More coral reef shots

Sharkbait · Nov 5, 2003

Again, from the 6' long glass box in my living room...

This is a blenny sitting on some lettuce that I had been feeding to my convict tang.

(Shot with Canon Rebel 300D (Digital Rebel), shutter priority, 18-55 lens)

Sharkbait · Nov 5, 2003

This is one of our hermit crabs crawling next to an aleveopora coral.

Sharkbait · Nov 5, 2003

A colony of purple mushroom corals.

Sharkbait · Nov 5, 2003

Some green star polyps, a polyp-based mat coral.

(Each polyp, spread open, is a bit smaller than a pencil eraser)

Phodog · Nov 5, 2003

Very nice work for shooting thru glass - did you use any special lighting or anti-relective spray. I wish I had such a tranquil space in my living room. Very cool.

TwistMyArm · Nov 5, 2003

Nice work John. I really like these, with the first two beeing my favorites.

Phodog said:
did you use any special lighting or anti-relective spray. I wish I had such a tranquil space in my living room.

Just curious what anti-feflective spray might be. I've never heard of this before. I know that polarizing filters will remove reflections in glass and water, but not always all of the reflections.

Sharkbait · Nov 5, 2003

The glass is 5/8" tempered. The only lighting on those shots is the actual tank lighting. In a reef tank, you need LOTS of light. I have just over 400 watts of lighting over the tank. The bulbs are VHO (very high output fluorescent) and are designed to accurately reproduce the color spectrum (and color temp, around 10,000K) of sunlight.

Even with that much lighting, I usually have to really tweak the camera to get good shots. I have to shoot around 1/125s shutter speed, which is not nearly slow enough for that level of lighting. Consequently I usually end up with a LOT of dark shots, even by increasing the exposure and ISO settings in the camera. I'd say on average I'll shoot 50 shots of the tank and get 3 or 4 that are good, useable shots.

To keep glare down I shoot at night with the room lights off and the tank lights on. I use a tripod for shooting the sessile invertebrates (corals and such), but usually hand-hold to shoot the fish.

Sharkbait · Nov 5, 2003

Here's the thread with some more shots from my tank...

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2367

LilCujo · Nov 5, 2003

These are really neat...I love the purple mushroom... the colors are awesome.

mrsid99 · Nov 5, 2003

Absolutely fantastic!
The clarity is great and the colors are spot-on, love that wide DOF as well (gotta have that 10D!).
The fact that those coral polyps are open like that tells me that tank is in the best of health, good work all around!