Cozer's Basement Tank
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revhtree
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Very awesome tank and corals!
OP
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cozer
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My LED fixture is composed of CREE XP-G white LED x 24, CREE XP-E blue+royal blue x 12, and Edison 1W UV LED x 8. The fixture has a built-in automatic light controlling system and a high efficient cooling system as well. This fixture is manufactured by Illumagic company. More information of this company and their products can be easily found on google.
I use Coralife salt. I do not dose on this tank.
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cozer
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Hey bob, below is the article that I posted in RC talking about my experience on photography, I hope it will be helpful to you.
Many people asked me how I could get these nice looking photos. What settings of the camera should be? Below is my personal experience on photography:
To get better quality photos, remember to:
(1) Shut down the pumps (wave or return pumps) before taking the photos. The water flow always causes negative effects on focusing, especially for those corals that wave with the water flow.
(2) Try to set the ISO to lower value. I personally prefer to set at 200 when I used my 60mm micro lens.
(3) F value: the extent of light entrance (the higher the value is the less the light can enter the camera)
If you want a photo to be with shallow depth of field (only the focused region is clear and the surrounding is blurred), set the F to lower value, such as 2.8. This will allowe more light to enter. In this case, one can decrease the shutter value to avoid negative effects due to the vibration.
When a small F value is set, shutter value should be adjusted by refering the light condition. The intenser the lighting source is, the lower value (1/100 sec) of the shutter should be set to avoid over-exposure.
If you want to have a deeper depth of filed, please set the F to higher value, such as 8 or even 10. The higher the F value, the less the light can enter and be captured. In this case, one should set the shutter to higher value (to increase the exposure time), such as 1/5 or even 1 sec to compensate the light loss due to the high F value.
(4) Shutter value: Light exposure time (the higher the value is, the more light is exposured)
When the shutter has to be set at high value (longer exposure time), there is a great possibility that artificial vibration can cause negative effects to the photos obtained. The photos might become blurred due to the vibration. In this case, a supporting leg will be necessary to fix the camera. An even better way to eliminate the vibration is to get a remote line to press the button.
Please remember, using P-mode of most digital camera may get you some "good" photos but definitely not "great" photos.
If you want to take some FTS of the whole tank, higher ISO value is recommended. Just try to fix one setting (F or shutter) while adjusting the other (shutter or F). You will find the difference between them.
I am willing to offer my personal experience on photography. Please feel free to point out the mistakes for correction if there is anything wrong with my understanding.
jiffy
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wow I wish you weren't so far away I love your collection, I've seen a couple pics of your tank on google and they have been an inspiration for my zoa dominated tank. thanks for sharing, I will definitely be following this thread.
bob
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What does your exposure meter look like for your shots? I usually shoot in manual and have tried high/low f-stops and it still takes me a quite a while to get the proper exposure. But when my meter is dead on my shots end up overexposed, do you pay attention to yours while shooting? And even with the proper exposure the colors never seem right under LEDs. Do you do any post-processing to correct for those effects or are those pretty raw images? Thanks!
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cozer
Community Member
My tank dimension is 36"x24"x19", which is about 65gallons. With the sump, the total water capacity should be around 85 gallons.
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cozer
Community Member
I did not notice the exposure setting during shooting. I used to select M mode which can allow you to set both shutter and F value. I suggest you to fix one setting while adjusting the other. For example, you can first fix the shutter value on 1/20s and try to tune the F values and take some photos. You will see that the photos will become darker with increasing F value. And you will also get images of different depth of field. On the other hand, you can fix the F value (ex. 1/5.6) and try to adjust the shutter value. And you will therefore obtain images of difference brightness.
As for the colors, I did use post-processing software to correct photos taken under "pure blue" LED light because white balance function in most cameras are not suitable for this special environment. Since the post-processing is artificially related, I now seldom take photos under pure blue light condition to avoid this process. As for those photos taken under white+blue LED light, there should be no problem with the colors if the white ballance is adequately set. When one is trying to take photos under bluish light, higher white balance value is recommended.
Let me know if I did answer your question! LOL
bob
Community Member
Hrm! I always have to under-expose my shots according to my light meter otherwise they're overexposed. I normally shoot in RAW so I'll mess with the white balance settings post-process and see if I can get more realistic colors. Thanks!
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