Best settings for actinic shots.

[garybooth]

:)Hi Guys,

I have seen loads of stunning photos on here of tanks lit by actinics or blues, where you can really see the flouresance of the corals.

I have a Fuji S7000, which does take some really nice shots, however whenever I try to take a picture with just the actinics on, I just get blue everyhting, I lose all of the colours in the corals. I have recently upgraded my tubes to Narva Blues, and the corals really stand out colour wise, however in the pictures, everything is just a shade of blue.

What are the best settings for this kind of shot?

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Gary

[Reef bloke]

Have a look in the manual concerning white balance.The actinics may be fooling your camera and throwing the white balance out.

[garybooth]

Nice one mate, I will see what I can find.

Gary

[dickwilly]

Is it a SLR type camera?

Can you addjust ISO, apeture and exposure time?

[garybooth]

Its Slr like, so to speak you can adjust most settings, but cant change the lens.

What settings would you recommend?

Thanks

Gary

[dickwilly]

I just mess about with the settings till i get something i like.

I try to use the lowest ISO i can (to reduce noise), the smallest aperture i can (to get most of the depth of field) and the fastest shutter speed (to prevent motion blur). If you mess about with all these you should be on to a winner in no time. Try an aperture of ~f5.6 and then adjust the ISO and shutter speed to get a well exposed shot. When you have a crisp image, mess about with the white balance (or use photo shop to post process)
(If all this doesn't make any sense to you (it certainly didn't when i first got started) then let us know and we'll try to help).

I find a tripod and remote shutter release is almost a necessity for decent actinic shots. And turn off all your pumps, this stops corals swaying in the flow and becoming blurry in the image.