Writing this guide that hopefully will become useful for those wishing to take photos of their marine tank and its inhabitants. Will try to make it as simple as possible with the least equipment needed and least amount of post processing (using Snapseed app on a smartphone) once the photos has been taken. I will not be talking about post processing using the Photoshop software as it is not as straightforward and will be daunting to some.
The Equipment
Most of us nowadays own either a DSLR or a decent point and shoot camera. These 2 are a very good platform to start off with and here are the things that you will require to setup the shoot.
1) A DSLR or point and shoot camera
2) Kit lens (the lens that came bundled with your camera - normally 18-55mm or 18-135mm) or a macro lens (more advance)
3) A tripod (doesn't need to be expensive, as long as its sturdy)
4) Cable release or remote (optional - there's a way to overcome this if you don't have one, will be highlighted further down in the course under The Technique section)
5) Smartphone or tablet (optional - for post processing of the photos taken after taken the shot). Please download the free app - Snapseed
6) Clean the glass on your tanks
The Settings
Ok here comes the interesting part. How do I go about setting the camera? If you're a DSLR user, set your camera to Aperture Priority. Normally its Av or A on the mode dial and if you're a point and shoot user, set it to the Macro mode (for close up of corals), normally depicted by a flower icon in the menu options or the full auto mode (for full tank shot), normally depicted by a green square or the word auto. For those who don't plan to post process and want to just post the images straight off the camera, you can choose to increase the saturation and/or sharpness in your menu options. As for the white balance, set it to Auto.
Leave the ISO and aperture (f-stop) setting alone for the time being and I'll cover that under The Technique section.
The Technique
Ok now that you have your gears and basic settings done, you're ready to take your first shot. I'm going to cover 2 items here, the full tank shot and closeup of your corals.
Before that, please note that the best time to shoot your tank will be at night with all the lights off in the room except lights from the tank itself. This is due to the fact that there will be hardly any reflection from lights or the surroundings bouncing off the tank when you're taking your photo and the darkness of the room will help to bring out the colors and contrast from the tank itself. Note that if you shoot at night, you'll hardly need a CPL filter (circular polarizer filter) that is often used to cut off reflections on a DSLR camera. DO NOT use any flash to take the photos as the flash will produce a reflective glare back at your camera and it will show up in the photo. Please disable all the flash function in the camera.
Full Tank Shot
I'm going to cover 2 angles for the full tank shot and you can try out other different angles once you're comfortable shooting it.
The first angle will be the Full Tank Shot. Place your equipment directly facing the front of your tank so that when you view the framing in your camera's viewfinder or lcd screen, you can see your whole aquarium in the photo. You may either choose to zoom in or out to achieve this or just move your equipment forwards or backwards. Once you are happy with the framing, here's what you need to do next. Remember to position the camera at the same height as the tank to avoid any distortions (top down or bottom up distorted look).
Quick recap on your basic settings - DSLR (AV mode), Point and Shoot (Full Auto mode)
Ok here it gets a little complicated for DSLR users but bear with me. You will need to set ISO and Aperture next (For DSLR users) before taking the shot. Assuming that you have your tank lights on full, you can set the ISO to the lowest in your camera (ISO 100 or 200). Set your Aperture (f-stop) to f11 or f13 so that you have a good depth of field to cover the whole tank (basically making everything sharp and in focus).
Once you have set this, set the timer on your camera before pressing the shutter release button if you do not have a cable release/remote. If you have one, just use the cable release/remote to take the photo. By using the timer, you avoid causing a camera shake when you pressed the shutter button, similar to using a cable release/remote.
For point and shoot users, you do not need to set the Aperture and ISO but use the same technique to release the shutter (timer).
If all goes well you should get something like this.
The second angle will be the Side Angle Shot. You will use the exact same technique as the Full Tank Shot and just move your camera to a 45 degree angle shot of the tank. Again if you followed the above steps, you will end up with something like this.
How To Take Photos Of The Corals And Inhabitants
Now that you've familiarized yourselves with the full tank shot, we'll move on to shooting the corals as well as the other inhabitants in your tank. Here, we will encounter 2 situations - non moving/slow moving corals/inhabitants (example chalice, moon corals, brains, zoas, mushrooms, clams etc) and the fast moving corals/inhabitants (example anemone, hammer, torch, fish etc). There are 2 different techniques required to shoot these 2 categories in order to obtain clean and sharp photos.
