C&C: Clownfish and Anemone

hi guys can i go first? i love clownfishes and i shoot them everytime i get the opportunity. although these would probably be my best to date, there seems to be something "wrong" with them.

I'm using a Canon A95 without external strobe.

Location: Anilao, Batangas
Viz: 10-15 meters
Depth: 10-12 meters

Exif Data for both images:

Shutter Speed: 1/100
Aperture: F5
Exposure Mode: Manual
Focal Length: 7.8mm
Max Aperture Value: 2.8
Flash: fired
Metering: Center Weighted
WB: Manual
No PS Tweaking on both
Canon A95 saves JPG only

WTG Jon!!! Glad to see a post with the new idea - I'm shattered tonight, but I'll be coming back to this thread first thing in the morning to see what's what

But I'll say that the colour of the fish and the anemone works for me in both images - well done with the light.

You might want to have a look at the blue-ing at the edges of the white saddle/green anemone - that will likely be something caused by your camera itself and mostly beyond your control shooting. But it's something that you might be able to tweak in processing. It's well controlled in the second image already - I only saw it coz I was looking

The depth of field seem to be shallow.
The back 2/3 of the top clown fish seem to be slightly out of focus. As does the whole of the bottom clown fish.
I think i would try to set the F stop to 16. This might not be possible without an external strobe.
Set the autofocus to single spot. It might be that the camera is trying to focus on the anenomie and not the clown fish.

I do hope mine are as good as this, then I will be a happy bunny.

alcina:

You might want to have a look at the blue-ing at the edges of the white saddle/green anemone - that will likely be something caused by your camera itself and mostly beyond your control shooting. But it's something that you might be able to tweak in processing. It's well controlled in the second image already - I only saw it coz I was looking

Click to expand...

so really filling the frame does it's purpose in this case. that's the only thing i seemed to adjust for the second shot.

@victor: on the shallow depth, i did shoot these with macro on and i noticed just now the slight off focus of the second pic as you mentioned. unfortunately i could only go to a max of F8 with my camera. yes i do find that the camera has a hard time with center weighted metering...it tends to focus on the anemone. this happens a lot. i could set the focus to single point but wouldn't it be more of a problem considering clownfishes are always moving around?

next dive i'll try all three metering modes to see the difference. thanks guys.

Hey Jon,

Firstly let me say nice shots .
As to your question that something is wrong with them, really to my eye the only issues are the colours and slight softness of the clownfish.

Re the softness I think it’s a result of the shutter speed and varying distances of the anemones and clownfish from the camera.
What did you focus on initially when setting up this shot?

I’d up the shutter speed to 1/200s or so and actually take this photo in TV (shutter speed priority mode) as I find using the flash while in Manual mode makes it very difficult to gauge the right ‘power’ to use.
I think for a macro subject like this that’s fairly close to the camera and filling the frame that TV mode would work best.

Don’t know if your A95 is like my A610 but I effectively have control of the internal flash in one third increments only, the lowest setting is underpowered for almost anything that I’d encounter underwater.
Two thirds power is not enough and on full setting the flash will nuke next to anything that you’re taking a photo of, I think you can control this though with pretty high shutter speeds and a small aperture like f6.3 or greater.

As for the colours quick PS tweaking can remove the green colour cast, add contrast over the midtones, boost saturation, tweak the colour balance, sharpening et cetera.
Second photo looks a little dark to my eyes, you can brighten that image also.

I hear you about the varying metering modes, I still don’t have a good handle on it.

Have you taken a look at Radiantvista or Luminous Landscape yet?
They have some great photoshop tutorials there that really give you a good grasp on PS.

Jamdiver:

Hey Jon,

Firstly let me say nice shots .
As to your question that something is wrong with them, really to my eye the only issues are the colours and slight softness of the clownfish.

Re the softness I think it’s a result of the shutter speed and varying distances of the anemones and clownfish from the camera.
What did you focus on initially when setting up this shot?

Click to expand...

Moved in and metered on the area of the anemone that the clowfish comes out from. I don't know if that would be the best way to meter the photo, i remember the initial shot i did (just the anemone) was slightly under exposed which i thought was acceptable. The final shots i took on a very slight upward angle so i could get more ambient light.

I’d up the shutter speed to 1/200s or so and actually take this photo in TV (shutter speed priority mode) as I find using the flash while in Manual mode makes it very difficult to gauge the right ‘power’ to use.
I think for a macro subject like this that’s fairly close to the camera and filling the frame that TV mode would work best.

Click to expand...

yes i did shoot full manual including flash, but i did bracket with flash power, shutter speed and aperture setting (10-13 photos in all). i haven't tried shooting TV, i'll give it a shot tomorrow and see what difference it makes.

Don’t know if your A95 is like my A610 but I effectively have control of the internal flash in one third increments only, the lowest setting is underpowered for almost anything that I’d encounter underwater.
Two thirds power is not enough and on full setting the flash will nuke next to anything that you’re taking a photo of, I think you can control this though with pretty high shutter speeds and a small aperture like f6.3 or greater.

Click to expand...

i think our cameras are prety much the same.

As for the colours quick PS tweaking can remove the green colour cast, add contrast over the midtones, boost saturation, tweak the colour balance, sharpening et cetera.
Second photo looks a little dark to my eyes, you can brighten that image also.

Click to expand...

i'll give it a shot. since these photos were taken during the workshop, i did set a personal of objective of taking photos which should not need PS work.

Have you taken a look at Radiantvista or Luminous Landscape yet?
They have some great photoshop tutorials there that really give you a good grasp on PS.

Click to expand...

not yet, will check them out. thanks for the inputs jam, will be trying them out tomorrow.

oooops...from the guidelines of the C&C sticky i think you should create your own thread catherine

nice free swimming anemone fish though. i've got a shot of one who kept bugging during a dive

what? This is a private thread? oops sorry...thought it was a theme thread on clown fish. Sorry...I admit to skipping the sticky's at times.

what the heck is C and C...sounds like a homeowner's association thing.

catherine96821:

Jonix, with the big aperatures is your depth of field diminished? I am afraid to get it wrong cause Ron Frank will slap me into next week. I was trying to shoot with a bigger aperature. Who knows, cause my camera is saying shutter priority even when I shoot manual. I know the shutter speed needs to be faster with these guys but I think the trade off is depth of field. Ron says my Ribbon eel exposures were good but they look soft. Is that out of focus?

Click to expand...

yes, it dof becomes too shallow at times (i'm sure jam would like that though). but on times i do intend to shoot with a shallow dof, i set my internal strobe to the lowest setting to compensate for the light increase. for now i initially shoot 1/125 or 1/100 @ F5 then bracket the aperture to 2 stops higher or lower. then i reset to F5 and bracket on shutter speed, 2up & 2 down. gives me a lot of photos to study.

Jon, I actually like the colors of this pic because to me, the darkness and the soft focus of the green anemone makes the orange nemo pop out (more distinct) .

You mentioned that you bracketed the Fstop. Did you take him in F8? Without a strobe, some of my F8 fish fotos look too dark especially when I'm not very close (supermacro close) to the subject. What did your F8 fotos look like?