How to get these results?

[gabyne]

Hi,
I'm doing underwater photography for quite a while and all in all I'm not too dissatisfied with my results. But what I would desperately love to learn is how to achieve this kind of image:

There are certain wide angle shots with a very colourful, saturated foreground, f.ex. a gorgonia or softcoral, whereas the surrounding background (especially the maybe not so nice parts of the reef) is (almost) black but with still nice blue water colour and sunbeams.

Is it just a matter of closing down the aperture accordingly or special positioning of the strobe or underexposure or what?

Please tell me...

Gaby

 

[dbh]

Hi,
I'm doing underwater photography for quite a while and all in all I'm not too dissatisfied with my results. But what I would desperately love to learn is how to achieve this kind of image:

There are certain wide angle shots with a very colourful, saturated foreground, f.ex. a gorgonia or softcoral, whereas the surrounding background (especially the maybe not so nice parts of the reef) is (almost) black but with still nice blue water colour and sunbeams.

Is it just a matter of closing down the aperture accordingly or special positioning of the strobe or underexposure or what?

Please tell me...

Gaby

I believe the results that you are looking for is achieved with shutter speeds of 1/500 or faster. Here is a link to a friend of mines (I still haven't quite nailed it yet):
Rand McMeins

 

[Mike Veitch]

Very easy if you have the right equipment. What are you using?

The best way to do this sort of shot is either before 9 am or after 3pm when the sun is low in the sky and not so overpowering.
Then get below your subject and shoot up.
You want a wide angle lens, preferably about 15mm or so, and get as physically close to your subject as possible, ie fill the frame...and shoot vertical.

Position your strobe(s) close to the subject, soft coral or whatever. Hopefully you will be around 1 or 2 feet away (.3 or .6 of a meter)
THis will allow you to use a high f-stop such as f16-f22. These hi stops aid in darkening the background.
But as dbh said, a high shutter speed is the best thing. The minimum sspeed for freezing light rays on film is 1/90, on digital you need to be higher because it does not handle the sun very well. I would try anything from 250 to 1/500 or even higher if your camera allows.
The key with getting a decent sun ray in digital is to actually leave the ball of sun out of the frame and just have the edges/rays poking in from the top of the frame.

 

[f3nikon]

Hi,
I'm doing underwater photography for quite a while and all in all I'm not too dissatisfied with my results. But what I would desperately love to learn is how to achieve this kind of image:

There are certain wide angle shots with a very colourful, saturated foreground, f.ex. a gorgonia or softcoral, whereas the surrounding background (especially the maybe not so nice parts of the reef) is (almost) black but with still nice blue water colour and sunbeams.

Is it just a matter of closing down the aperture accordingly or special positioning of the strobe or underexposure or what?

Please tell me...

Gaby

Very good question, I asked that myself. I have the same problem, and it is because of the large differences in exposure, on various points in the picture. Ex. the meter reading on the sunny blue water is at f11 then your close up subject and areas of surrounding reef background is at f4, thats a big difference. The sunlight will take care of the bluewater and your strobe will take care of the close up subject, the problem is the reef background will still be in the DARK!

The answer is more STROBES! I am working on an aux. slave fired wideangle strobe to be held by my dive buddy about 5ft above the subject aiming the strobe at the reef area behind the subject. Or you can always avoid the reef area behind your subject by shooting in an upwards direction, which is fine I did this myself, but to me it just doesnt give me that "look" of what I saw in a larger than life coral reef!

I have this same problem in shooting indoor land photography. The closeup subject is at the correct exposure because of the flash, the outside sunlight via the window or door is correct but the areas between the subject and outside is always dark. I could always fix this by aiming the flash towards the white ceiling to get a wider light spread and more even lighting. The problem underwater is there are no white ceilings to bounce off of.

Dive Safe

 

[gabyne]

Very easy if you have the right equipment. What are you using?

I'm using a housed Canon EOS 300 with an external strobe (Subtronic Gamma). Thanks a lot for your advice; I'll try them out as soon as possible... Great to have a photo pro around!

Gaby

 

[gabyne]

I believe the results that you are looking for is achieved with shutter speeds of 1/500 or faster. Here is a link to a friend of mines (I still haven't quite nailed it yet):
Rand McMeins

Yeah, that's it - I'll try that. Thanks a lot! Great photos of your friend, by the way.