Playing with camera again

[gflat65]

Just got all my Aussie Acans moved into the 22, so I had to get some shots. These are under T5's, but the $60 4 bulb fixture came with crappy bulbs (go figure). I've got better bulbs on order. These aren't too bad, but have no blue. Anyway, here goes. Still haven't done all the things I'm supposed to (turn off flow, etc), so some are blurry.

[gflat65]

Not a good shot (bad angle to the front glass/acrylic), but my best rainbow.





Another rainbow

[imyoraven]

rockin' !!!!
they'll look even better with some blues over 'em.

[crumbletop]

Some nice looking acans there, Gary!

[TitansFan]

wow very nice!
Time to work out a trade with you.

[fallinapart]

very cool! ..... and we will see some of them in Jan??????

Norman

[NeveSSL]

Wow! Very nice! Love the clown, too.

Exactly which fixture did you get for $60?
EDIT: Nevermind, I found it... I got all excited because I thought you found one for $60 that had individual reflectors. I should have known better.

Brandon

[NeveSSL]

Also, does anyone have any of the "galaxy acans" around here? Some of those look INCREDIBLE! I wish I could find a pic from the site I found them at...

Brandon

[HowardCath]

Very pretty animals. Now I've got to look 'em up and see what acans are!

[xinumaster]

Holly macaroni. That is a very nice collections. Worth more than a diamond.

[gflat65]

It cost about as much as a diamond, too... I took out a loan back in May for most of them.

I'll likely have some at the swap. I have a few left over from when I fragged back in May/June, so I'll likely add to them. They aren't arranged quite like I want, but I'll figure that out. I almost need a bigger tank for them.

[NeveSSL]

Why are acans so expensive? Are there just not many of them? Or just from where everyone wants them?

Brandon

[crumbletop]

I think the aussi acans are expensive because they only recently came on the market. There are some very nice looking ones for sure.

[NeveSSL]

Indeed there ARE some beautiful ones!

I may wait a few years to get into it... From what I hear, some of the named zoas were extremely expensive when that all started, too, to begin with, and some still are!

I absolutely love these in particular:



They want $599 for them, though!

Brandon

[gflat65]

The Aussie Acans are pricy to some extent because they are relatively new to the export market (just started back in the early part of this year, I think), but mostly, greedy collectors and wholesalers watch the boards and online sites and see them marked for $150 per polyp (I don't know how many actually sell at those prices, though), so they figure they should charge more on their end to get in on the free cash. These were not cheap (that tank is worth more than my car), but me likey. I'll chip away at the cost with frags over time. I sold quite a few in Chattanooga, but at ~$13/polyp on average, you get some screwy faces.

[NeveSSL]

Ahhhh... I see.

I have no doubt you may be a very popular man in January!

Speaking of, are you going to be able to make it up to the swap? If not, you may be very unpopular.

Brandon

[imyoraven]

actually, the pricing has more to do with the origin than complete greed. The australian exporters readily admit they can not compete with indo pricing given the economic comparisons between the 2 regions. Therefore, the pricing for australian goods is at least 2-3x the cost of indo goods. That doesn't mean greed doesn't contribute, but the divers and exporters in Australia would not be doing it if the returns were similar to that of the indo-stuff. Luckily for the australian exporters, they have some very desirable species they are collecting--otherwise they would be obsolete.

[gflat65]

imyoraven,

I agree that it will inherently be more from Australia (not a 3rd world economy like most collection sites). Shipping is more, too, I think. The prices started getting steeper (or pricing was the same, but sizes and colors were less substantial) over time as the craze continued to grow (is it still growing?). Except for the crazy rainbows that places like reefraft find, most of what I'm seeing these days are the same or very similar to the same morphs as the beginning (got my first batch back in early June-had to go back and check emails because I think I said May earlier). The guy I get mine from shows me pictures of what he gets in and it is extremely variable sometimes. There might be a 5 or 6 polyp piece come in and nothing on the invoice less than $200, or a piece five times the size might come in at the same price (usually a grade B, but from what I've seen lately, little distinguishes an A from a B except price...). He's seen a lot of polyp bail out, too, so the DOA's rack up more expense. They believe that Aussie waters are dirtier than Indo waters, so the rock has more organic that leaches out or dies off after transit. The black sponge and black sections inside the rocks are something I've heard repeated numerous times.

Brandon,

Unless something like what kept me from the Memphis swap happens, I'll be there. I still hate that I missed Memphis... I'll have some frags of these, but not sure how many I'll cut yet. I plan to start cutting whatever I'm bringing to the swap in the next week or two, so I should have a pretty good idea by then. Gotta get more tanks set up. I'm thinking of a piggy back to the piggy back system.

[gflat65]

Originally posted by NeveSSL

I absolutely love these in particular:



They want $599 for them, though!

Brandon

That's steep but the per polyp cost isn't too bad considering they are nicely colored rainbows. Some places are still selling these things for $130+ a polyp (or advertising them at those prices, anyway). Too steep for me on one piece, but nicer than most of what I have. I can't wait for my new lights to see if I find some hidden color...

[ct_vol]

Gary~ Great pics!!!

I find that if you turn off your pumps you can leave the shutter open longer and get cleaner sharper images... I have a new toy coming in next week, I'll be sure to start posting some new pics...

[NeveSSL]

You know, Gary... GlassCages has some pretty nice rimless coral tanks now...

Brandon

[gflat65]

Jenn would kill me if I suggested another tank (or even a replacement). The tank room concept is pushing the limits.

Randy-I'm too lazy to turn off the pumps. I've got wires run all over the place to power everything, so I'd have to hunt down the plugs every time. I'm going to try to get in there this weekend and clean it up some. It's amazing how a little polyp moving can break the shot...

[ct_vol]

lol Those American DJ power centers are just the thing for cleaning up electrical bird's nests... Of course I have two in the box I still need to set up...

[gflat65]

I still haven't goten any of those... We looked at them one day on ebay, but never pulled the trigger. They may deserve another look.

[gflat65]

Photography skills haven't improved as I would have liked, but here are some more shots under the new lights.
Tried a few different things on the FTS...



Think these are A. bowerbanki?





My best rainbow.