I'm having lots of trouble getting decent pictures of my fish tank. I have an 8.2MP digital point & shoot camera, and all the pictures I take of my fish tank turn out blurry. For those with cameras like mine, how do you get good quality pictures of your fish/tank? :1zhelp:
Point & Shoot Camera vs. Aquariums
- Thread starter agp
- Start date
I don't get great pictures, but in order to get decent pictures I have to always make sure the camera's set to macro mode - even for full tank shots. I also use a tripod, as I don't like using a flash.
If you're taking photos in the dark without the flash to get the full effect of the aquarium's colours and lighting, there are going to be two issues:
1) you're going to need a high-speed setting since the fish will be constantly moving
2) without a flash, you'll have to keep the camera really still to prevent motion blur
I would recommend using a tripod or something stable to set the camera on to eliminate the motion from holding it. Also, if your camera has a timer I would use it as well since I find even on a tripod when you're zoomed in really close, just the movement from pushing the button will cause blur.
1) you're going to need a high-speed setting since the fish will be constantly moving
2) without a flash, you'll have to keep the camera really still to prevent motion blur
I would recommend using a tripod or something stable to set the camera on to eliminate the motion from holding it. Also, if your camera has a timer I would use it as well since I find even on a tripod when you're zoomed in really close, just the movement from pushing the button will cause blur.
It depends on the custom settings of your P&S. If you are trying to take a picture of a fish constantly in motion you defiantly want to increase shutter speed. Some P&S without a lot of custom settings have a sports option that may improve shots. If you can entice the fish to pause with sinking fish food at least you can predetermine where you want the fish to be, if that helps.
I have a 4 MP camera, and it's an old camera, but I manage to take great pictures by playing around with the shutter speed and the F-stop (?). It takes great balancing to get that. Additional light above the tank will help.
Like other people have said, the options available to you are going to depend on what specific P&S you have. Some have no manual control at all, others support manual ISO settings only. Nicer ones will allow you to control the shutter speed, exposure and aperture, but yours may not. What camera is it? (ed: reading comprehension fail. Not familiar with the J10, I'll have to look into it)
Tripods and monopods are probably going to be largely ineffective if you want to take clear, detailed pictures of the fish themselves; there's simply no way that you're going to get them to hold still for long enough under normal aquarium lighting (unless they're an extremely sedentary species to begin with) for the camera to expose the shot correctly. They'll work fine for taking whole-tank shots though.
If you really want to get pictures of the fish themselves, the solution is probably ultimately going to be more light. Even if your P&S camera allows you to bump the shutter speed up high enough to eliminate motion blur from the fish, there are going to be other consequences from doing so (very poor depth of field, excessive sensor noise and/or a severely underexposed image) that are probably going to render the image useless.
I'd recommend getting one or more clamp-on worklights (these things), which should be available at any hardware store, and a corresponding number of GE's 26w 6500k "Daylight" compact fluorescent bulbs (these). I'd start with about 1 per 10 gallons for normal-height tanks and go from there. Deeper tanks like 20XTs and 55s will probably need more than that, but start there.
There are cheaper ways to go about getting more light into your tank, but they're unlikely to work as well. There are some "200w equivalent" CFL bulbs out there that would be brighter, and there are also relatively cheap 500w halogen worklights which work great (although they get hot enough to melt things if you're not careful), but with a normal P&S camera, neither is a practical option for you. Most CFL and halogen bulbs give off a very yellow light; about 3000-4000k; if you're using a camera with RAW shooting and full manual control you can correct for this in post processing in a program like lightroom; that's what I do with my shots. But when you're using a P&S that probably doesn't offer full manual control, probably only shoots in jpg, and when you (I assume) don't have a program like lightroom or photoshop on hand to fix it, what you end up with is a very yellow-tinted picture, which doesn't look very good at all.
So yeah. Cliff's Notes: Try the clip-on lights with 6500k CFLs.
Tripods and monopods are probably going to be largely ineffective if you want to take clear, detailed pictures of the fish themselves; there's simply no way that you're going to get them to hold still for long enough under normal aquarium lighting (unless they're an extremely sedentary species to begin with) for the camera to expose the shot correctly. They'll work fine for taking whole-tank shots though.
If you really want to get pictures of the fish themselves, the solution is probably ultimately going to be more light. Even if your P&S camera allows you to bump the shutter speed up high enough to eliminate motion blur from the fish, there are going to be other consequences from doing so (very poor depth of field, excessive sensor noise and/or a severely underexposed image) that are probably going to render the image useless.
I'd recommend getting one or more clamp-on worklights (these things), which should be available at any hardware store, and a corresponding number of GE's 26w 6500k "Daylight" compact fluorescent bulbs (these). I'd start with about 1 per 10 gallons for normal-height tanks and go from there. Deeper tanks like 20XTs and 55s will probably need more than that, but start there.
There are cheaper ways to go about getting more light into your tank, but they're unlikely to work as well. There are some "200w equivalent" CFL bulbs out there that would be brighter, and there are also relatively cheap 500w halogen worklights which work great (although they get hot enough to melt things if you're not careful), but with a normal P&S camera, neither is a practical option for you. Most CFL and halogen bulbs give off a very yellow light; about 3000-4000k; if you're using a camera with RAW shooting and full manual control you can correct for this in post processing in a program like lightroom; that's what I do with my shots. But when you're using a P&S that probably doesn't offer full manual control, probably only shoots in jpg, and when you (I assume) don't have a program like lightroom or photoshop on hand to fix it, what you end up with is a very yellow-tinted picture, which doesn't look very good at all.
So yeah. Cliff's Notes: Try the clip-on lights with 6500k CFLs.
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Play around using the flash. Get your lens right up to the glass (make sure it's clean) and try shooting at a slight angle into the glass to eliminate any reflection from the flash.
I've done this before, and gotten decent shots. Nothing professional, but I wasn't looking to sell the shots, anyway.
I've done this before, and gotten decent shots. Nothing professional, but I wasn't looking to sell the shots, anyway.
I will try those methods. And I will most likely pick up a clamp on light as well because I probably need a few more watts for my plants. The real challenge will be figuring out where to place the light since the hood covers up 80% of the area above the tank.