This habit can be crippling to aquarium images for more than a few good reason. Image quality and aesthetics aside for filling the frame, issues of distortion and reflections (your flash and other room light sources alike) can be brutal yet easily avoided by mindful positioning.

The first thing is to simply get (stand) as physically close to your aquarium subject as possible. Ideally... your camera should be pressed against (flat and perpendicular to) the viewing pane... and your subject sitting exactly on the other side. Aside from the reduced interference of particles, sediments, light , etc from being between you and your subject, it also minimizes the distortion of your picture through the glass itself.

To be specific, when you are shooting through a 12mm pane of glass... you are shooting through only 12mm of glass if you have your camera pressed against the pane flatly.

But if you tilt your camera at an angle or are standing back and shooting at an angle, then you are actually shooting through more than 12mm of glass (the angle of your imaging through the pane). This often causes bad distortion... to the extent that some cameras will not even (auto)focus if your angle is too severe (the shots are crappy too).

Rather ironic too to be using a $200, 500 or 1000 piece of glass (your lens objective) to try to capture perfect images while shooting through a green or blue tinted piece of $2 sq.ft aquarium glass We need to lower our expectations here or better... invest in a clear (white) glass or acrylic photo tank

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Anthony Calfo

Anthony Calfo