New Jersey aquarium

(Ghastly) Krueger · Jan 5, 2008

In a recent trip to Phila to visit my brother, we made an unscheduled visit to the NJ aquarium. Fortunatelly, I had my new 50mm f1.8, which helped a lot with the low light, but I still couldn't get very good results.

I will post these anyway in case someone can give me some tips on how to improve the sharpness. All are handheld or leaning against walls / tank frames, almost all manually focused.

1. Dragon

2. Tun... tun... tun... tun

3. Even though it's all blurry, I liked this one.

4. Fishes

5. Ray's singing duo... It was a carrol, BTW.

6. Sea turtle and a friend

7. I am terrible angry at myself for not getting this one right.

8. I don't remember this guy's name

9. Glow in the dark Jelly fish

Thanks for looking. Your comments are as always appreciated. Especially tips on how to improve sharpness.

Antarctican · Jan 5, 2008

Those are really tough shots to get, given the lighting and having to shoot through glass. I don't have the expertise to give you any tips. But I wanted to say I really like the jellyfish shot, the two 'singing' rays made me chuckle, and I think the spiny fish is a lionfish.

KC10Chief · Jan 5, 2008

Yes, #8 is a lion fish. I liked the rays too! I don't really have any advice for shooting in an aquarium. I've read posts on here where people suggest a rubber lens hood that you can press up against the glass. Or use a tripod. But any kind of fish is almost always moving. That's rough when your shutter speeds are slow! I used to live in central Jersey. I liked it there. I never did make it to the aquarium.

RKW3 · Jan 5, 2008

The only advice I have for you is one obvious statement; your focus is off. Was the lighting too poor to auto focus or something? That's a bummer.

You did a great job at stopping the motion of these creatures, and you did a nice job of preventing noise. I guess it'll just take practice to get the focus right all the time.

Cero21 · Jan 5, 2008

I can say I feel for you. I was at the Vancouver Aquarium yesterday and I too faced a lot of challenges trying to shoot in that environment.

In the end I ended up trying to shoot at ISO 1600, with the aperture wide open and shutter speeds around 1/15 to 1/30 (even though my camera was telling me everything was going to be under exposed 1-3 stops).

I haven't looked at the pictures on a computer yet but I know they aren't what I wanted.

I think the only thing you can really do is get lenses that can open up at wide apertures but unfortunately that is $$$. I know it's something I gotta invest in in the future.

KC10Chief · Jan 5, 2008

It's hard to beat the nifty fifty for letting light in. If that won't do it, it's going to be pretty hard to do. Even if you use a tripod, turn the ISO all the way up and then open the aperture all the way, you're still going to have lighting problems in an aquarium. Fish are constantly on the move. So, if you're camera is perfectly still and you're still having to shoot at 1/15 on a fish that's swimming, you're pretty much screwed. I'm sure there's a solution. I don't know what it is.

LaFoto · Jan 6, 2008

Well, as far as advice goes, I can't give you any, I'm afraid. I last tried to photograph in a zoo aquarium in August and the result was so you here on TPF never got to see any of it... So much about my "expertise" in that area ... nill

. Low light, thick (!) glass, fast moving fish --- nothing there that could make photography easy.

But I really like the "singing Rays"! That one makes me smile, and if that were mine, I'd easily be able to overlook anything that might be "wrong" technically, for it is just too funny!

The glow-in-the-dark jelly fish are also quite a sight to behold!

NikonLady52 · Jan 6, 2008

Hi Krueger,

Here is another forum where others querried the same question. Here you can find some tips and techniques from others that shoot Aquarium images. Best of luck.

They do however, suggest what was said above..The Lens needs to be flat against the glass (preferably with a rubber lens hood) and absolutely no flash.

(Ghastly) Krueger · Jan 7, 2008

Antarctican said:
I wanted to say I really like the jellyfish shot, the two 'singing' rays made me chuckle, and I think the spiny fish is a lionfish.

Thanks for your comments. Glad you liked those.

KC10Chief said:
I liked the rays too!...I've read posts on here where people suggest a rubber lens hood that you can press up against the glass.

Thank you. I'll take a look at the hood.

RKW3 said:
The only advice I have for you is one obvious statement; your focus is off. Was the lighting too poor to auto focus or something? That's a bummer.

Yep, poor light, low contrast, glass (curved some times) and water in the way... it was hard to manually focus. Maybe I need to check my lenses (the ones I wear)

Cero21 said:
In the end I ended up trying to shoot at ISO 1600, with the aperture wide open and shutter speeds around 1/15 to 1/30

IIRC the highest ISO I used was 800 and yes, the speeds were around what you got. I had to pan for the sharks, they were swimming too fast.

LaFoto said:
But I really like the "singing Rays"! That one makes me smile, and if that were mine, I'd easily be able to overlook anything that might be "wrong" technically, for it is just too funny!

The glow-in-the-dark jelly fish are also quite a sight to behold!

Thanks for your comments.

NikonLady52 said:
Hi Krueger,

Here is another forum where others querried the same question. Here you can find some tips and techniques from others that shoot Aquarium images. Best of luck.

Thanks... but I see no link?

They do however, suggest what was said above..The Lens needs to be flat against the glass (preferably with a rubber lens hood) and absolutely no flash.

Thanks.