Coral canvases: Do you try to emphasize angles and textures in your photos?

[Peace River]

Coral canvases: Do you try to emphasize angles and textures in your photos?

Taking pictures of corals and fish in our reefs can be hard. Dealing with the blue lights, the water, the water spots on the glass, getting the fish to stop moving, working around cables and other equipment, and so much more can be a challenge. The good news is that there are many tips and techniques to deal with these obstacles and many of these are discussed in photography section of R2R. A couple of approaches to consider are to emphasize angles and focus on the textures in your tank. Let us know what you think about when taking pictures of your tank – do you emphasize angles and textures in your photos?

Pro Tip: Changing the camera angle to shoot across the coral and paying attention to the shadows in the tank can emphasize the texture of the corals in the photo.

Photo by @Wizard677


This QOTD is sponsored by Nutramar: https://www.qualitymarine.com/nutramar/

“Nutramar’s 100% natural food products are used by public aquaria and breeders around the world. They offer superior nutrition to your most finicky and delicate fish and invertebrates.

 

[Gumbies R Us]

For me, I try to get an angle that is unique on photos but also captures the subject in the best way possible.

 

[shakacuz]

i'm terrible with pictures. point/shoot at 3 different angles: left, front, right. very seldom do i take top-down pictures

 

[vetteguy53081]

I get the best image I can see, then point and shoot. This is one of the better ones I took (below). Ive gotten better.
For more precise pics, I use my DSLR camera

 

[Dburr1014]

Other

I'm just trying to get them in focus. Looks great on my phone but crappy on the site.

 

[o2manyfish]

I love macro photography of our aquariums. I think a great macro shot of just about anything is beautiful. I found that trying to 'capture' a 400g tank and showing everything in it was impossible. So I gave up on all but the occassional FTS and focused on getting just some good photos.

Sometimes the cell phone will rip one right off, and other times I will spend hours with a tri-pod, remote, dslr, $$$ Macro lens and shoot 300 photos just to get 1.

One of the things I learned early on, with the help of Greg Rothschild, was on my 400g tank which was 3/4" Acrylic. Is that if you didn't shoot straight thru the acrylic, it would be impossible to get the 'perfect' shot because the light moving thru the acrylic at an angle was bending to some degree.

So that limited my photo angles from either straight on. Or a god awful scary looking contraption of a large tripod, with a tripod arm - one end of which hangs a couple of water jugs full of water to counterbalance the 5 figure camera setup dangling in the middle of the tank for top down shots. Yes I did replace a DSLR when the strap holding a water jug broke and the camera dropped into the tank. Was I more upset about buying another Canon or that when 6lbs of camera equipment fell in the tank it broke an 8" arm of Oregon Tort off the colony -- Ponder that for a moment

Last year we moved up to a 750g - Now the photos became even more impossible.... a) The Tank is 10' long - It sits in a room only 10' across. Try to shoot a FTS of a 10' tank when you can only get as far away as 6' in front of it. b) The tank is 48" from front to back - That's a crazy depth of field to bring into focus when shooting from only a few feet away c) The Tank is made from 1.5" Acrylic --- what's it going to be like shooting macro thru that.

Since we started out with mostly frags, pulling out the macro lens and big camera hasn't been inviting yet in the big tank. So it's been all cell phone photos.

 

[Slocke]

I love macro photography of our aquariums. I think a great macro shot of just about anything is beautiful. I found that trying to 'capture' a 400g tank and showing everything in it was impossible. So I gave up on all but the occassional FTS and focused on getting just some good photos.

Sometimes the cell phone will rip one right off, and other times I will spend hours with a tri-pod, remote, dslr, $$$ Macro lens and shoot 300 photos just to get 1.

One of the things I learned early on, with the help of Greg Rothschild, was on my 400g tank which was 3/4" Acrylic. Is that if you didn't shoot straight thru the acrylic, it would be impossible to get the 'perfect' shot because the light moving thru the acrylic at an angle was bending to some degree.

So that limited my photo angles from either straight on. Or a god awful scary looking contraption of a large tripod, with a tripod arm - one end of which hangs a couple of water jugs full of water to counterbalance the 5 figure camera setup dangling in the middle of the tank for top down shots. Yes I did replace a DSLR when the strap holding a water jug broke and the camera dropped into the tank. Was I more upset about buying another Canon or that when 6lbs of camera equipment fell in the tank it broke an 8" arm of Oregon Tort off the colony -- Ponder that for a moment

Last year we moved up to a 750g - Now the photos became even more impossible.... a) The Tank is 10' long - It sits in a room only 10' across. Try to shoot a FTS of a 10' tank when you can only get as far away as 6' in front of it. b) The tank is 48" from front to back - That's a crazy depth of field to bring into focus when shooting from only a few feet away c) The Tank is made from 1.5" Acrylic --- what's it going to be like shooting macro thru that.

Since we started out with mostly frags, pulling out the macro lens and big camera hasn't been inviting yet in the big tank. So it's been all cell phone photos.

Wow that’s quite the hassle just to get a good shot! Have you considered a smaller tank?

Joking and your photos are incredible!

 

[Alfie]

I try to lol I have been keeping a record of the growth of number of pieces now for several months so often they are from the same angle usually from above. I do tend to photograph underwater though which makes it a bit trickier

 

[steveschuerger]

I mostly take straight on shots but last few months I’ve tried for a more angled shot here and there. Some came really good some, well, meh. Including a few non Reef pics to show what I’ve been trying as well.

 

[Alexraptor]

It depends entirely on the purpose of the shot. Am I showing off? or am I documenting progress?

Documentation tank shot:


Emphasized subject shot (colony on left-hand side on above shot).