Glowlight Tetras with Ixus 75

[beeky]

Hi all,

I got a new camera the other week, an Ixus 75. It's only a compact as I couldn't stretch to an SLR and my wife wanted something easily portable, and so did I to some extent. I had an old SLR (Minolta Dynax 7000i) but it was quite bulky to carry out on holidays and stuff. Anyway, I read some reviews and plumped for the Ixus, cost me around £100. It's actually got an aquarium setting, but couldn't find it when I playing last night. I suppose I'll have to read the instructions

The pictures are of my glowlight tetras. I tried to get some of my panda corys but they were too fast for me! I can appreciate how manual focus would be a blessing as I had the fish perfectly in the frame but the autofocus kept trying to focus on a nearby leaf!

Here they are (I'm quite pleased with them!):







And one of my Aphyosemion australe:

 

[LondonDragon]

Very nice shots beeky, you have to try that aquarium mode to see if you can improve on already good photos 🙂

Btw, plants and fish look very healthy congrats 😉

 

[ceg4048]

Ooh, I like that Aphyosemion (is that some kind of killifish?

If you can get your hands on an older version of Photoshop (or The Gimp if you use Linux) you can clean up the photo, reduce the yellow and crop to suit. Digital cameras have various filters, both optical and software, that actually degrades the image. Post processing is almost as important as the shot itself. Here is an example of corrections that can be made to that last image. Aquarium daylight bulbs have way too much yellow so I've added in more blue. You also have "blow out" highlights on the leaf in the lower part of the frame. It's hard to recover those without making t look fake so I just cropped it out and I reckon it made for better framing. The anti-aliasing filtration dulls the image so it has to be re-sharpened. Check it out: You'll see that you can retrieve a lot more detail in the leaf surfaces like that crypt and the fish surface is more crisp.

Cheers,

 

[beeky]

Wow, that was quick Clive! I agree it looks much better, makes the orange stand out more. The ones of the glowlights would be better cropped as well, even just to remove the out of focus bits, but I didn't have time last night so just stuck them up.

What I like about digital cameras is that the resolution is so good you can crop and blow up to the original size without much noticeable loss (within reason).

The camera's got a white balance setting as well, but I didn't play with that much. Pretty pleased for a camera that cost £100. Only problem is that it doesn't come with an instruction book, only a quick start guide. The proper instruction manual is on CD. I use computers every day, but I still like reading on paper!

Clive, yes, the Aphyosemion is a killifish. Quite long lived too I've had him for a few years now. Unfortunately, the female preferred carpet fluff to tank water. It's the 'gold' form, tank bred strain. The wild ones are chocolate with gold spots. I love the shape of the fish as well, not just the colours. They have enormous paddle like pectoral fins.

 

[Martin]

Nice photos Beeky, wonderful colouring in the killifish.

Quite long lived too I've had him for a few years now. Unfortunately, the female preferred carpet fluff to tank water.

I too have had some of those carpet fluff loving species

 

[TDI-line]

Great pics Beeky.

 

[Ed Seeley]

Clive, yes, the Aphyosemion is a killifish. Quite long lived too I've had him for a few years now. Unfortunately, the female preferred carpet fluff to tank water. It's the 'gold' form, tank bred strain. The wild ones are chocolate with gold spots. I love the shape of the fish as well, not just the colours. They have enormous paddle like pectoral fins.

Do hate to be picky here but the chocolates usually seen have been selcted just like the golds because they've been in the hobby so long. You want wild australe try and get some with newer collection codes! There are eggs often available on Aquabid.

The golds are cracking fish though and a great choice for covered planted tanks. I'm down to a single male too who's now in my Rio enjoying pestering the blue eyes!

 

[beeky]

Ah, cheers Ed. I thought the chocolate ones were what the wild type were called. You live and learn! It would be nice to get some wild types too. I'll have a look. I'm thinking of joining the BKA again as well so I might see what they have.

 

[Ed Seeley]

Ah, cheers Ed. I thought the chocolate ones were what the wild type were called. You live and learn! It would be nice to get some wild types too. I'll have a look. I'm thinking of joining the BKA again as well so I might see what they have.

Some wild populations look similar to Chocolates, but others look very similar to Golds! Try the 'Cap Esterias' strains if you want some cracking fish!