Re: [GSAS-Member] Green Texas cichlids (herichthys carpintis) spawned

[Matt Staroscik <matt@wrongcrowd.com>]

on 12/10/2006 4:35 AM SUSAN WELENOFSKY said the following:
> Matt:
>
> Your pictures are so clear. How do you do them? Do you not use a flash? What
> kind of camera do you use? Does it cost anything to host your pictures on
> that webpage?
>   
Look out, you got me talking! Hope this helps.

Technique: I almost always use the flash. With no flash, there isn't 
enough light to keep the shutter speed high; anything below 1/125 I find 
means blurry fish and even then 1/250 is better. I can increase shutter 
speed by turning up the ISO (light sensitivity), but my camera has too 
much noise at high ISO (200 or more) to make that a good option. As a 
point of reference I have 220W of CF bulbs over my 90 gal tank. It looks 
like a lot of light to the eye, but not to my camera. (My small reef 
tank, which is 72W over only 24 gal, looks VERY bright to the eye and it 
STILL isn't enough light to take pictures without a flash. With my 
camera, anyway.)

You can minimize flash problems by shooting at an angle to the glass, 
making sure the glass is clean, and making sure the water is clear. But 
for every picture that I keep, there are still 20 or more that I don't. 
I just put the camera into macro mode, aim at an angle to the glass, 
pre-focus on a spot that I know the fish will pass by, and wait... (In a 
"keeper" picture, it is also more common than not to crop the image to 
remove a shadow or other deficiency that would detract from the subject.)

When I want to get serious, I break out some external flashes. With 3 
studio strobes I can dump a LOT of light into the tank from different 
angles. This means I can use a very high shutter speed and keep the ISO 
low for the cleanest images. All of my best tank pictures have been done 
that way. Even 1 external strobe would be better than using the flash on 
the camera though, because you don't want the flash coming from right on 
top of the lens--that's pretty much the worst scenario for most photos.

Camera: My camera is a Nikon 8800, which is kind of a weird thing in 
between a point-and-shoot and a DSLR. It is a very good camera except in 
low-light situations where it is quite weak. It's possible that with a 
DSLR I could shoot clean pictures at ISO 800, which would let me take 
some tank pictures without any flash at all; of course, I'd have to buy 
the right lens. (I'm sure I'll try that someday too, I like gadgets.)

My first advice for anyone who wants to take better fish pictures is to 
get some kind of external flash and learn to use it. Depending on your 
camera that might mean shooting in fully manual mode; or the camera and 
flash might talk, making getting a good exposure easier. (If you can't 
shoot in manual mode or trigger an external flash, your camera probably 
isn't suited to this kind of work.) My second piece of advice is to not 
get discouraged. I have had evenings where I shot 200 pictures and kept 1.

Web site: As a matter of fact that web site costs a fortune to use, 
because I run it on a computer at home, which I have on a business-style 
DSL account. :) There are free or cheap ways to host pictures though, I 
just am not really familiar with the best options. (On the occasions 
that I want to share a picture that I don't want burning up my home 
bandwidth, I use http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com/ and it's REALLY easy.)

- Matt S.
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