This is terrible. How do you photography one of these?

This is a black hairy frogfish. Very rare. It stinks that my only chance to see one resulted in such a terrible result. So how do you photography what looks like a lump of coal against this sand? How could this have been better?

Good question! I also found a big black one in Eilat last month and I just ended up "hating" the animal ... they are made of the same substance as black holes; they even trap the light!

Backlight it.

Use Shadows in Aperture editing after to ease a little of the frustration.

I’d probably just ignore it... find a nice common brown one...

Hi Matt,

Simon is right on, and Alex gives up to easy. Try using one strobe to light their face and use the other to pump some light behind it to provide some color seperation. Oh yeah, try getting closer. It's not a hairy but it's black, from Isla de Coco.

Black Frogfish Beauty shot by Jaw's Dad, on Flickr

Cheers,

Steve

Hi Matt,

Simon is right on, and Alex gives up to easy....

For reasons best known to itself the 'Thanks' button is missing from the above post...so I hope 'Thanks Steve' will do just fine...

I had a bad time, too. This can be played with in PS to make it a bit brighter and sharper. Maybe I'll try.....someday....

(

I guess you could try to use strong lighting but snooting it more or less, so you don't have the background....

It's not black, but this kind of shot can probably end up well :

How about stopping down to get some Bokeh-use the eyes as a focus point?

I would try and fill the frame with it as much as possible too.

I really like Steve's version!

Adam

How about multiple levels differently adjusted?

Took this in Lembeh about three years ago, Steve's and Adam's advice is basically what I did.