tip of the day

[Tim224DT]

Another tip:

Don't use zoom on your camera or at least the digital zoom on the camera when taking pics. Only use the optical zoom which gives you a clearer pic. So if you don't have a digital camera and are looking to buy one look for the highest optical zoom one you can afford. Most cameras are 3x optical and that is what mine is. I zoom all the way out and don't use the zoom when taking pics so they come out better quality.


Tim

[Troy]

Raw is only better in that you have more control of the processing of the image. If the camera's default processing is better than the processing you manually apply the picture will look better when you don't use raw. The trick is to get better at post processing than the camera defaults. Your likely not adjusting the curves and sharpness correctly.

[Troy]

For most SLR users you will get better pictures by purchasing an external flash and flash extension cord (And learning how to use them well) than buying a fancy new lens. This holds true for both tank shots and indoor photography.

[Troy]

If you don't have manual aperture control (F-Stop) on your camera you can get a better background blur by zooming in as much as possible on your target and moving back until you fill the frame correctly. Zooming in more will increase effective camera shake though, so it becomes more important to use a tripod or brace your camera. If you don't, everything will be blurry, not just the background.

[Fly Guy]

Im a newb..but i have figured out how to use the raw now. And the major benefit of it to me is that i can now crop any part of a pic out and not lose hardly any resolution at all in doing so.

What i was doing before is not using the "unfilter mask" lol no wonder they sucked : )

[Troy]

Shooting in glass tanks are more difficult because you have greater distortion as you take pictures at an angle from the front glass.

Shooting in acrylic tanks is more difficult when using flash because light from the flash can travel through the acrylic until it hits microscratches you can't see and bounce into the camera lens causing distortion.

Both tank types present their own challenges.

[Troy]

For others who may be wondering I think you mean the unsharp mask. And you are correct. Unless you are very careful about your settings a picture stored in any format other than raw that is cropped is resampled. This gives you the copy of a copy problem you've probably seen with office copiers.

[DebsSisterFlo]

unsharp mask is such a wonder! I didn't know about it until I picked up that tip around here... it really helps with a great pic that isn't as sharp as you'd like...