180g tank pics w/ some questions

[lvschiavo]

I'm pretty new to photography and just got a Nikon D80 w/ 18-135mm and 60mm Macro lenses. I'm having some trouble getting the settings right in Manual mode. I can take close-ups of corals fine, but when I try far back tank shots the fish are really blurry and I can't get the corals as clear either. When I increase the shutter speed so the fish come in clear the pictures start coming out too dark even with ISO turned up some. So how do you guys get such good tank shots with the DSLR's?




I took some LED shots too, but they came out a little blurry because I couldn't use a tripod. I know I should have the shutter speed faster for these too, but when I turn it up the pictures get dark real quick. Anyone got any tips on blue LED shots?

[maroun.c]

Very nice tank.
I'm assuming you are using the 18-135 when you go back for full tank shots and the 60 mm macro for the coral closups.
so what's happeining is that when you are taking the closups your 60 mm can open to 2.8 which allows more light and a faster shutter speed so you get nice results.
When you go back and use the other lense, that one is a slower one and one of two things is happeing:
you use a larger aperture (smaller number) and you endup with some things not in focus as the wider your aperture the smaller your depth of field.
or you chose a smaller aperture (biger number) which give you more DOF so you see more of the tank in focus but now your shutter speed is slow and moving fish will appear blurred.
Looking at the exif in your posted pictures:
All of them are shot at 1/4 shutter speed so wither you are using S mode and having it fixed on 1/4 or you are on manual and going that slow to pick up more light.
for the full tank shot I would which is shot at F11 and 1/4 ISO 400 If you like sharper fish pictures you should be shoting with a speed of 1/60 at least so that would mean you would have to use a larger aperture which should be fine as you should be able to get good DOF at F8 or maybe even at larger aperture. you will also have to increase your ISO as going from F11 to 5.6 will not increase your speed from 1/4 to 1/60 don't know how the D80 handles noise with higher ISO so I would experient with 800-1000 ISO if it's to noisey then your stuck with slower shutter speed of 1/15-1/30 and then just have your camera on a sturdy tripod and shoot with a remote release and take many shots hoping that in some the fish will be moving slower to get them to look sharp. Other alternatives would be to increase your lighitng on the tank (which will not really make a difference) or using flash which is hard on full tank shots but allowe you to freeze the fish movement. In that case you can experiment with having the flash above the tank using Nikon CLS which works great or you could also experiment with multiple flash setups as nikon handles it very nice. this way you set your shutter speed to a seting that allows you to pick up more colours from the tank lighting as the flash will sometimes wash out the colours and tha aperture has to be a compromize between flash contribution and how much DOF you want to have.
Hope this helps, sorry can't help with the LED lighting pictures, hoever it follwos the general rule slower shutter speeds without tripod will give you blurred pictures. a lens with VR could help with that but still it has its limitations. Also try stopping water movement which could decrease the amount of blurr.

[customclimates]

Picture # 2 is a great top down shot. Very nice colors.

[lvschiavo]

thanks.

[NaH2Ofreak]

Ya..those LED's have some pretty cool effects on those zoas. Good pics!

Dennis

[lvschiavo]

yeah when i first saw them i knew i had to have them.

[oct2274]

which LED's are you using, very nice colors.

[thor32766]

wow beautiful tank!!!

[lvschiavo]

The LED's are Current USA. They are great, really makes the colors pop. It's like a whole different layer of actinics on top of actinics.