Photos Underwater photography... Ha, saltwater...

Thankie. I tend to just whip out my camera during any down-time at work, and just shoot anything that looks interesting (and will stay still long enough to get a shot of them).

I even managed to get two entire sequences of a chameleon eating a cricket.

On the cat note: I absolutely love catfish of all sorts. One of my displays currently contains: 6 farlowella, 1 whip-tail cat, 7 glass cats, 3 upside-down cats, 2 butterfly plecs, 8 mast-fin cats, 1 sucking loach, and 2 ghost knifes.

Between that, and the shrimp infested planted tank, I get a lot of comments from people who have never seen either tanks like these, or fish like I carry. And cats just have a tendency to attract people due to their odd nature (upside-down cats) or unique care requirements (farlowella).

 

Personal life getting a bit wonky at the moment. Sometimes I really hate women. Anyway, more of what you came here to see: pictures of fish! (now with 100% less shrimp)



I love this shot, as the crayfish kind of looks like he is angry.


Two female betta's. Sorry for the graininess, had the ISO set far too high (800 I think).


As seen in this picture: upsidedown cat, ghost knife, mast-fin cat.


For KayinBlack.


You have a guess at what it is.

 

Far too much happening in my personal life, and thus too much going through my mind. So I do apologize for the lack-luster few today, though I am rather sure nobody would be "following" this thread.


One of my favorite cats.


Female betta.


Another female betta.


I'll let you guess at what it is.

 

Few things sorted, and lots of pictures! Actually had just under 100 shots to go through tonight, and these are the best of the crop:


Much better shot of that female betta (at least I think it's the same one).




My favorite female betta.


I know, I know, more shrimp...


Definitely my favorite fish. Very identifiable personality, rather gentle, and eats algae. Perfect fish in my opinion.


Sort of a re-hash of a previous picture.


Below the water...


...above the water.

 

Training somebody today, so not a lot of time, but got a couple.

 

Crazy red shrimp that appeared out of nowhere.

 

Don't worry, we're still following your updates. =) Looking good!

 

Definitely one of your best.
That picture tells a great story of life in a fish tank and the "eternal" view.

 

Thankie. What I really like about it is how the glass transitions from full mirror, to opaque, despite that it is entirely clear. The effect was not done in post either (using windows picture viewer to edit photos at the moment).

The picture kind of bugs my eye a bit though, due to the perceived depth, and the abrupt change to opaque.

 

So, had a bit more time to snap off a few today (plus I got my printer working again), and I'm really impressed by a few of them. The shrimp in this series I have been trying to get a good shot of for a while (there have been a couple shots of him in this thread).










A stunning shrimp, and neither me, nor the guy who has been in the industry for 30odd years have seen this particular species of shrimp this colour before.














This photo is a separate shot to the one above, but edited on the camera itself from a full colour to the sepia seen here. Thinking of entering this in the potm contest (sort of "last breath", or "the last time" sort of idea maybe, but the potm site doesn't work for me).

 

Death has always interested me, so I think (time permitting) I want to start focusing on that aspect of the industry a bit.


Only shot that really turned out (though only two were dead that day, so not exactly like I had a ton of material)

 

Yes, the platty is dead.






Absolutely love the way this one turned out. Kind of like toxic algae.

 

New fish today, but was crazy busy. Managed to get some shots of this astounding crayfish.













Cannot manage to get his antennae to be clear at this low of a light level (camera is doing 1/3 F4.1 with the iso set to 200 on most of the above) Really wish this camera allowed me to have more control.

 

Lots of shots this time, 19 in fact! Really have been experimenting with "emotion" with these, due to the overwhelming responses from the one shot looking through the glass with the black moor in the foreground. Hope you like.


Ok, funny story: she is a 3' long silver arowana, and was given to the store more than a year ago. So after a great many price drops (I think they foolishly set her original price at $500), somebody finally came in on saturday to buy her. As I'm sure you can imagine a three foot fish needs a rather large amount of water for transportation, so the buyer went home and grabbed a large plastic tote. That was fine, but when he came back he literally threw the tote at me, and walked off to do some shopping while I grab the fish.

Kind of rude on the guys part, but whatever; it was going to take me a bit to get her out of the tank anyway. Now, over the past few weeks I've been working closely with her, getting her used to my hand (petting her, and feeding her), and used to me in general working around her tank, so she didn't mind too much when I started to grasp her, and slowly work her out of the water.

Then she flipped right the **** out. Tore off three scales, and cut herself slightly on the snout. In any case, it took me a few tries, but I got her to settle down, and allow me to hold her out of the water. However, about half way to the bucket, she again flipped right the **** out, and went flying, right onto the ground.

Think about this for a second: a three foot, eel-like, slimy fish flopping around on the floor with some clutz (me) desperately trying to grab her, and get her into a bucket. I'm sure you can imagine how funny this looked. A few customers were even laughing at it, while my co-workers were s****ing bricks.

The story ends well though: got her safe and sound into the tote, she calmed down, and is now living happily in a 150gallon tank.

Really wish I had handed my camera off to somebody to take some snaps. Oh well, more photos:








This shot, and the one previous are my fav set. I just cannot decide which perspective I like best...




That little female betta just looks so pissed!


This picture, and the following sequence are all of the same black moor that appeared in the previous shot of the same nature.










One of the most awesome little catfish I've ever seen. These little guys bark. Seriously.


Unfortunately this little guy lost an eye.


This shot just makes me think "looking to heaven" or something of the sort.






Yes, I'm in love with this crayfish.





Well? What do you all think? What emotion should I shoot for next? Think I've gotten anger and loneliness so far, what would be a good one to target?

 

I've been watching this thread, and scanning through your (many) updates, but I just wanted to say that there are photos in this update that are really good

Dan

 

Thank you muchly. And I do agree, that last post was rather good. Still trying to get better though (spending an hour or two every day with my camera is kind of nice I must say).




More shots of those talking cats. Absolutely love them.


Alright, now I've got a quiz for you: what is the above shot of? As a hint, know that I've mentioned what it is previously in this thread (or what it is a part of).

 

Really love all of your siamese fighting fish shots - such a beautiful animal.

The "above the water" frog shot is pretty cool too.

Kudos man - i've enjoyed flicking through this thread.

 

You wouldn't believe how hard they are to capture! I've got over a hundred shots of those things, but yet only a handful actually turned out worthwhile. Though saying that, the females seem to be better with the camera than the males. Not sure why...

As for the frog... Just wait for friday/saturday. I'm getting in more firebelly toads and some newts I'll be taking many snaps of them.

 

Your "barking" fish is a striped raphael. I have a spotted one. Very secretive, those...

And that's an arowana scale. Not too hard to recognize if you've seen one up close.

 

Trust me, these are not a striped raphael; I've got a few of those. Think more like a Agamyxis pectinifrons, but without the spots.

These guys very loudly, and audibly make a barking noise, more-so than most in it's family.

Spot on with the scale.