Black subject help!

Today I saw my first ever black frogfish (we call them anglerfish). I have precisely zero good photos and two that I'm keeping just because they show I was there. In one he's even yawning a little for me. BUT

a.) they are full of backscatter. That was just me and my brain freezing, so I can probably work that blunder out...it always seems to happen on the shots I care about LOL

b.) this little guy just SUCKED all the light out of the water. Underwater I couldn't even find his eye so I just took a guess and fired away. I did OK with that part - not great, but OK - but man, he's just a vacuum for light.

He was sitting on a light coloured sponge, kinda yellow/greeny, and I have that exposed properly (whooppeee). So pretty much I figure I have to frame that puppy out of things if I find him again tomorrow. BUT

how do I light this guy to get some detail and not totally fry everything around him? Am I going to have to just accept a full frame closeup? I'd like to have a shot of the whole guy, but the background is problematic at this time. Oh yeah, he's sitting IN the sponge so it kind of surrounds him on two and a bit sides...

I appreciate any and all help and pointers. Here is the gear I have so please help me with that in mind: Canon 20D, 60mm, Woody's dioptre, single Inon 220s strobe, twin miniQ torches for aiming lights.

Yep, i ran into one of those once...same problem, nothing came out.

I think your best bet is just frame the face.

The two big time different subjects means you are either going to overexpose one or under the other.

You could always try to make some sort of cone shaped thing for your strobe to direct the light directly at the froggie and avoid the sponge?!?

You can try to position your strobe lower, and aim slightly upwards. This way, what the frogfish is sitting on will receive only the edge of the beam of your strobe. Also, if you do aim upward, expose for the background, and adjust strobe power to properly expose the frogfish. It should stand out better against a light blue background...

Good luck!

Matt has a good idea that i use regularly for subjects in the sand.

I try angular lighting with my single strobe. masically you want to make the light from the strobe skim across the light areas and hit the subject. whatever angle you can achieve will help it doesn't have to be upwards but this is often the case (or perpendicular to the subject) Now you will also get the added benefit of hitting the subject with light from one direction helping to create contrast and shadows on an already dark body.

The other choice I guess is to go for the arty burnt out background. Maybe try and get the back ground blurred as well as overexposed and it may look 'arty' but ya never know until you try.

Do what we all do .. if you have the chance keep snapping until something good happens then remember what you did and show it off to the rest of us

Very strong sidelight (from the 2 o'clock position, with the subject in the center of the clock), and front fill.

I've not seen one of these critters, but I assume they have a non-glossy body. I had to shoot a velvet-draped model a few years ago in the studio, and this worked for me. The strong side/back light lit up the furry stuff at the wrinkles.

All the best, James

I had the good fortune to be able to work on one of these shots under controlled circumstances... our local aquarium. Our photo club (LAUPS) had a night to play "after-hours".

Of course, backscatter was not a problem, nor was time/air, so trial and error worked out OK.

Since the black beast was in a tank, the strobe needed to be angled, which ended up helping. In the end, the best shot was created by placing the strobe near the bottom left pointed up at about 45 degrees. This let me direct most of the light onto the frogfish and less on the surrounding "reef".

All that said, the fish is still very dark, but the bit of highlight on his body is there, and the eye can be seen. YMMV!

I had the same trouble with a black frogfish in the phillipines, i got it so that i could just make out the eyes but it had gold/ white markings that would just blow out very frustrating, but that is what makes this hobby of ours fun

I consider black frogfishes to be essentially unphotographable. The highly textured skin is like black velvet, or maybe worse - it just sucks up light. Plus the ends of small shiny tubercules scattered on the skin are highly reflective and quickly blow out, creating the impression of backscatter/snow.

I once tried every conceivable combination of f-stop, aperture, and strobe power on a black froggie. It was an interesting experiment, but my result was that nothing really worked. That was on using film. I had slightly better luck shooting a very dark purple frogfish using digital a year or so ago, but none of the shots (I shot almost 100 frames on two dives) are even remotely close to being publishable.

My advice? The next time you see a black frogfish, enjoy looking it and then swim on, maybe you'll find a yellow or a red one. (Which is not to say that I won't try again myself.)

Frogfish

I have to agree - these are extremely difficult to photograph. We had one in Palm Beach, and I shot probably 100 frames (along with several other photographers) across several dives and there are 2 techniques that created "acceptable" photos:

1. Frame tight on the face

2. Shoot subject against blue water - you still don't get much definition on the fish, but you see the outline better. If you can light it from below/side, you can get a little contrast.

All in all, play around with it. If you figure out a way to do it, please let us know - from what i've seen, it's hard to get anything other than a black blob with some sand speckeld on it (and the eyes/mouth/lure)

good luck

I had an encounter with a dreaded black frogfish last month in Alor.

These are the best I could do with this critter - of course it was in the most awkward place ........

I remember checking and rechecking the strobe settings ......

and another

Those are pretty good pictures for black frogies. I, like the rest, have 50 shots of a useless black frogfish. Hard to shoot. I wish I had my strobe snoots with me, I think that may have helped a bit, but still no contrase and the capacity yto absorb light makes them challenging to photograph.

Joe

it just sucks up light

that's the understatement of the day

Those are pretty good pictures for black frogies.  I, like the rest, have 50 shots of a useless black frogfish.

I took three roles (yes film!), yes a hundred odd shots over a dew days of some black froggies in Vanuatu last year .... couldn't believe it when I got home ... Perfectly exposed warts, even sand on the fish, but this fishy shaped black hole otherwise. I still get a great response from divers (and some non-divers) to the shots ... they see the warts and then the sand, then lure, hands and finally the fish. When doing a presentation I end up spending more time on a black frogfish shot than other/better shots ... I think because people are engaged / fascinated by the cryptic-ness of the fish

OK, here's a pleasant frogfish nightmare. This is a mating pair, happily posing together like Ma and Pa Antennarius, marine Amish farmers (but Pa needs a little pitchfork, or maybe a trident). A wonderful subject, no? Except that the (large) female is mostly bright white and the smaller male is a very dark purple, almost black. Plus they were keeping house on the Liberty Wreck, against a terribly busy background jam-packed with multi-colored ascidians, hydroids, patches of coralline algae, etc. Even knowing where they were, every time I looked away or gave my attention to the camera for a few seconds, I'd have to spend half a minute just to find them again, though they were always in plain sight.

It's hard enough just to shoot a single dark frogfish against a simple contrasting background that be thrown out of focus. Here, however, every effort to to pick up more detail in the dark male simply blew out the white female, while exposing for detail in the light-colured female turned the dark purple male into a black featureless hole. And a lot of the surround was in the same plane, and so busy that most people have trouble making out either of the two fishes, which was a bit difficult in reality too.

I tried every combination of exposure settings and strobe configurations I could think of, but this - which wasn't very good - was the best I could do.

Frogfish

Robert, that night be the coolest frogfish shot I have ever seen!

that's pretty good

cool thing to see too B)

Thanks, you guys. The subject was very cool, and I'm very glad to have seen them together like this. As anyone here might have already guessed, I love frogfishes. I just wish I could have figured out some way to make a more succesful image out of the opportunity.

Frogfish