Ray in Western Australia

Just got back from Ningaloo Reef shooting DSLR for first time.

I like this ray but it is too blue. Also I would have liked the sunrays

too come through a bit more. Any ideas ?

Cheers Lars

For a critter that big, you need to use a wide angle lens, 15mm fisheye is probably the best choice for your camera, and get close.

Saw my first West Australian manta ray today, off Enderby Island, Dampier Archipelago. Sorry, no photo (and noone else saw it, so it's just an alleged manta ray).

Anyway - Herb,you mentioned that 15mm fish eye was the go. I've been looking at them today on EBay. Is 17mm on 1.6 FOV crop too long to shoot mantas and whale sharks? I've found 17mm good for turtles, but I'm guessing it might not be quite wide enough for the big critters.

Lars, if you're heading north from Ningaloo, let me know.

Rob,

I don't think the 17mm is a fisheye, is it? The 15mm is a fullframe fisheye (on a film camera) so it has a very large angle of view - MUCH wider than the 17mm I think.

HTH

James

James, yes, the 15mm fish eye has a much wider angle of view than the 17mm end of the 17-40L, which is the widest angle I currently shoot at (and I'm sure there's lot of DRebel owners shooting at 18mm).

I was just wondering as I don't have a fish eye yet - it's on the shopping list - and it'll be whale shark season at Ningaloo soon.

And plus I'd just got home from the dive where I saw the manta ray, and had already started browsing Ebay for 15mm fisheyes when I saw this thread! I figured the 15mm fisheye was the way to go, but was just wondering if anyone had experience shooting mantas/whale sharks at the 17mm/18mm non-fish focal length.

Rob,

 

I don't think the 17mm is a fisheye, is it? HTH

James

Just to clarify, as I was a bit unclear in my inital post. I was talking about the wide end of the 17-40L, which along with the 16-35L is probably the most common wide angle solution for Canon users (the 18-55 EF-S for the DRebel will be a popular choice also)

Canon doesn't make a 17mm prime for the EOS system (there was a 17mm for the FD mount system). There is a Tokina 17mm prime, but it's not a popular lens choice. Canon do make a 14mm prime (as do Tamron and Sigma). Other than these choices, if you want to go wide fish eye is the go, with Canon and Sigma producing 15mm fish-eyes.

Sigma now have a 12-24 for EOS, but it doesn't seem to be particularly popular yet. There's also a Sigma 8mm fisheye now, which sounds interesting, but I haven't heard of anyone using it underwater.

You get a dark blue when you underexpose your background. As far as "too blue" I would imagine you need to work on your white balance. You get sun-rays when your shutter speed is fast enough. Sometimes at 1/125th but you will be better off at 1/250th. Your best off shooting in manual though you can use aperture priority if you watch your shutter speed.

When I first got my D100 (1.5x) I used the 17-35 that I use to shoot my 35 mm film wide angle with. Though you can get useful wide angle at that focal length the 12-24 and 10.5x are far superior. To get useful wide angle you need to go down to at least 14 mm in my opinion.