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Mike,
Thanks for the kind words but everything I know about photography was pried
out of the brains of Dr. Harry Grier. Harry was the official
photographer for the Florida Tropical Fish Farmer's Assoc...I dont think he
shoots for FTFFA any longer.
Apisto/ Characin/ Killie photography is a little tricky because these fish
are small and to fill the frame, you have to get pretty close to your
subject. This causes a little problem - the closer you get to
the subject (even with a macro lens), the smaller your depth of field (the area
in focus) becomes. In such an instance, if your apisto is not exactly
parallel to the film, you will end up with part of the fish being blurry.
The only way to cure this problem is to increase the depth of field by closing
the aperture i.e.. shoot at f/11 or f/16 or f/22. 16 or 22 is my
preferred setting. With just one flash and 100-speed film, f/22 may give
you dark pictures. So, add as much light as you can. As Mike said,
get a few AC Slave strobes - they cost about US $25. These things
essentially double the amount of light generated by my flash and for each
additional strobe, I can shut down the aperture by one f-stop.
I shot pics of Laet. thayeri, Cleithr. maronii and cupido last week at
f/22, 1/125th second shutter speed, Ektachrome E100 VS (nice film!), off-camera
primary flash about a foot to my right, second strobe a foot to my left, both
angled at 45 degrees to avoid reflection, 3rd and 4th strobes about a foot apart
on top of the tank pointing down at the water. The tank was 4-feet
long.
My arms get tired easily from holding the camera and the strobe, so I
started using a tripod for the camera and clamps for the strobes, freeing both
my hands for focusing and clicking.
Brett Kemker had a spectacular photo of a pandurini on the cover of the
Tampa Bay club's newsletter. A beautiful image! Brett, we haven't
talked photography in a while - what were your techniques for that
picture? Mike, is a JPEG available anywhere on the web?
I have a couple of articles on the subject at http://www.geocities.com/NapaValley/5491
Click away,
Vinny
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