Before that, let's familiarize ourselves to the Rules of thirds way of composing a photo. This will help to enhance the look and draw the eye to the subject you're shooting as oppose to the common practice of placing the subject straight in the middle of the photo frame. Imagine 2 diagonal and horizontal lines intersecting on your photo frame as shown below. You will want to place the point of interest, be it a colony of corals or the point of focus at the point of intersections. This is known as composing to the rules of thirds. It will take some getting use to at first but once your comfortable with this, you'll automatically compose your shots this way.
Shooting the slow or non movers
Ok now we will cover the slow/non movers first. Bring your camera and tripod close to the coral that you want to shoot. An important point to remember, your camera height needs to be at the same level as the corals so adjust your tripod height accordingly. You CANNOT shoot from top down or bottom up through the glass of your tank as the glass will distort the light going into your camera thus causing the image to be out of focus. Once you have your equipment set, compose accordingly using the rules of thirds.
Next we will cover the camera settings before taking the shot. DSLR users leave it on at AV (Aperture Priority) mode while Point and Shoot users will set it to the macro mode. For Point and Shoot users, you may directly take the photo after setting it to macro mode. Remember to use the timer method that you've learned from the Full Tank Shot technique.
For the DSLR users, you will have a few more settings to carry out before taking the shot, namely :
1) ISO - set it to 100 or 200 for non movers (example chalice coral) and set it to 400 for slow movers (example zoas moving in the current)
2) Aperture (f-stop) - set it between 5.6 - 11 (depending on the look you want to achieve, I'll explain further below)
3) White balance - set it to Auto
4) Take the shot using the timer/cable release method
Before we proceed to take the shot, let me explain why you need to set it as such so that you'll understand the concept and will know the correct technique to apply in the future. When you're in the Aperture Priority mode, all you have to do is to set the aperture and the camera will automatically set the shutterspeed based on the amount of available light (in this case the lighting from the tank). Normally we do not need to worry about shutterspeed since our camera is mounted on a tripod, however when you're shooting something that moves, the tripod will not save you from blur photos (since the subject is moving) but rather the shutterspeed comes into play. Use 1/125 shutterspeed as a guideline for the camera to be able to freeze a slow to moderate moving subject. The only way you can influence the shutterspeed when you're in the Aperture Priority mode, is to adjust the ISO (sensitivity of the camera's sensor to light). The higher the ISO the more sensitive the sensor is to light and the faster the shutterspeed you're going to get and vice versa.
This is the reason why when you're shooting a non moving coral like a chalice, you do not need to worry about shutterspeed (can as slow as a few seconds) as the fellow ain't going nowhere. Therefore the lowest ISO can be used (100 or 200). Similarly for slow movers you would want to bump up the ISO to 400 or even 800 depending on the aperture you're using to obtain a shutterspeed of around 1/125 to freeze the subject in the camera. Got it?
Next we will take a look at the aperture setting. The bigger the number (example f11 compared to f5.6), you will get better depth of field or more areas coming into focus/sharper. It pretty much boils down to your own creativity and choice when selecting aperture to bring out the subject. You might want to have all areas around it blurred out, so you will choose a smaller aperture or you want a larger area to be in focus, hence you use a bigger aperture. Bear in mind though, the bigger the aperture, the less light will be going into your camera sensor, so you'll need to bump up the ISO to obtain the faster shutterspeed to freeze the subject.
Ok now that you know the reasoning and relationship behind using Aperture Priority - ISO - Shutterspeed, you can go ahead and take the shot using the timer/cable release method. You will end up with a shot looking similar to this.
Shooting the fast moving corals/inhabitants
Using the same technique, you can now apply this to faster moving corals/inhabitants. Basically everything remain the same EXCEPT ISO where you will need to bump it up higher to around 800 - 1600 for you to be able to obtain shutterspeeds of around 1/125-1/200 to freeze waving tentacles of a torch coral for example. Below is an example of how the feeding tentacles of a bubble coral has been "frozen" by the higher shutterspeed.
Do note that this is where DSLR has a big advantage over Point and Shoot cameras, in terms of flexibility to control the settings. Point and Shoot cameras might not be able to capture the faster moving corals because if they bump up their ISO, they will start to see noise/specs appearing in their photos. DSLR have a much cleaner output.
Ok, so far we've basically covered all the shooting techniques that will enable you to take some nice photos of your tank and its inhabitants. We will be covering post processing of your photos next using the Snapseed app.
