Photographing Fish Through Glass

[Seb Spiers]

I've been trying to get some good photos of my fish but the glare from the glass and various reflections caused by daylight, tank lights, camera flashes, etc are a total pain. Does anyone have any tips for getting good fish photos?

 

[Corleone]

http/www.fishforums.net/content/Members-...Photos-How-To-/

This thread worked for me, particularly the parts about room lighting and angling the camera.

 

[Seb Spiers]

[URL="http/www.fishforums.net/content/Members-...Photos-How-To-/"]http/www.fishforums.net/content/Members-...Photos-How-To-/[/URL]

This thread worked for me, particularly the parts about room lighting and angling the camera.

Top stuff! thanks!

 

[england]

take photos at an angle,not head on, i always use a flash<99% of the time>
usually take pics from a little distance, then i zoom/crop the fish
usually i use the macro<flower simbal>iam no photographer but iam happy with my fish pics
try where possible to close curtains/blinds////lights out in room

 

[Seb Spiers]

try where possible to close curtains/blinds////lights out in room

I dont have any curtains/blinds. I took them down with the intention to fit replacements but im so lazy it just hasnt happened

I think the lack of these might be my biggest issue.

 

[fozziebear]

i take my pics with a blacked out room and no flash.

 

[Corleone]

Are the mounting brackets still there? If the window's not too big, you could hang a large towel or a blanket over it while you're taking pictures.

 

[Seb Spiers]

take photos at an angle,not head on, i always use a flash<99% of the time>
usually take pics from a little distance, then i zoom/crop the fish
usually i use the macro<flower simbal>iam no photographer but iam happy with my fish pics

These tips seem to have worked a treat. I wasnt aware of the benefits of the little flower symbol!

 

[aaronnorth]

also set a faster shutter speed as possible, it is sometimes a symbol +/- set this to negative setting. It lets less light in therefore captures this fish quicker. Also if you use photobuket r any other software, go on beutify, and sharpen the image, dont do it to much though or it will become grainy!

 

[gaz gun man]

also set a slower shutter speed as possible, it is sometimes a symbol +/- set this to negative setting. It lets less light in therefore captures this fish quicker. Also if you use photobuket r any other software, go on beutify, and sharpen the image, dont do it to much though or it will become grainy!

actually a slow shutter speed would not capture the fish quicker, for that you need a fastish shutter speed, a fast aperture (f2.8 for example) and, if necessary - boost the ISO to speed up the shutter speed.

 

[aaronnorth]

oh yeah - i did mean that, the rest of it made sense though! The reason i didnt mention about ISO etc is because it doesnt sound like an advanced camera.

I am still learning myself

 

[raptorrex]

whilst upping the shutter speed allows you to take "sharper" pictures. using the lens at its maximum aperture, say F2.8 is not the way to go. lenses, especially the type fitted to none SLR cameras, though they suffer too, would we working at about their worst at maximum setting. this is why lenses with a very fast maximum aperture are so expensive, it takes vast amounts of money to, try, and maintain descent quality when the lens is wide open.

if you can add light to you tank, even just temporary ones, and let the camera sort things out. that is unless you are experienced in manual photography. Flash is fine, though it needs extensive use of a photo editor to make it look real, and it brings even more problems with flashback. if you have no way of eliminating ambient light. try throwing an old White bed sheet over the tank, make sure it covers the tank so no outside light get in, directly. now cut a hole big enough for just your camera to fit through. this will give you a reflection free environment to work in. any ambient light that get through, will be very diffused and should not cause any problems. these are called light tents, and are used professionally to photograph highly reflective objects. if you have an SLR you can arrange flash heads on the outside of a tent, allowing you the benefits of ambient light, with out the problems of reflections flash back and high contrast suffered when using flashes.

 

[Miss Wiggle]

to be totally honest if you're not into advanced photograaphy the single most important thing you can do is to get the room totally dark, if you've no curtains then wait until night time to take the pics.

 

[gaz gun man]

whilst upping the shutter speed allows you to take "sharper" pictures. using the lens at its maximum aperture, say F2.8 is not the way to go. lenses, especially the type fitted to none SLR cameras, though they suffer too, would we working at about their worst at maximum setting. this is why lenses with a very fast maximum aperture are so expensive, it takes vast amounts of money to, try, and maintain descent quality when the lens is wide open.

if you can add light to you tank, even just temporary ones, and let the camera sort things out. that is unless you are experienced in manual photography. Flash is fine, though it needs extensive use of a photo editor to make it look real, and it brings even more problems with flashback. if you have no way of eliminating ambient light. try throwing an old White bed sheet over the tank, make sure it covers the tank so no outside light get in, directly. now cut a hole big enough for just your camera to fit through. this will give you a reflection free environment to work in. any ambient light that get through, will be very diffused and should not cause any problems. these are called light tents, and are used professionally to photograph highly reflective objects. if you have an SLR you can arrange flash heads on the outside of a tent, allowing you the benefits of ambient light, with out the problems of reflections flash back and high contrast suffered when using flashes.

which settings would you reccomend then?

 

[raptorrex]

whilst upping the shutter speed allows you to take "sharper" pictures. using the lens at its maximum aperture, say F2.8 is not the way to go. lenses, especially the type fitted to none SLR cameras, though they suffer too, would we working at about their worst at maximum setting. this is why lenses with a very fast maximum aperture are so expensive, it takes vast amounts of money to, try, and maintain descent quality when the lens is wide open.

if you can add light to you tank, even just temporary ones, and let the camera sort things out. that is unless you are experienced in manual photography. Flash is fine, though it needs extensive use of a photo editor to make it look real, and it brings even more problems with flashback. if you have no way of eliminating ambient light. try throwing an old White bed sheet over the tank, make sure it covers the tank so no outside light get in, directly. now cut a hole big enough for just your camera to fit through. this will give you a reflection free environment to work in. any ambient light that get through, will be very diffused and should not cause any problems. these are called light tents, and are used professionally to photograph highly reflective objects. if you have an SLR you can arrange flash heads on the outside of a tent, allowing you the benefits of ambient light, with out the problems of reflections flash back and high contrast suffered when using flashes.

which settings would you reccomend then?

well unless you are well up on manual photography, which is the method i would use by choice, just leave it in macro mode and on auto or program. don't use the zoom. all you really need is a shutter speed fast enough to capture the fish, too fast a speed will freeze every thing, its often nice to have some movement seen in a picture. not the fish you are photographing, but in the area around it.

on the manual side, try to use an aperture of about 1.5-2 stops less than the maximum aperture ( about f5.6-8 is the area most lenses work best). if this setting gives too slower shutter speed, you can up the ISO to say 400asa, but here too you will loose picture quality, or you can add more light.

if you go for flash, f8-11 will be quite good, as you get closer to your subject, apparent, depth of field will reduce. use some form of diffuser, either the tent i mentioned, or tissue paper over the flash head will do. with flash, on compact or leaf shutter cameras, the shutter speed has no effect. flash duration can be as little as 100,000 of a second, so you can see it will have no effect, slow shutter speeds will be the same, but if its too slow camera shake can become a problem. that however is no too likely. if you use an SLR, dependent on the camera, you will be stuck with something between 0 and 500 of a second. there is little you can do with this as it is simply an effect of the type of shutter used.