How do you take full tank shots?

[aaronnorth]

What settings do you use/ reccomend to use? Providing I dont have a brilliant camera (Fuji S5700)

I took this shot using the settings:
f/ 6.3
ISO 200
Exposure Time: 1/6 second

Because i dont have any additional lighting to add over the tank, i was wondering if there was anyway to improve it. WOuld having an ISO 400 and a quicker shutter speed help? Or if you could point out a cheap lighting source

Thanks

 

[ceg4048]

Aaron, i don't get your question. It's too broad. That looks like a full tank shot to me. What is your objective and what is it that you dislike about the shot you have taken?

Cheers,

 

[Mark Evans]

upping the iso will give you quicker shutter speeds, but wont improve on picture quality, infact the opposite. your looking for 1/ 125 sec to just about "freeze" a fish' movement. fish dependent though.

the higher the f no. the more your subject forground/distance will be in focus. so the higher the better. but then you end up with a light/iso trade off! :? you need to push your camera to its limits then ease off back to where it looks ok. amano shoots at f32 but is using flasheads.

if you look at the shooting data on my full tank shots there in the region of f5.6 only because im not taking the "proper£ shot just yet. definitely will be hiring flash heads for my current scape.

i'm guessing ceg's beat me to this post

 

[Mark Evans]

'm guessing ceg's beat me to this post

yep!

 

[ceg4048]

 

[aaronnorth]

Aaron, i don't get your question. It's too broad. That looks like a full tank shot to me. What is your objective and what is it that you dislike about the shot you have taken?

The stems at the back look out of focus to me, and i was wondering if there is anything i could do about rather than using a larger aperture, because when i shoot at f/13.6 (because the camera goes from f/6.8 to f/13.6 ) the tank is always too dark.
I have just found out about aperture priority, so i set it at f/13 but the camera then takes 2.5 seconds which is no good.

Just looked at a pic of the henge (as i know there is plenty there ) and for one of the shots you use the same settings, but a 1/125sec shutter speed (plus an extra 48w of lighting!) Something which i dont have lol


So would you say the only viable option is to put more lighting over the tank?

Thanks

 

[Mark Evans]

So would you say the only viable option is to put more lighting over the tank?

definitely.you have no other option. just watch your white balance when adding another source of light.

 

[Mark Evans]

btw aaron your p heferi looks fantastic

 

[aaronnorth]

Thanks, half of it is from you

I am just searching through 'short courses' and i have read about different Kelvin temperatures etc. This is more confusing than Plants :?

 

[aaronnorth]

What about changing the metering mode (spot, multi etc) do any of them affect the final outcome?

 

[ceg4048]

Well, the first thing you need to establish is whether this phenomenon of the stems is ooF (out-of-Focus) which would be a result of it being outside the DoF (Depth of Field), or whether it's due to blurring due movement of the stems (I'm assuming you turned the filters off).

If it's a matter of DoF then one option is to move back for the shot. The further away from the subject you are the deeper the DoF will be. You can then crop away the area you didn't want, however the unwanted area around the tank will influence the exposure if set to automatic. It's not clear to me whether you have manual control.

As Mark says, you can hold your position and stop down which also increases DoF but the penalty there will be a higher ISO and therefore noise. I'm appalled that you only have access to f6.3 and f13.6. That's about 2 stops which means to get the same exposure (and same shutter speed) you'll need ISO 800. So, you'll gain DoF but will have more noise and will loose some overall sharpness due to diffraction. It may be a good tradeoff though. What you need to du is to shoot both apertures and view both photos on your monitor at 100% zoom setting in your image program so that you can see the flaws in each.

Remember that any half way decent image program will easily be able to recover data in an underexposed shot. Two stops is not that difficult and I do it intentionally all the time to keep the shutter speeds high and to keep DoF. Your image program is as (or more) important as your camera.

Cheers,

 

[JamesM]

:?

This is why I shoot FTS on Auto The 5700 is a clever little bugger. You can view the pictures properties to see what settings were automatically used, and play about with them from there. Try turning the macro on to sharpen things up a little too. Works well for me.

 

[Mark Evans]

Remember that any half way decent image program will easily be able to recover data in an underexposed shot. Two stops is not that difficult and I do it intentionally all the time to keep the shutter speeds high and to keep DoF. Your image program is as (or more) important as your camera.

well said, i always shoot 2 stops under. a little more room for manoeuvre with raw, but it's all the same in the end.

 

[aaronnorth]

Well, the first thing you need to establish is whether this phenomenon of the stems is ooF (out-of-Focus) which would be a result of it being outside the DoF (Depth of Field), or whether it's due to blurring due movement of the stems (I'm assuming you turned the filters off).

Filter was left on

If it's a matter of DoF then one option is to move back for the shot. The further away from the subject you are the deeper the DoF will be. You can then crop away the area you didn't want, however the unwanted area around the tank will influence the exposure if set to automatic. It's not clear to me whether you have manual control.

Thanks for the tip, i got as close to the tank as possible, i have manual control and load of other settings:
http://www.cameras.co.uk/reviews/fuji-finepix-s5700.cfm

As Mark says, you can hold your position and stop down which also increases DoF but the penalty there will be a higher ISO and therefore noise. I'm appalled that you only have access to f6.3 and f13.6. That's about 2 stops which means to get the same exposure (and same shutter speed) you'll need ISO 800. So, you'll gain DoF but will have more noise and will loose some overall sharpness due to diffraction. It may be a good tradeoff though. What you need to du is to shoot both apertures and view both photos on your monitor at 100% zoom setting in your image program so that you can see the flaws in each.

Thanks for the info, i do have other aperture settings, i should of made that clearer (3.5, 4, 4.5, 5, 5.6, 6.3, 6.8, 13.6) It is a shame, f/9 would of been handy
I will try at ISO 800, like you say, to get the extra DoF the noise may be worth it, plus i dont know how much noise will enter at this stage as i havent tried it yet (although i am assuming a fair amount)

Remember that any half way decent image program will easily be able to recover data in an underexposed shot. Two stops is not that difficult and I do it intentionally all the time to keep the shutter speeds high and to keep DoF. Your image program is as (or more) important as your camera.

Tell me about it, i am learning new tools everyday on GIMP and all the time my photo editing skills are becoming better I also have paint.net as it has a few different features that sometimes come in handy.

Thanks again.

 

[aaronnorth]

:?

This is why I shoot FTS on Auto The 5700 is a clever little bugger. You can view the pictures properties to see what settings were automatically used, and play about with them from there. Try turning the macro on to sharpen things up a little too. Works well for me.

Never thought about seeing what settings automatic would use

 

[aaronnorth]

Another question...

What about backgrounds? I see most competition entriess have a white coloured background, do you place a piece of cloth behind the tanmk with a light shined onto it? Or is it just the light itself?

 

[JamesM]

Cloth, paper, whatever really. The light can go behind this, or in front of it. I remember George playing about with this on his first nano way back when. Doesn't show it here though..

 

[Mark Evans]

a little crude, but it worked. you can buy high powered lights from ikea and stuff i think....

 

[Thomas McMillan]

It looks a bit... unnatural or something to me, but I'm not sure what it is. I'm no good with camera settings and stuff but to improve the lighting you could use a couple of desk lamps or something similar if you have them.

 

[Mark Evans]

here was more experiments. like james says. cardboard will do....

i ended up with pics like this...