Photographing My Fish

[This Old Spouse]

I've seen some really stunning photos on this forum, but try as I might I can't get any good photos unless my fish are simply not moving. Is there a trick to this? I finally found my macro setting on my Canon PowerShot S3 IS, but of course the shutter speed is too slow on the P setting. Can't use the macro on the sport setting, so does anyone out there have a helpful hint or two? PLEASE??

Thanks.

 

[lljdma06]

While there are some good photographers here, I think Tropical discussion might be a better forum for you, or even photography, but let's try toprical discussion for now. More traffic.

Liz

 

[Randomitity]

Lots of sitting and watching mainly, I mean it took me 2 days to get a good photo of the white oranda I got and that was just trying to take a normal picture lol, while with my bettas I have gotten a few good pictures of them showing off while not even being there for 10 minutes.

 

[Davo86]

may help: how to take great fish photos

 

[twodoctors]

may help: how to take great fish photos

Mostly good advice.

It's easier with dSLR. Still, it is possible with a P&S. Probably easiest in Shutter priority mode, with speed of at least 1/125. I would push the ISO up to about 800, but as per advice, the lower the better. Aperture of f4 to f8. With lower f number, you'll struggle to have the fish in focus because of the narrow depth of field. Don't use flash as it will reflect light off the glass. Manual focus, and focus to one point only. Snap when the fish pass that particular point (hence easier with dSLR as less time lag).

Most important of all is to keep the eye of the fish in focus. Like photographing human, it is the eye the people focus on first, then the rest of the photo. Don't worry about the composition to start with. You can always crop it later.

Hope that helps.

Adrian