Post Processing Your Photos With Snapseed App
Here's the last fun part just before you upload your photos to the web. First thing that you will need to do is to transfer the photos that you've taken, over to your smartphone or tablet. You can do this either through wifi (if your camera has this capability) or through cable/card reader. Once you have done this, launch the Snapseed app on your device. The first screen that you'll see will look something like the screenshot below. Select the icon highlighted in the screenshot (step 1)
A pop up menu will appear as per the screenshot below. Select "Choose photo" to bring up all the folders containing photos on your device. Select the photo that you wish to post process/edit.
Once you have selected your photo, you will be brought back to the original screen as per below screenshot. Select the "Automatic" icon as shown. Snapseed will try to adjust the contrast and color balance automatically based on the photo you have taken.
You will see a change in the contrast and color of your photo and will be taken to this screen.
Ok here's the important part. You can change the contrast and color correction by placing your finger on the photo and moving your fingers left to right (to change the amount of correction) and moving your fingers up and down (to change between contrast and color correction) as shown below. Remember previously when we were taking our photos, the white balance has been set to Auto? This is where you can correct the colors on your photo by changing the color correction. If your photo is too blue, just slide your fingers either left or right and watch the photo changes in color till you're satisfied with the look you want. Similarly with the contrast function, adjust accordingly till you're happy with the look. After that just select the "tick" button on bottom left of the screen to confirm your changes and you'll be taken back to the original screen with the changes already made on your photo.
The next thing that we want to adjust is the saturation of the photo. To do this, select the "Tune Image" icon as shown below.
Again move your fingers up to select "Saturation" from the list as per the screenshot below. Adjust the intensity of the saturation required by moving your fingers left/right accordingly and then click the "tick" button once done. Ok we're almost there, just one last adjustment.
The last adjustment that we're going to do is to sharpen the photo. Scroll the icons below the screen to the left till you see the "Details" icon as shown in the screenshot. Select this icon.
Adjust both the "Sharpening" and "Structure" values to about 20. If you need sharper then just increase the values. Select "tick" once done.
And that's it, we're done! Now you will need to save your edited photo by clicking on the icon shown. Your edited photo will be saved to the "Snapseed folder" on your smartphone/tablet. You can then upload this photo onto the web to be shared on Reef Sanctuary forums
Hope that this guide will help you to improve your shots and do feel free to ask me any questions if you are facing difficulties, I'll try my best to help out
The Equipment
Most of us nowadays own either a DSLR or a decent point and shoot camera. These 2 are a very good platform to start off with and here are the things that you will require to setup the shoot.
1) A DSLR or point and shoot camera
2) Kit lens (the lens that came bundled with your camera - normally 18-55mm or 18-135mm) or a macro lens (more advance)
3) A tripod (doesn't need to be expensive, as long as its sturdy)
4) Cable release or remote (optional - there's a way to overcome this if you don't have one, will be highlighted further down in the course under The Technique section)
5) Smartphone or tablet (optional - for post processing of the photos taken after taken the shot). Please download the free app - Snapseed
6) Clean the glass on your tanks
The Settings
Ok here comes the interesting part. How do I go about setting the camera? If you're a DSLR user, set your camera to Aperture Priority. Normally its Av or A on the mode dial and if you're a point and shoot user, set it to the Macro mode (for close up of corals), normally depicted by a flower icon in the menu options or the full auto mode (for full tank shot), normally depicted by a green square or the word auto. For those who don't plan to post process and want to just post the images straight off the camera, you can choose to increase the saturation and/or sharpness in your menu options. As for the white balance, set it to Auto.
Leave the ISO and aperture (f-stop) setting alone for the time being and I'll cover that under The Technique section.
The Technique
Ok now that you have your gears and basic settings done, you're ready to take your first shot. I'm going to cover 2 items here, the full tank shot and closeup of your corals.
Before that, please note that the best time to shoot your tank will be at night with all the lights off in the room except lights from the tank itself. This is due to the fact that there will be hardly any reflection from lights or the surroundings bouncing off the tank when you're taking your photo and the darkness of the room will help to bring out the colors and contrast from the tank itself. Note that if you shoot at night, you'll hardly need a CPL filter (circular polarizer filter) that is often used to cut off reflections on a DSLR camera. DO NOT use any flash to take the photos as the flash will produce a reflective glare back at your camera and it will show up in the photo. Please disable all the flash function in the camera.
Full Tank Shot
I'm going to cover 2 angles for the full tank shot and you can try out other different angles once you're comfortable shooting it.
