Taking Photos at the Aquarium

Recently I visited the Monterrey Aquarium with my girlfriend. It was an awesome trip and I had loads of fun but taking photos in the aquarium is hard. Maybe not hard, but it takes some getting used to and I wish I had better gear to take advantage of the great exhibits. Here's some things I learned...

1) It's dark in there! - And i mean really dark. Here's a shot of some corrals. This was probably one of the brightest exhibits i saw there. To show you how dark it was, here are some figures for you. This shot was taken at 85mm at f/5.6 ISO 800 and 1/30th of a second (my 17-85 can't go any faster than that at 85mm : ( ). If I didn't have image stabilization on my lens, I think the shot would have been worse. Image stabilization or IS is good for these low light situations when you subject ISN'T moving. Luckily these corrals were moving very slowly and I was able to get a fairly sharp shot. If your subject is moving Image Stabilization doesn't do a thing...You need either a fast lens or you need to bump the ISO to get a faster shutter speed. Unfortunately my camera can't do anything higher than ISO 1600, but even at that speed there's too much noise. So I had to work with what I had.

Here's another shot that was taken at low speeds. I think the jellyfish tanks are great, but there are loads of people around and I felt bad for hogging the glass.

2)Flashes - Some exhibits allow flashes. Some don't. I actually didn't flash at all during my trip. I found that just the ambient lights were enough to cause annoying reflections in the glass. I would think with a flash it would be even worse, but I didn't try it. If you do use flash, I think it would be best to put the flash and camera as close to the exhibit glass as possible to cut down on reflections. Almost the whole time I was there I was glued to the glass with my lens...kinda felt like one of those sucker fish. The fish must of thought I was crazy :P

3) Slow shutter - When all else fails be creative...at least that's what I tried to do. Considering I couldn't freeze the motion of most of the fish with the equipment I had, I went for a more abstract look. In this pic, there were lots of fish going in the same direction. They were going fairly quick, so I went for a slow shutter speed (.6 secs) and kept the camera steady. This made a cool blur effect.

4) Panning - Another technique that I tried was panning. This is very hard, but with some practice I was getting some fairly decent shots. I know this shark photo isn't tack sharp, but the blur from panning creates a nice sense of motion IMO. This shot was taken at 1/2 sec.

5) Metering - Metering for the right light source is key in the aquarium, but it's hard with the contrasting light sources. In this pic my camera was metering for the whole shot and I was getting some weird results. I wanted the corral to be exposed properly and I wanted everything else to go black. In this case I changed my metering mode to center weighted and aimed at the corral. I locked in my exposure and recomposed. This was my result.

Ideal equipment? - I'd say a camera body with good high ISO plus fast lens are key. I was shooting ISO 800 most of the time and I could have gone higher if my camera could do it. I think either of the 5Ds, Nikon D700 or any pro body would work well. As for lenses, there are some very small things like corrals and some very big stuff like shark tanks. If I could do it again, I'd bring a 5D with one fast wide...maybe the 24mm 1.4 II and a fast telephoto...maybe the 85mm 1.8 or 100 macro.

I hope this helps anyone going to the aquarium to take photos. Anyone have good shots at the aquarium? I'd love to see other photos and see what I did right and what I did wrong. Any help appreciated...

Utah Pano

I haven't blogged in a while, but it's been a crazy few months. I recently updated my portfolio with this image that was taken in Utah. I've been getting into panoramic photography and I've learned a bunch. Here are some tips and some questions if anyone can help out.

1)Hardware - first things first...what equipment do you need for a good pano?

1. Lens - I use either a prime 24mm or a wide zoom with my Canon XT. You want to use a lens that doesn't have a lot of distortion so I find that primes do the best job, but zooms will work too. The main thing is to go wide!
   
2. Filters - I hate taking pics and the ground is exposed properly and the sky is all white or you expose for the sky and the ground is all black. You can fix this with neutral density grads, but you'll need a holder to attach the filters to your lens. I have a Cokin P holder that I use with neutral density grads to balance to exposure.

2)Technique -

1. Orientation - When I shoot panos I always shoot vertically to get more of the foreground and sky. I find that when I shoot in landscape orientation it doesn't give me enough space to work with once i stitch the pics in Photoshop.
2. Exposure - I set my camera to Manaul mode. Don't use Av or Tv modes or you will get different exposures for each pic in the scene. I usually start by scanning the entire scene to find the brightest and darkest areas. Once I have these two points, I choose an exposure in the middle. I take a test shot somewhere in the middle of the scene and check the exposure. I rely on my in-camera histogram to make adjustments to the exposure if needed. Once you get a good exposure you're ready to go.
3. Focus - Manual focus...kinda. Let's say you have a cool mountain range way off in the distance or a really cool building. It may be tempting to focus on that, but don't! Focus on the foreground and use hyperfocal apertures to get a clean result. If you want more info on hyperfocal distances check out this site. I usually autofocus on the foreground first. Once I get autofocus lock I'll switch to manual focus on my lens and shoot the rest of my sequence. With my 24mm I usually try to focus on something ~10ft away. With my aperture set to f/8 or f/11, everything ~5ft and farther will be in focus. This is key to get everything in the frame in focus. I usually don't use apertures smaller than f/11 (say f/16 or f/22) because you will get softer images due to diffraction.
   
4. Sequencing - My camera doesn't have a "Pano" mode, but I've seen it on some cameras. If you have it, use it. If you don't have that option you'll need to eye ball it. Once I get my exposure and focus spot on, I'll start my sequence usually from left to right. In my first shot I'll try to look for an object on the right side of the frame that I can easily identify, for argument sake let's say a rock. I use that rock as a marker so I know when to stop in my next shot. In the second shot I try to put that rock on the left of the frame, but not to close to the edge. You want some overlap so photoshop can easily stitch the images. After I take the second shot I look for another object in that frame, once again on the right side that can be a good marker for the next shot. Repeat until the sequence is finished. Of course this takes some practice, but it can be done handheld.
   
5. Post-production - this is where you keep your fingers crossed and pray your pano comes out okay. I've used both Photoshop CS3 and CS4 and both work well. Just open all your pics in photoshop and go to File ->Automate -> Photomerge. It will ask you which layout you want ( I usually use auto), what files you'd like to use and some extra options. If you already have all your photos in photoshop just click "Add Open Files" and then Okay. Make sure the "blend images together" box is checked. Photoshop will do its voodoo on the pics and stitch them together for you.
   

3)Questions? - There are some things I still haven't figured on with panos. Can anyone help?

• Moving objects - How do you account for moving objects like waves? Is there a particular way to make these panos better, or do you just need to clone out the mess.
• Filters - Has anyone compared Cokin and Singh-ray filters? The Singh-ray filters are nearly 3 times expensive and I'm wondering if they make that much difference.