flash. which would you recommend for taking aquarium pics?

thanks,

paul

I have that same camera and have not been able to find any one of those settings to be better than the other, which keeps me using the auto setting. I end up turning off my VHO supplements to get better colors in the photo, however I do not pick up the 'green return' in the pigments of the zonathids in the camera. My tank is lit with dual 150WDE 14k Hamiltons and the picture comes up decent. The colors just do not pop as they do in person.

those default settings suck equally... knock yourself out, bro, with experimentation. I think you'll find that none of them give you realistic aquarium colors. I'm serious... sorry, mate.

Not helpful advise...but it is the truth. All in all, it is a nice camera though for those of us who take pictures of things other than are aquariums

Chris

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

CTReefer — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 09:00:32 GMT

Steve

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 16:11:13 GMT

those default settings suck equally... knock yourself out, bro, with experimentation. I think you'll find that none of them give you realistic aquarium colors. I'm serious... sorry, mate.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

paulmac54 — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 22:34:36 GMT

hey calfo,

thanks,

paul

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

PCIALF — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 16:50:58 GMT

I use an ExpoDisc and it works great!

http://www.expodisc.com/products/product_detail.php?prodid=2&productname=ExpoDisc_Digital_White_Balance_Filter_-_Neutral

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 08:49:09 GMT

the setting should ideally be taken with the reference card next to the subject (like when you see photogs holding a grey card next to a models face)

For most accurate color, do place the reference underwater (aquarium or reef)

For aquariums... if you cant take it underwater... then do your best to shield the card from extraneous room light that will fall on the card but is not actually falling on the subjects in the aquarium that you will be photographing

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

CTReefer — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 08:05:31 GMT

Anthony: Would you suggest placing the "white reference" material in the tank & shooting through the glass in order to set the WB? Or just have it outside the tank & close to the lighting spectrum? Just curious as to whether or not this would make a difference? What about when diving on a reef? How should the WB be set? In the water vs. on land? Also, as far as taking a picture with a digital camera, I always shoot with the highest image capture of the camera. Hence the use of 1GB or higher cards. Thanks,

Steve

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 08:25:59 GMT

great to hear Chuck! Yes... it is amazing... and so simple. Without someone pointing this out, many of us go for years using the default setting and frankly having bad color in our aquarium images.

To all - if you have your user manual (or check online), do see if you can make a custom white balance setting. By holding the known bright white plastic cap (or a proper grey card from a photo shop) under or very near your aquarium/lighting/setting... you can "tell the camera" what white really is (shooting a pic of the white cap and setting Custom WB with it).

The white reference will have the influence (seen with the naked eye) of the ambient lighting... but the software will correct the corruption of color for you if you just tell it what white really is.

RE: single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

charlesr1958 — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 07:45:18 GMT

Wow, big difference. I have had this camera for two years and have played with that setting a few times but never liked the results, that is until I used the white background trick. Really does show the true colorations within the aquarium. Thanks!

Chuck

single best SETTING advice for aquarium photogs

Anthony Calfo — Wed, 22 Nov 2006 05:56:16 GMT

if I had to pick a single tip to impart to aquarium photog friends... it is white balance. If you can do a custom white balance setting on your camera, please do - every time. The trueness of color in your images will be extraordinarily better! Without buying a photogs grey card, you can simply keep a bright white plastic lid (like from aquarium supplements) in your camera bag and shoot a pic of that as an example for your camera computer to set custom white balance from in each new lighting environ.

The auto white balance and the presets (sunny, cloudy, incandessant, etc) are useless under skewed aquarium lighting.

The autoWB especially since the camera searches for the lightest part of each image and calls it white - whether it is or not - essentially. So all other colors for that pic are skewed on that corrupted presumption. Generalizing a bit here... but you get the point.

Setting a custom white balance takes about 2 clicks and 4 seconds. Do invest that time for tremendously better aquarium photography