The first angle will be the Full Tank Shot. Place your equipment directly facing the front of your tank so that when you view the framing in your camera's viewfinder or lcd screen, you can see your whole aquarium in the photo. You may either choose to zoom in or out to achieve this or just move your equipment forwards or backwards. Once you are happy with the framing, here's what you need to do next. Remember to position the camera at the same height as the tank to avoid any distortions (top down or bottom up distorted look).
Quick recap on your basic settings - DSLR (AV mode), Point and Shoot (Full Auto mode)
Ok here it gets a little complicated for DSLR users but bear with me. You will need to set ISO and Aperture next (For DSLR users) before taking the shot. Assuming that you have your tank lights on full, you can set the ISO to the lowest in your camera (ISO 100 or 200). Set your Aperture (f-stop) to f11 or f13 so that you have a good depth of field to cover the whole tank (basically making everything sharp and in focus).
Once you have set this, set the timer on your camera before pressing the shutter release button if you do not have a cable release/remote. If you have one, just use the cable release/remote to take the photo. By using the timer, you avoid causing a camera shake when you pressed the shutter button, similar to using a cable release/remote.
For point and shoot users, you do not need to set the Aperture and ISO but use the same technique to release the shutter (timer).
If all goes well you should get something like this.
The second angle will be the Side Angle Shot. You will use the exact same technique as the Full Tank Shot and just move your camera to a 45 degree angle shot of the tank. Again if you followed the above steps, you will end up with something like this.
How To Take Photos Of The Corals And Inhabitants
Now that you've familiarized yourselves with the full tank shot, we'll move on to shooting the corals as well as the other inhabitants in your tank. Here, we will encounter 2 situations - non moving/slow moving corals/inhabitants (example chalice, moon corals, brains, zoas, mushrooms, clams etc) and the fast moving corals/inhabitants (example anemone, hammer, torch, fish etc). There are 2 different techniques required to shoot these 2 categories in order to obtain clean and sharp photos.
Before that, let's familiarize ourselves to the Rules of thirds way of composing a photo. This will help to enhance the look and draw the eye to the subject you're shooting as oppose to the common practice of placing the subject straight in the middle of the photo frame. Imagine 2 diagonal and horizontal lines intersecting on your photo frame as shown below. You will want to place the point of interest, be it a colony of corals or the point of focus at the point of intersections. This is known as composing to the rules of thirds. It will take some getting use to at first but once your comfortable with this, you'll automatically compose your shots this way.
Shooting the slow or non movers
Ok now we will cover the slow/non movers first. Bring your camera and tripod close to the coral that you want to shoot. An important point to remember, your camera height needs to be at the same level as the corals so adjust your tripod height accordingly. You CANNOT shoot from top down or bottom up through the glass of your tank as the glass will distort the light going into your camera thus causing the image to be out of focus. Once you have your equipment set, compose accordingly using the rules of thirds.
Next we will cover the camera settings before taking the shot. DSLR users leave it on at AV (Aperture Priority) mode while Point and Shoot users will set it to the macro mode. For Point and Shoot users, you may directly take the photo after setting it to macro mode. Remember to use the timer method that you've learned from the Full Tank Shot technique.
For the DSLR users, you will have a few more settings to carry out before taking the shot, namely :
1) ISO - set it to 100 or 200 for non movers (example chalice coral) and set it to 400 for slow movers (example zoas moving in the current)
2) Aperture (f-stop) - set it between 5.6 - 11 (depending on the look you want to achieve, I'll explain further below)
3) White balance - set it to Auto
4) Take the shot using the timer/cable release method
Before we proceed to take the shot, let me explain why you need to set it as such so that you'll understand the concept and will know the correct technique to apply in the future. When you're in the Aperture Priority mode, all you have to do is to set the aperture and the camera will automatically set the shutterspeed based on the amount of available light (in this case the lighting from the tank). Normally we do not need to worry about shutterspeed since our camera is mounted on a tripod, however when you're shooting something that moves, the tripod will not save you from blur photos (since the subject is moving) but rather the shutterspeed comes into play. Use 1/125 shutterspeed as a guideline for the camera to be able to freeze a slow to moderate moving subject. The only way you can influence the shutterspeed when you're in the Aperture Priority mode, is to adjust the ISO (sensitivity of the camera's sensor to light). The higher the ISO the more sensitive the sensor is to light and the faster the shutterspeed you're going to get and vice versa.
