Working on my tank / fish picture taking abilities

So, I don’t have any skills in this area, looking for tips from some of those that are great at taking pictures… I’m forced to use my cell phone… it’s a newer one, so it should be capable of taking tolerable pictures…
Some of my challenges are lighting, ( I have good lighting, but most tanks are heavily planted with terrestrial plants, shading my tanks ), several have tannin stained water, and lots of water movement…
I think I fight the small screen, for viewing, and end up over zooming, and over “cropping” and make a picture that looks ok on my cell sized screen, but by the time it get to my computer screen, they don’t look as nice…
I think I do ok on tank pictures… I’ve been practicing on this one, as it’s close to where I drink my morning caffeine… I moved a plant yesterday, to get the rootball out of the foreground, I like the lighting effect that the plant ring in the floating plants, gives me on the Anubis… now I think if I tamed the wild air line in the foreground, it would look good???

Now getting good fish pictures, has for the most part evaded me… I think lighting would help… I’ve noticed if I use the flashlight on my phone ( I’ve been inspecting a cave for Pleco mating activity ), that I can make individual fishes colors pop, but how to get that light without reflection on the front glass…
Any of you photographers, willing to give away any of your secrets, including filters, and lighting???

Whenever I take a pic of a fish/tank on my iPhone 12 I do video 4k 60fps focus lock on the thing I want a picture of film it for a couple of seconds then screenshot the clearest frame. My tanks do have bright lights so using the flashlight on the phone isn't needed. As for glare, I have to shut off any lights that aren't the tank and shut the blinds so no natural light comes in.

Android phones usually have much better-quality pictures in my experience.

Yep, I have a newer I phone… Mrs. camera seems to naturally take better pictures, and her phone is several years old…
And beyond actually taking of the pictures, is probably picture management… I maybe have a dozen good pictures I’ve taken of tanks and fish combined, over the years, yet have 100’s of them on my phone… I should probably take the time to delete any that aren’t good… it would definitely help, when trying to find a good picture I took previously, and maybe even actually saving them in named files… I use this phone at work for documentation, so I have a huge number of pictures to scroll through, when looking for a specific picture…

In this picture I had Mrs. go to the other side of the tank, so the fish moved to this side… seems the further the fish is away from the side I’m taking pictures, particularly with dark or turbid water, the harder it is to get a good picture, it’s like the camera focuses on the turbidity, and the fish are out of focus… I did mess with the flashlight on my cell phone the other day, and even aiming it away from the fish, still brightened their colors… I can’t get the camera to work with the flashlight function on… but maybe an additional, focusable light would help??? It’s hard to find a light, or focus, that will show the filaments in the darker water's… this fish has a trident tail, and filaments on both the dorsal, and anal fins… trying to find a way to make those as visible as possible

Try not to zoom in. The more you zoom in the more camera shake you get and the crappier the picture will be. Most cameras also have 2 types of zoom (normal and digital). Normal zoom will extend a lens a short way and digital zoom tends to crop the outside of the picture and stretches the image to fit the screen. it makes for a poor picture so avoid zooming out too far.

Clean the inside and outside of the glass before taking pictures.

Do a big water change and gravel clean the day before you take pictures.

Clean the filter regularly so the water is free from particles.

Turn off airstones a few minutes before taking pictures.

Have lots of light. Cameras need light and aquarium lights don't normally provide enough light for a decent image. Use the flash and have the room light on.

To avoid flash glare on the image, hold the camera on a slight angle to the glass so the flash bounces off the glass and goes away from the lens.

When photographing fish, try to aim the camera at their head as they are swimming towards the camera. Avoid photographing fish from behind because you get poor pictures.

Some cameras/ phones take better pictures than others. Maybe borrow your wife's phone and try that. See if you get better results.

Most good photographers take thousands of pictures and might print a few. The good thing about digital photography is you can take lots of pictures, check them on your computer with a full size monitor, keep what you like and delete the rest. Then go take some more. It's not like the old days with film where you got 24-36 shots on a roll and had to wait a week for the film to be developed. I might take 100 pictures of the same fish and keep a dozen of them and probably won't print any of them.

Practice, practice, practice.

MattW said:

Whenever I take a pic of a fish/tank on my iPhone 12 I do video 4k 60fps focus lock on the thing I want a picture of film it for a couple of seconds then screenshot the clearest frame. My tanks do have bright lights so using the flashlight on the phone isn't needed. As for glare, I have to shut off any lights that aren't the tank and shut the blinds so no natural light comes in.

Android phones usually have much better-quality pictures in my experience.

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I have iPhone 15, it doesn't do awful pics but I can't focus lock the camera.. Samsungs have it nice tho, better focus, camera focus lock, and can dim the lighting so only light is the tank and anything in the light focus.

For fish, these are the only good ones my phonw has taken:




And if you don't mind me setting an example of the difference it shows fish tank vs other shots.
I don't have such difficulties taking pics of my reptiles through glass doors or not.








Again, sorry, just wanted to set examples. I don't like or hate my phones camera, but it just lacks a couple features.

Shoot from a slight angle, aim at the eyeball and beware of reflections on the cleaned glass.

What type of LED light is fit to your tank. If its submersible in water you could maximise the light in your tank by raising the water level to the top of the tank and placing the submersible light on the water surface which covers most of the tank area. This would help increasing the light in your tank.

My lights are mounted on the ceiling, with 18- 20 inches of plants between the lights, and the water’s surface…

I'm with you Magnum, me and anything that takes a photo are mortal enemies. I have taken a ton of pics trying to do justice to these fish but out of maybe 1k tries ive gotten 2-3 that i actually like.

Glare on the glass from outside lighting is a huge issue and I turn off all room lights to get rid of as much on the outside glass as I can. I just can't make the camera see inside the water what my eye does and it's really frustrating.

@Jinx_ those are some really nice pics you've taken. You said those are from an iPhone correct? Are you using any specific settings?

I always have the room dark, but my main group of tanks are built like in, and in a “C” shape, not direct light, but enough light from the other tanks, that the fish can see me, so, many of them will shy away from the front of the tank, if I’m close enough to take a “good” picture… so, many of my pictures are taken from further away, than I’d like, which forces me to zoom… or I’m forced to take a picture with the fish in the center, or back side of the tanks… the lights are all on a complex schedule, so I try not to turn them on or off separately…

Tried this with a flashlight this morning… the subject is one of my “fantastics” that a good picture has eluded me… but added foreground light, seems to goof up the auto focus… this with the flashlight pressed fully against the glass to reduce the surface glare… a different effect in lighting, but out of focus

This taken this morning also, 2 Fantastic’s, as the subject, without the flashlight more in focus, but these are outstanding looking fish to the eye, that I’ve never been able to get a picture to do them justice

In this picture you can see a little of the “tail light, on the one on the left

This is over zoomed, but a vague attempt at trying to show the fish, as my eye sees it, but now too out of focus to see the detailed colors on the body of the fish