C&C juvenile catfish

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pakman

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OK... kind of burnt out processing my pics from the Philippines trip. But for the heck of it, thought I start doing a second pass to see if there are any other worthwhile pics... Came across this set of juvenile catfish in Puerto Galera. Kind of undecided if they are interesting or not. Lack of color contrast kind of makes these dull... Anyways...

The swarm
IMG_1218.jpg


maybe they'll look interesting if I get closer... OK sand granules start giving a better size perspective on the catfishies...
IMG_1214.jpg


hmm... maybe if I get in a little more closer... losing DOF, maybe should gone to a smaller aperture, say to 22...
IMG_1215.jpg


All shot with a Canon 350D, 60mm, dual flash, f/11, 1/125, shot in raw, no cropping, slight levels adjustments in PS to lighten them up a bit, and a dash of smart sharpen.

:popcorn::coffee:
 
wow......a lot juvenile catfish:popcorn:
 
Hey Pak,

I’m fond of all three.
Nice lighting and focus, nice colours and D O F.
As it is I think they’re all good photos.

I think the patterns and lines of the catfish along with the overall shape of the ‘school’ so to speak lends itself well to a black & white conversion.
What say you?

Curves would work well on the first pic as it looks a little ‘flat’ to me.
Cheers :).
 
There's something mesmerizing about that first shot. Maybe a tighter crop would bring out the "artsy" nature of all those stripes. Something like this?

cats.jpg
 
SeaYoda:
There's something mesmerizing about that first shot. Maybe a tighter crop would bring out the "artsy" nature of all those stripes. Something like this?

cats.jpg

this does look better. to my mind shooting them in an artsy fashion would make the shot as well.

overall i like them pak (i find it very hard to shoot these buggers), but noting what you mentioned as lack of contrast why not try increasing the blacks?

btw, i love the third shot. macro :wink:
 
jonix:
... but noting what you mentioned as lack of contrast why not try increasing the blacks?:wink:

oops, actually when I was adjusting levels, I think I lightened the midtones too much thus the flat look to it!
 
Yup, have a play with B & W on the cropped version - I'd do it myself, but you made nasty comments about my diving skills when armed with a camera on another thread, so
cheekyfingers.gif


:D

Actually I'm at work, with no photoshop to play with. Boo hiss.
 
Making sure your shadows and contrast are set well is a good start to make sure the image presents well. Remember RAW must have work done - it takes the converter to make it colour (RAW data isn't in colour) and it takes you to make the decisions that cameras would otherwise make when creating a jpeg for instance. ACR is your friend with properly exposed images so use it well - don't be scared of it.

These guys can be really cool to shoot but extremely frustrating. I don't attempt them very often as I end up with "ok" but kinda ho hum shots more often than not.

I see a couple of things that I try to keep in mind:
1) you've gotta get at least one of the fish eyes in sharp focus or they just become a mass of stripes.
2) you've gotta get them in a group for a group shot to work. This takes patience and luck :wink: If you can get them to show their motion of balling so much the better.
cfex2.jpg


3) if your group isn't tightly packed it can still work but you again have to get some of the eyes sharp. A looser pack can show more details of the fish - here eyes, mouths, whiskers etc...
4) you've gotta get lower! That last shot is so close but all the motion still looks like you are peering down on them.
cfex1.jpg


These two shots are from my trusty Oly 5050, 1/1000, f6.3, ISO64 If I had to do this with the 60mm macro (that I adore!) I would start at about f16 and work from there. f11 just doesn't give enough dof for this type of shot, imho. Could my two images be improved next time - I sure hope so :)
 
Thanks Alcina... good advise.
[Self-hijack] btw, I took a look at that Sigma 17-70mm. Nice lens especially with the close focus ability. If I didn't already have the 18-50mm EX lens, I'd snap that up for the macro capability. The only downside is I would need an additional extension for either my dome or macro port to fit the sigma 17-70mm fully extended to 70mm to avoid hitting the glass... So I ended up leaving the store with a Canon 100mm macro lens... oh dear... now to get a port extension and diopter for it... :D
 

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