Since I was emailing tips to a friend who had asked for them, I thought I'd post them here too:
--Use a digital camera that will allow you to override all the automatic settings and will allow manual focusing. If you are purchasing a new camera, be wary of Canon cameras because they add blue/purple artifacts to aquarium shots. In general, I would recommend Nikon, though I'm not familiar with their current models. Any "normal" lens will do.
--If shooting swimming fish, use flash. If shooting corals or fish that are not moving, then don't use flash.
--Use a tripod.
--Set a shutter delay so that the shutter will go off a couple of seconds after you push it. Or use a remote shutter control device so that pressing the shutter release won't jiggle the camera.
--Use f8 as your aperture setting and allow the camera to set the shutter speed.
--Turn off actinic lights and room lights.
--You may also need to turn off powerheads.
--If
metal halide lights cause bright white "hot spots", put sheets of plastic eggcrate across the top of the tank to diffuse the lighting. Trying turning off the light nearest the area you are photographing.
--Though in general I dislike PC lights, 50/50 PC lights yield the truest color in photos that I've found. 10,000k T5 lights also work well.
--Zoom in as far as possible, focus, then zoom back out as desired before shooting.
--Make sure the inside and outside of the glass or acrylic are clean.
--When shooting your tank and stand, shoot straight on rather than from an angle.
--Frame your shot to eliminate as much extra background as possible.
--If you don't have Photoshop or another program that will allow you to resize photos and you plan to email them or post them on the Web, shoot at 480x600 or 800x600 pixels.
--Photos for the Web and email must be in .jpg format (aka JPEG format), a digital file compression scheme.
--JPEG is a "lossy" file compression format. When saving as JPEG, the more compressed the file, the worse the image quality, the smaller the file size. For Internet use, medium quality compression is sufficient. Avoid high quality as it results in large file sizes.
--DO NOT SAVE PHOTOS IN GIF FORMAT!!!!
--Avoid photo file sizes larger than 100k for use on the Web or as email attachments. If sending to someone with a dial-up connection, aim for under 50k.
--Most email accounts have limitations on the size file attachments allowed. Send photos individually as attachments to separate emails. Or, if you have any Web hosting space (often free with your dial up or broadband account) upload the images to your Web site folder and send the URLs to the recipient in an email.
--File size is determined by several factors: the dimension of the photo (ie, 800x600 pixels), the quality or degree of compression and to a smaller degree by the lightness or darkness of the image. Dark images result in larger file sizes.
--If images don't look good in your Web browser and you're using AOL, find the AOL preference that allows you to turn off AOL's image compression, which really messes up photos. Or use AOL to connect and then use another browser such as Internet Explorer, Safari, Foxfire or Netscape.
--Many photos can be significantly improved with simple techniques in Photoshop. Though new versions of Photoshop may be prohibitively expensive, older versions can be bought on eBay very inexpensively. Versions 7+ will do anything you could possibly imagine doin and then some, though you may need some extra RAM (memory) to run it. Fortunately RAM is inexpensive now too. If you have Photoshop and want tips for using it, let me know.
