Taking photo's without the "blue" on your phone ***

I wanted to share how I take photo's with my iphone and not have that blue hue in the photo's. You can actually take really good photos with your phone.

You need a orange filter to balance out the blue hue when you're taking photos. I purchased this in ebay and used the orange filter.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/27199973320...49&var=570819505638&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT

I'm sure there's a lot of other places to purchase this, but here's an idea where. You can also use pill bottle plastic, orange lens safety glass, etc.

I cut a strip of the film out, just enough to cover the lens on the camera. Another thing I do that's helpful on taking clear photo's is let the phone rest flush with the tank, so that it's flat against the glass/acrylic. This works really good.

I put the strip between my case and the phone. The case holds it secure so you can take photos.

Example of picture without filter:

Example with orange filter:

Great info thanks!

Cheers!!!

Wow thats pretty neat.

Thanks

Nice Oregon blue tort

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Thanks Jeremy for the tort!! It's looking great in my tank!

By the way your light is too high!!

Just kidding...


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I know it'd be more work, but just wondering, can you have the same result by editing the photo?

That's pretty cool !

Yep, this is a sure fire way to get 'close' to accurate photos from a phone or Point and Shoot camera. These pics were taking using a Cybershot circa 2003-4, with a whopping 7.1mp at it's disposal.

Selecting the correct gel filter can be a task and a half in and of itself.. After a lot of trial and error this has worked best for my tank, tank lit by 6x24 T5, 3 Blue+, 2 Coral+, 1 Actinic.

Ok question guys if we put the orange filter on why not just take a pic with the white lights

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A couple reasons.

First -- It's *still* not accurate, and just looks washed out. Try it, you will be highly disappointed unless you have a decent camera, and some photography skills.

Second -- Not everybody has white lights. My T5 fixture is 3 Blue+, 2 Coral+ and 1 actinic, all of which are on in my picture. There are no white lights to turn on.

Third -- Assuming you *could* turn on white lights, you would just get another misrepresentation of what you see.

No matter how you slice it, it's significantly easier to tune your camera to settings which best fit the criteria of your reef aquarium, and then fine tune it once you find the filter that best matches what you're seeing in person. It took a lot of trial and error for me to find the filter and camera settings to best represent what I see when I look in my tank. But it's an extremely close match now

Oh ok got you so what camera are u sing now and what filters with it and what lights are u running also


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For lights: I'm running an ATI 6x24w T5 fixture,
For Bulbs: I'm using 3 ATI Blue Plus, 2 ATI Coral Plus, and 1 ATI Actinic
Camera: ANCIENT Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-W55 7.2mp Camera -- Made in 2005/6
Gel Filter: LEE Filters #156 "Chocolate" with a Yellow content of 26.4%
Gel Filter Runner Up: LEE Filters #205 "Half C.T. Orange" -- 'Converts daylight to Tungsten 3800K Mired Shift +109 with a Yellow Content of 70.8%


Keep in mind, all of this information may not be applicable to you depending on your lighting, your indirect lighting, time of day, etc etc.

Thanks for the info. I was just asking to get an idea where to start looking. Thanks again


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Gotcha! Well here's a few more tips homie.

The Gel filters that will probably work are -- you'll most likely want one of the orange, yellow-orange, or pink colors. I have a swatch of 300 different gel filter samples and out of every color possibility the oranges, pinks, and yellows were the only ones that were within the realm of 'close'. Some within those color choices were real close, and one or two were virtually dead on.

After grabbing a handful of them that looked dead on -- I started comparing them against each other and could easily weed out a few there. When you're left with 3-5 it'll get more tricky, at that point if you want to really find a good match I highly suggest taking LOTS of pictures with each gel filter, trying to replicate each exact shot for each of the best options. It took me maybe 30-40 pictures when I had 3 options, maybe another 20-30 when I had 2 options, and then probably another 100+ pictures of fine tuning the camera when I settled on the Gel Filter that best represented what I see when I look at my tank.

Additionally some features... -- Some of the best options for my camera were reliant on me using a setting that automatically had FLASH enabled.. But Flash washed out all the pictures. So I decided to paint over the flash, and cover it with thick paper and tape to keep any flash from physically happening, while getting the benefit of that particular setting. These are the minute trial and error type things I'm saying could require up to 100 pictures to dial in *just* right.

The better your camera -- The less you'll have to dial in so many small details. A high quality DSLR that shoots in RAW will not need any filters, but it WILL need you to get the colors up to par in photoshop or something.

One of the reasons I spent so much time fine-tuning my camera is so that I don't have to play with Photoshop, or after affects, or pixlr, or any other program. These pictures of my tank are 100% untouched besides the Gel Filter and the Camera settings. To me, that saves a LOT of time in the long run, but obviously takes some time setting up initially.

Last tip -- Rest the camera against the glass, or rest your hands/fingers against the glass while shooting. This will help greatly in reduction of blur, although the best option is to just spend $20 on a cheapie Tripod from Amazon.

I hope this helps you sort out your pictures! It definitely takes a bit of time but the end result is worth it.

A tripod is always a wise investment for any still photography taken of an aquarium, but one of the most important things to get is a shadow box.

Either make one yourself, or get one designed for window photography.

In addition to shooting in total darkness, when shooting away from the glass, wearing matte black is crucial.

As i use a point and shoot there aren't really any available shadow boxes, I'd have to build one and hold it by hand (unless you know of any other ideas!)

The Matte black also makes a lot of sense

This dude covers all the bases, but essentially, his idea is the same approach it should encompass.

https://www.reefpeeps.com/threads/building-a-shadowbox-for-your-aquarium.560/



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https://www.amazon.com/iPhone-Filter-Samsung-Android-Smartphones/dp/B01AYY85HG

I'm thinking of trying this out. I tried using the orange pill container and was happy with the results. But wanted something more easier to attached to.