Marine Tank Background

[maccers]

Hi, am slowly putting together a Marine tank, after keeping tropical fish for a few years. I have pretty much all the hardware in the tank, minus live rock and water.... Before I put the tank into place where back and side access is quite restricted I wanted to get some thoughts on backgrounds.

I have seen the various backgrounds that you stick onto the back of tanks, but this has never really done anything for me, I never had this on my tropical tank.

I have seen some marine tanks in shops painted black, or very dark blue on the outside of the tank at the back and some back and sides.

Has anyone who is reading this done anything similar with paint? I could always do nothing with it and have the magnolia wall paper as a backdrop, but this may blend the coral sand and rock into the background and look a bit naff.

Any comments welcome

Richard.

 

[Mr Miagi]

Try painting it. Always nicer than seeing wallpaper. I wouldnt paint the sides though, they are a god vantgae point for optimal viewing of your reef. Alternativly, if you didnt want to paint your tank, you could buy some of the plain backgrounds from your LFS and stick them on with doublesided tape.

 

[steelhealr]

I agree with mr. miaggi. In general, your reef features would be lost against a busy background. You want to be able to focus on the intricacies of the reef. If the tank was visible 360, I would not use any background. If it was meant to be viewed from front and sides, I agree that painting it a dark color is the way to go, unless you just put a solid paper background on the back. Remember tho', you will now be dealing with saltkreep, so, regular tape might keep falling off. Welcome to the dark side of the TFF forum. SH

 

[crazyelece]

There is a backround that is already adhesive on one side. Kind of like a big decal similar to window tint. I recommend this option or painting. I went with the backround just because I figured it was easier to remove if I ever want to sell the tank.