This is the reason why when you're shooting a non moving coral like a chalice, you do not need to worry about shutterspeed (can as slow as a few seconds) as the fellow ain't going nowhere. Therefore the lowest ISO can be used (100 or 200). Similarly for slow movers you would want to bump up the ISO to 400 or even 800 depending on the aperture you're using to obtain a shutterspeed of around 1/125 to freeze the subject in the camera. Got it?
Next we will take a look at the aperture setting. The bigger the number (example f11 compared to f5.6), you will get better depth of field or more areas coming into focus/sharper. It pretty much boils down to your own creativity and choice when selecting aperture to bring out the subject. You might want to have all areas around it blurred out, so you will choose a smaller aperture or you want a larger area to be in focus, hence you use a bigger aperture. Bear in mind though, the bigger the aperture, the less light will be going into your camera sensor, so you'll need to bump up the ISO to obtain the faster shutterspeed to freeze the subject.
Ok now that you know the reasoning and relationship behind using Aperture Priority - ISO - Shutterspeed, you can go ahead and take the shot using the timer/cable release method. You will end up with a shot looking similar to this.
Shooting the fast moving corals/inhabitants
Using the same technique, you can now apply this to faster moving corals/inhabitants. Basically everything remain the same EXCEPT ISO where you will need to bump it up higher to around 800 - 1600 for you to be able to obtain shutterspeeds of around 1/125-1/200 to freeze waving tentacles of a torch coral for example. Below is an example of how the feeding tentacles of a bubble coral has been "frozen" by the higher shutterspeed.
Do note that this is where DSLR has a big advantage over Point and Shoot cameras, in terms of flexibility to control the settings. Point and Shoot cameras might not be able to capture the faster moving corals because if they bump up their ISO, they will start to see noise/specs appearing in their photos. DSLR have a much cleaner output.
Ok, so far we've basically covered all the shooting techniques that will enable you to take some nice photos of your tank and its inhabitants. We will be covering post processing of your photos next using the Snapseed app.
Post Processing Your Photos With Snapseed App
Here's the last fun part just before you upload your photos to the web. First thing that you will need to do is to transfer the photos that you've taken, over to your smartphone or tablet. You can do this either through wifi (if your camera has this capability) or through cable/card reader. Once you have done this, launch the Snapseed app on your device. The first screen that you'll see will look something like the screenshot below. Select the icon highlighted in the screenshot (step 1)
A pop up menu will appear as per the screenshot below. Select "Choose photo" to bring up all the folders containing photos on your device. Select the photo that you wish to post process/edit.
Once you have selected your photo, you will be brought back to the original screen as per below screenshot. Select the "Automatic" icon as shown. Snapseed will try to adjust the contrast and color balance automatically based on the photo you have taken.
You will see a change in the contrast and color of your photo and will be taken to this screen.
Ok here's the important part. You can change the contrast and color correction by placing your finger on the photo and moving your fingers left to right (to change the amount of correction) and moving your fingers up and down (to change between contrast and color correction) as shown below. Remember previously when we were taking our photos, the white balance has been set to Auto? This is where you can correct the colors on your photo by changing the color correction. If your photo is too blue, just slide your fingers either left or right and watch the photo changes in color till you're satisfied with the look you want. Similarly with the contrast function, adjust accordingly till you're happy with the look. After that just select the "tick" button on bottom left of the screen to confirm your changes and you'll be taken back to the original screen with the changes already made on your photo.
The next thing that we want to adjust is the saturation of the photo. To do this, select the "Tune Image" icon as shown below.
Again move your fingers up to select "Saturation" from the list as per the screenshot below. Adjust the intensity of the saturation required by moving your fingers left/right accordingly and then click the "tick" button once done. Ok we're almost there, just one last adjustment.
The last adjustment that we're going to do is to sharpen the photo. Scroll the icons below the screen to the left till you see the "Details" icon as shown in the screenshot. Select this icon.
Adjust both the "Sharpening" and "Structure" values to about 20. If you need sharper then just increase the values. Select "tick" once done.
And that's it, we're done! Now you will need to save your edited photo by clicking on the icon shown. Your edited photo will be saved to the "Snapseed folder" on your smartphone/tablet. You can then upload this photo onto the web to be shared on Reef Sanctuary forums
Hope that this guide will help you to improve your shots and do feel free to ask me any questions if you are facing difficulties, I'll try my best to help out
Last edited:
Well done Kevin !
