So why is it that the coolest fish will invariably be found just as the sun hits the trees, requiring a mad dash up the nearest hill to get the last bit of light for photos? Or you collect something fun and interesting, and as you're getting out of the water to set up your photo stuff the skies darken and the raindrops start to splat down all around you?

I'm in southwest VA for a wedding and some fieldwork, and I got chased around by thunderstorms yesterday, interrupting three separate photo sessions. I'm starting to rethink my position on natural light, and pining for the pair of Speedlites that I used to have access to... I might break down and buy a set this summer.



(even with the rain, it was still more fun than the wedding...)

Incredible photo, I'm in awe. That is a beautiful MRDB and a Very impressive photo. I've noticed that a lot of people use black or white for backgrounds on photos. Has anyone ever tried Gray or other colors?

(even with the rain, it was still more fun than the wedding...)

What isn't......being shot in the face maybe?

It's funny you mention this Dave. I was in Southern Alabama over the weekend, visited many sites and only managed one set of photos. I had the gear out many times but rain forced me to put it away all but once.
I've found clear reinforced tarp material and I'm determined to make a simple tent that will allow me to photograph in the rain. I'll let you know how the project pans out. Great P. oreas shot BTW.

Wow, you definitely got Mr. Oreas in full dress, great photo!

Blake

Great photo. It makes me miss the days when I actually caught fish with color!!!

I use a twin head macro flash. Works better than a ring flash as you can angle the heads to suppress glare on the glass, though I've found that simply getting so close to the glass that glare is outside the range of the lens seems to eliminate glare.

Expensive solution for the weather - use a weatherproof setup. In my case it's an Olympus E3 camera with 50 Macro lens. It's not built to be submersible, but the occasional rain shower won't bother it.

Experimenting with a photo box. Best results I've had so far are creek sand glued to the bottom for a natural look (l photo a lot of darters) with a black background, though I do have to go to manual flash and dial the gn back so it doesn't overexpose the fish.

I still get the best results in my tank. That takes a lot of patience waiting for the subject to get in just the right position, but the end result is a much more natural looking photo.

Edited by JohnO, 27 June 2009 - 08:17 AM.

Has anyone ever tried Gray or other colors?

A few folks have gotten some great shots using the grey background. I was thinking I favor the grey until I saw this photo. The black really works for that fish!

Can somebody please explain why so many field guides and regional atlases settle for such crappy photos for their books? Especially preserved specimens. I say, if all you got is pics of preserved fish, get a drawing or don't include a pic at all.
The shots we see on this forum, including but not limited to the one above, are far, far better than so much that has been published to date.

The shots we see on this forum, including but not limited to the one above, are far, far better than so much that has been published to date.

For one thing, it gives you an idea of the kind of lag you have to deal with when publishing. It just takes a long time. Secondly, the technology in the last couple years has jumped incredibly for the price. That's not reflected in the guides yet because of the time lag. So what we see here, and what folks on this Forum are figuring out is far ahead of any book in hand.

Believe me, in another 5 years, there'll be the Uland Thomas standard. That just takes time to propagate

Todd

Todd, I have to respectfully disagree; the photos in several "state books" (VA, TN, SC, and some others) stand out, and at least two of those were all shot on slide film, through substantial effort and expense. I have a tremendous amount of admiration and respect for the guys that originally developed and refined this technique the hard way. If I remember correctly, Jack Randall was one of the first to make common use of a photo tank and pinning board for fresh specimens (ahh, gotta love freshwater stuff because doing this on board a rolling research vessel is a total pain in the tail!). Digital SLRs and post-shot processing with Photoshop make this orders of magnitude easier than it used to be.

Mike, thanks for the compliments, but there's also need for photos of preserved fish (as well as drawings!!). Fishes of VA stands out by having both b&w photo of fixed specimens as well as color plates of freshly-killed fish. Most of mine are fresh-dead and slightly fixed when the shutter snaps; just try to get a clean lateral view of a live sculpin or madtom without doing that!

Awesome pic, Dave! Beautiful fish!

Brian

Todd, I have to respectfully disagree; the photos in several "state books" (VA, TN, SC, and some others) stand out, and at least two of those were all shot on slide film, through substantial effort and expense.

I'm glad you pointed this out Dave, because what I wrote reads pretty disrespectfully, and I apologize for that. I too have a deep appreciation for the time, trouble and expense with which those earlier photos were taken, and I did not relay that in my post. Perhaps an analogy to music is appropriate to convey my thinking... Those photographs are The Stooges, The Modern Lovers and Bowie. What we have now is mass consumption, maybe something has been lost in the creativity, but the fidelity of "signal" among the masses is improved (although thoughtless posts like my own work against that notion lol). That results in more consistent interpretation of the subject, but is not implicitly "better", I still listen to the Stooges. "Look out honey, cause I'm using technology..."

However, I will argue that the technology has improved orders of magnitude, perhaps most, and in what I left out, in printing technology (both print and layout). I'd be curious to see what the VA and TN photos looked like using current printer techniques, resolution, and saturation. I think that's where 75% of the difference in what we see on the screen from the photos getting post here and what ends up in a book exists. I haven't looked at the SC book yet, but I'm imagining that if Fritz used old slides that he took, they look absolutely amazing in print. I'm going to guess it's as sexy as the Fishes of the Middle Savanna. Grabarkiewicz got his copy of the new Ontario book, and he said it was amazing. So perhaps the propagation has begun.

The other 25% I think is in flash technology, and this may be where the contemporary photos have what seem to be a little bit more luster. Saturating the fish's color makes all the difference. The arrays you guys are shooting with are just amazing. Don't discount that affect.

And that's really all that I meant by the Thomas Standard Again, I apologize for any implicit disrespect, it's not what I think, it's just what I typed.

Todd