Reefs.org Forums

[Sharkky]

Well I think I found the forum that will suck up even more of my time than the sump, methinks. What a fan-frickin-tastic idea! Let's just combine John's 2 favorite hobbies--reefing and photography! Rock the heck on! I'm goin' home to take pictures of my new orange and green ricordea tonight, now!

[jamesw]

Hey Sharky,

I use a Fuji S2pro in an Ikelite housing for my underwater photography. I have two DS125 strobes.

Here's a review:

www.wetpixel.com/reviews/

Cheers
James

[brandon429]

responses:

1. As soon as this forum was created I knew youd be a major contributor Shark--post em here. If they keep creating forums here that cater to our geek niches (nanos, photgraphy etc) all my free time will be consumed by RDO. Ill have no job or social life, but Ill be plugged into the reef pipeline like nobody's bizness.

2. I would like to submit some pics to this forum and also to the contest thread, but I only have a simple kodak digital camera. My tweak abilities are limited to nano reefs and RC planes, nothing along the lines of megapixels even enters my mind. So, how does adjust macro setting on the cam aid pic quality? is macro a measure of kb or mp? For now, I am just using the setting that says personal (other selection is email which I assume means jpeg and smaller file kB). This is an incredibly newbied question I realize, but Id like to know how to get the most out of a standard Wally camera. its the kodak model that comes with the matching printer etc...


Brandon

[brandon429]

I think a major factor appears to be the kilobyte size you trim it too in the shop. Now that Ive worked a few pics, even my larger ones look better and do have some quality given the type of camera. One major standout detail is the image separation you guys have with the pro equipment. It seems no software (boosting lower camera quality) can outperform a camera that takes it right the first time--that hammer coral up close-up has microscopic detail, impressive.

[wade]

You are right in that you cannot replace missing detail in images. You can do some fill effects and some creative things to hide the lack of tiny detail, but you cannot restore something that wasn't ever there... on the flip side, if you aren't careful with trimming and file size reduction, you can just as readily lose that detail. Its a trick and it takes time to get it right (and the right software)...

Keep trying with the Kodak camera though, given time, you will figure out how far away you can be to achieve any sort of detail. Post to the techniques forum for specific help as well. Many people would probably very readily assist!

Wade

[Sharkky]

I think a major factor appears to be the kilobyte size you trim it too in the shop. Now that Ive worked a few pics, even my larger ones look better and do have some quality given the type of camera. One major standout detail is the image separation you guys have with the pro equipment. It seems no software (boosting lower camera quality) can outperform a camera that takes it right the first time--that hammer coral up close-up has microscopic detail, impressive.

As a rough estimate, yes, that's a good thing to go on. The bigger the file is, usually the larger and/or more detailed the photo will be. Photoshop Elements has a pretty nifty compression feature though that saves pictures in a web-publishing format that actually keeps the imagesize large but cuts the filesize way down.

But you're right in your latter statement that if it ain't there to begin with, no software is going to put it there. Always take the largest, highest resolution pictures you can. You can always resize and compress to make it smaller, but you can't get that once-in-a-lifetime shot that unfortunately is the size of a postage stamp to get bigger and still retain quality.

-John