Chapter Seventeen n 



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Photograpning Fiskes 



It is obvious how important, as well as interesting, photographic 

 records of fishes can be. In writing on the subject in the hope of 

 having others enter this unlimited and fascinating field of work, the 

 author presupposes a fair photographic technique to start with. The 

 main requirements are a small aquarium with a front of thin plate 

 glass and an adjustment for keeping the subject in focus, a few card 

 backgrounds of different shades, a board on which to focus the cam- 

 era by sliding the whole instrument (preferably, but not necessarily, 

 of back-focus design), and a lens working at about F5 to F6. The 

 author does his own work on a shutter, the ends of which are laid on 

 the seats of two chairs, fastening a piece of cardboard to the back 

 of one of the chairs to act as a background. The aquarium, with a 

 front seven inches square and a depth of two and one-half inches, is 

 usually stood about a foot from the background, to keep it out of focus 

 and to avoid shadows from the edges of the aquarium. The fishes 

 are kept in the focal plane by use of an adjustable glass partitioa 

 For holding small fishes in place the following simple arrangement is 

 used : three pieces of glass are cut about twice the width of the thick- 

 ness of the fish, and of a length from three to five inches, according to 

 requirements of length of fish. The ends are fastened together with 

 adhesive tape like three sides of a square. The free ends are given a 

 cut to end them off at about forty-five degrees or less. These free ends 

 are fastened to top edge of partition by clips, first filing a nick in the 

 beveled surface for the clip to catch in. The glass partition with three- 

 sided cage attached (open at top) is then pushed up against the front 

 glass and the apparatus is ready to receive the fish. This not only 

 confines the fish strictly in the focal space, but keeps it out of the 

 corners of the aquarium, where it seems to delight in exhausting the 

 patience of the photographer. It is a good plan to have a number of 

 these little cages made up to different sizes to suit the measurement 

 of the fish to be photographed. 



