Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Sigh, I try flash, no flash, light, no light and I still can't get the orange to come out in my pictures. I'm close to chucking my camera, even though it is a decent 3.2 MegaPixel. I mean it has to be the camera and not me....

Anyhow a couple of last years Holdback Tangs.

Holdback Male

Another pic same Male

Female Tang

Mother is below in my sig, another crappy pic, with the camera that I replaced with this one.....
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Sam
Gecko Den
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Really nice and orange. Beutiful gecks.
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Sara

I have noticed that the monitor makes a big difference and what color setting yu have on it. I just got a new flat plasma one and the colors look sooo much better then my ancient one did. It really shows the oranges really well.
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Sara

She has a flat panel monitor....
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Sam
Gecko Den
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Thanks for the tip! 100000 times better on her comp, and I have the good video card! I am so going to replace this monitor with a flat panel! Thanks again Sara!
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Sam
Gecko Den
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Your welcome
I'm glad it helped. I noticed a big difference after getting my new monitor. Then when I use one of the old ones we have at work all the pics look dull again. It really makes a big difference.
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Sara

NP

.
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Sam
Gecko Den
Email Me

fgh
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Preston Berry
www.coolgeckos.com
prestonberry@austin.rr.com

Digital cameras in general seem to have problems with the reds. You can try playing around with the white balance (the lighting in your pictures seem on the warm/yellow side) and it might fix it. You might also have some "vivid" setting or equivalent on your camera, and that'll make the colors brighter (but also tends to give it a fake brightness, like overly bright, so makes a normal orange an almost flourescent orange).

If you have adobe photoshop you can manually balance the colors to the true color (but not too many people can afford to buy a $600 software package just to mess around with pictures). Some cheaper programs have color balancing too, but it's a little more cumbersome to use (Microsoft photo editor has some stuff, not too much though, if you have MS office, you'll have this program, or should have it).

-Lemur 6

Thanks for the tips, I guess I should read that big thick manual that came with the camera.

I'm hesitant to use any "photo enhancing" software, simply because I want to be able to honestly say that my photos are never "touched up", even if it is to get a true representation of color. Just a quirk of mine.
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Sam
Gecko Den
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when I take pics I use a tub (which I see you do as well), but I also place a 24in Reptisun 5.0 bulb over the tub. I have some spare rubbermaid tubs that use to house snakes. Some of the lids to those tubs are white, so as to have the light bouncing within the tub I place 3 lids around 3 of the 4 sides. I also place the light away from me when I'm taking photos. This helps reduce the over exposure. On top of the UV light I also take the photos about 5 ft away from a south facing window (doesn't allow direct sunlight in, but yet enough illumination).

Another thing, I'm not familiar with your olympus digi cam. My best friend had one (the C-2500 L I believe) and it worked great when I tried it on my leos. I take my photos with a Nikon CoolPix 4500. The whole reason why I got it is because I had the same problem you had. The camera just wasn't picked up by my old digi cam (1.1 mp Kodak). Another reason why I went with the Nikon is that a few leo breeders (Albey to name one) was using either the Nikon CoolPix 990 or 995. As you can see by his photos, the orange is represented very well and accurately (I've purchased a few critters from him and have compared live animal to the photo).

There are other cameras that can probably do the job besides the Nikon. I personally love mine and I think I'll be a loyal "Nikonian" from here on out. I would try the lighting technique I mentioned above. If you're still not statisfied with the results you might look into a newer camera. Another thing you can do (before looking into a new camera) is adjusting the settings on your monitor. I don't know any sites off hand right now, but I'm sure a search into google should turn up some sites that will tell you how to adjust your monitor to a more true color setting. Oh and just to entice you, look below my name...

Good luck,
Chris

Thanks for the tips. Rob Jenkins is a big fan of the Nikon too, and I have purchased 5 or 6 of Albeys geckos, and his pics always look really close to the actual gecko( The geckos look better in person still..) I'm going to try a few of the suggestions before I get a new camera. Hate to have to buy a new one, especially with my wedding coming up in May, plus
I have my eye on an Albino Hognose project that is going to cost a pretty big chunk of cheese.
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Sam
Gecko Den
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Great info Chris. I'm going to try to use the white lids to bounce light next time I take some pics; thanks for the tip.

Something Albey told me about a while ago when I was marveling at his pics was that in addition to the Nikon, he uses a flash bracket to bring the flash off the camera. I have been looking at one called The Rollbar, but don't know if I'll ever get around to buying it. It should help the coloring in most situations.

Oh, and you're right, I'm a Nikon freak. Even though I have a tiny Sony, my 995 will always be my favorite.

Here's one of my favorite pics from it; you've probably seen it before -

And one last year when our sky was on fire, unfortunately we don't have as nice of scenery outside our house as in your picture -

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Rob Jenkins
Have you seen the GeckoCam?
Herptopia Reptiles
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Nice photos...

I believe Albey also has the remote cord for his nikon. Something I'm waiting on getting. Right now I've got 3 lenses (0.45x wide angle+macro, 2.5x telephoto [both the 2.5x and 0.45x are digital optics titamium lenses] and the WC-E68 Nikon wide angle), the Nikon 28mm filter set, the nikon flash bracket (SK-E900), the Nikon SL-1 macro cool light, 3 batteries, 2 x 128, 2 x 64, and 2 x 16 mb cards (hehehehe) 2 tripods, and a soft carry case which doesn't fit all my lenses.

I think the greatest feature I love about my nikon is this...

Macro shots!

Now if I can just get a case big enough for my camera and accessories (something that would be field herping friendly), an external flash, a 3x telephoto lens, and the remote cord and I should be all set. Unless I make photography like herp keeping, you get 1 animal and sooner or later another one is coming to the collection.

BTW Rob, you suck because I bet you get all your nikon accessories much cheaper over there (if you're still over in Japan).

Chris

Thanks. Man, you've got a ton of stuff for your cam - I'm jealous. Actually we came back a little over a year ago. We're up in Maryland now. I only ever bought a battery in Japan and it was comparable to prices here. The economy is pretty good over there, so prices are high off post. I remember seeing my first Tremper albino, just a normal 'ugly' one for sale for $15k a few years ago...I was dumbfounded.

What did you use for the picture of the foot; that's amazing! How do you like the Cool light? Is it worth the $?
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Rob Jenkins
Have you seen the GeckoCam?
Herptopia Reptiles
Email Me

Both the Grandis foot and the mediterranean gecko photo were taken using the SL-1 cool light. I think it has been well worth the money. There's another cool light out for the nikons, but not made from nikon.

www.cs.mtu.edu/~shene/DigiCam/ You might read around there. I'm not sure what they list under the 990 or 995 for the cool lights so you might check the 4500 page (Lighting Equipment).

Chris

I noticed that you did find a vast improvement on a good monitor...but if you still aren't satisfied you can try putting them on a white background. I'm not sure if anyone else mentioned it...I didn't feel like reading the whole string...lol Anyway, Most cameras do well with the white background and making the white right will make the color of gecko right (better at any rate....lol).