Settings for taking photographs of axolotls.

Hello all,

I was just today given an old unused camera by a friend of a family and I immediately jumped at the opportunity use it to take photographs of my axolotl. Previously I had been using my mobile phone and the quality was never very good. I am having serious trouble focussing on the poor guy. The image is either dark and poor quality, or I get reflections from the tank's glass, and whatever happens, I can never get the auto-focus to focus on my axolotl himself. It seems that there are many people on here who can some wonderful photographs of their little guys, so please could somebody suggest which settings to use? I will of course upload the results here for all to see!

Thanks,
Sam.

Hello

Taking pictures of axies can sometimes be tricky. To counter the low light and darkness you can use a higher IOS. You can usually change this on most cameras in settings. I would try 300 or 400. This might make the picture a little more grainy, but you will be able to see him/her better. You could also try putting a light on the opposite side of the tank you are shooting from. This way your axie and tank will bet lit up but there wont be so much glare or reflections. If your camera can't focus so close up, then usually you can change the setting to work for you. Try a setting that is for close range shooting. Usually there is a flower icon indicating this. This setting usually works great for me. You will probably have to take quite a few pics before you find a good one. My axie loves to move around and blur the pictures I try taking of him.
Good luck

Oh, thank you very much for your help!

Shooting in a higher ISO is really does help counter the low light, thank you very much for that! I'm still having a fair bit of trouble with getting the camera to focus though, even in macro mode. It seems to focus on the glass just in front of my axolotl and so he always looks blurry. Any more tips to stop this? Can I perhaps manually focus the image?

Good I'm glad that helped If you are able to manually focus the lens then you could try that... most cameras you can't do that unless its a fancy camera with detachable lenses. Have you tried taking a picture at different distances away from your axie? Sometimes it takes just a couple centimeters difference to help the camera focus on the object you want it to. You can always go back on your computer and edit the photo - crop it to make your axie the center of the pic, and you can also sharpen and adjust the lightness and darkness of your pictures too- to an extent. The more pixels your camera has the better image quality you will get. That way you can take a pic from a little farther away and crop it and it will still be good quality.

What type of camera is it? Does it have a macro setting on it? I managed to fix my ISO on my camera and it helps 100 percent.

It went from blurry to not blurry lol.

Hope you get it sorted out. I have to make sure the glass is squeaky clean before hand though.

Blaze.

Wow, that is quite the difference! I always love how smiley your Sunny looks, Blaze!

I did some fiddling around and I think that I've found a reasonable ISO setting that lets me get the images in focus most of the time. I think they're still slightly out, but it is definitely an improvement on what I was getting earlier on! I have uploaded a few images with this post.

It's an old Sony CyberShot. It's only 5.1mpx. As I say, it was a friend's old camera and they just gave it to me when they got a new one. So, tell me what you think!

They look good!! I think maybe some mroe lighting is what you need. To get that second shot if Sunny it took 20 bad shots lol.

On a side note WOAH at your axies gills, they are beautiful!
Sunny is a smiley one isn't he haha


Blaze

Thank you! I was thinking that the lack of light was a problem. It's rather late at night here so the only light is an artificial light and the only source of light in the room comes from behind where I was sitting when I took that photo, which was probably why I was getting so much reflection. I'll try again in the morning.

Thank you again. Izel's gills do tend to look nice and fluffy. He seems to be a bit of a unique one in that respect as well because his right middle gill arch branches in two about halfway along it. It was like that when I bought him, though his gills have grown since and it is even more noticeable! He's always had a strange food on that side as well. I wonder if he was chomped on at the breeder's before I bought him and his gill arch and foot grew back in an unusual way? I tried to snap a picture of his foot but I couldn't get it to focus. I'll try again tomorrow, I think.

Hes very cute haha!

Yay I'm glad you got a couple pics to turn out! Your axie is super cute! :happy: