Sun coral
 

More pics:

http://www.hyperdream.com/~samw/reef...71_img_std.jpg

http://www.hyperdream.com/~samw/reef...29_img_std.jpg

Nice. How often do you feed these guys?

Its quite random. Depends on whether I felt like feeding my fish frozen food or not. They go together. Sometimes, I feed my fish frozen food 7 days in a row and then I'll feed the sun corals too if they have their tentacles out. Other times I would go 7 days without feeding the sun coral. Some times its every other day. Etc. No set schedule with the sun coral. The sun will catch flake, freeze dried plankton, and cyclopeeze that float by as well.

So not too high maintenance then?

Let me post a crappy pic...

http://www.members.shaw.ca/beans666/SunDSC00038_rs.jpg

Feeding of Cyclopeeze and Liquid Life tonite. :biggrin:

That's iffy to say. I do feed my tank more than the regular reef so I have a feeling that in a typical reef tank, you need to spend 2 days a week at a minimum to target feed it. Just a guess. More is better of course. I've been neglecting it more lately so who knows, it might slowly recede without me even knowing it.

Nice growth. So you did pick up some Cyclopeeze last weekend.

Yes I did. :wink:

And I mixed it and shook it up with Liquid Life, and it did mix in the water column very well.

Frozen or freezedried Cyclops-eeze?

Freeze dried Tony.

Mmmmmm... freeze-dried Tony...

:eek:

(Brrrr!) :lol:

Deb, do you soak your Cyclops-eeze beforehand for a long time? I find that a lot of the stuff I add to my tank ends up going down the overflow because it floats. I try to shoot it down into the tank using a baster but it still finds its way up to the surface. I don't really worry about it anymore (I assume that something in the sump will get it or it just eventually disintegrates or maybe it finds its way to the sump return pump) but I'm still curious how other people deal with this "feature."

Oh and Sam: incredible photos once again. I really dig the clarity of your photos.

I didn't really soak it, just shook it up in a jar of water and thru it in a high flow area.

New spot in tank. Moved them up high so I could feed them again. Haven't target fed them in about 2 weeks now

http://www.hyperdream.com/~samw/reef...58_img_std.jpg

Incredible clarity of your shots Sam. Great job.

You should write an article about taking such pictures (if you don't mind sharing some of your secrets that is :mrgreen: )

I'll second Tony's comments - just don't mention the new camera you're going to recommend... $$$

:eek:

Another excellent shot, Sam.
:biggrin:

Thanks everyone.

Well, in summary, the secret is:

Canon Powershot S40
Quick Shutter option
Breeze Browser http://www.breezesys.com/BreezeBrowser/index.htm


:smile:

I'm actually going to try and get a better camera in the New Year on Ebay when everyone sells their old cameras after getting new ones for Christmas. I'm going to get a Nikon Coolpix 995. Probably can get one now for $500 used. The Coolpix 995 can take macros up to 2cm close. For comparison, my Canon S40 can only take them up to 10cm close.

The depth of field is amazing. Most macro shots I take end up with a very narrow DOF because the aperture has to be wide open to accomodate a shutter speed that doesn't pick up camera shake or motion of the object (good luck trying to get a fish on macro).

I haven't tried going up to 1600ISO yet but I found even at 400ISO and 2x175W's over the tank I was trying to take pictures of I just cannot speed up the shutter speed any further. Anything slower than 1/30th of a second is going to pick up motion blur.

(I am stuck with 35mm for now ... no budget for a digital camera yet)

Do you use a tripod? Do you turn your current off to eliminate motion blur during any slower shutter speeds?

Hey Tony.

Not using a tripod. I wanted to get a tripod. But haven't had a really pressing reason to get one yet. If I buy one, I want a good deal since its a luxury item that I don't really need. I made a few bids on Ebay for some professional aluminum ones but came up short.

To prevent too much blur, I simply use the automatic quick shutter option on my camera. To get the polyps to look more extended and not sway, I did turn off one of the closer powerheads. The software does the rest by sharpening whatever it can when I convert them to web pages.

ohhhhh fater shutterrr
koolio
=o)

thanks

Another shot under MH lighting only. Actual colors. Not photoshopped. :smile: Getting sick of this coral yet?

http://www.hyperdream.com/~samw/reef...90_img_std.jpg

http://www.hyperdream.com/~samw/reef...10_img_std.jpg

Same coral during the day

http://www.hyperdream.com/~samw/reef...67_img_std.jpg