You DO NOT want to be using a flash in the aquarium. In addition to the stress on the fish, it also tends to bother the viewers. Your guy with the assistant and three bulb flash was either courting disaster, or someone they hired to take special shots.

1) Clean kid fingerprints off glass.
2) Put Lens DIRECTLY on glass. (no filters, please)
3) No Flash. Depending on the ambient light, adjust aperture.

Since you're holding the camera fairly steady, shutter speed is not too critical.

Here's a couple I took at the National Aquarium in Baltimore about three years ago. Pure dumb luck.

I could not agree with you more! The materials the tanks are made of really want to reflect light, many of the habitats in the tanks are highly prone to have lots of sediment, the colors of the lighting varies with each habitat and the refraction of the light (and focus) varies radically with the distance of the fish from the sides of the tank. These were shot in Baltimore at the national aquarium...they prohibited flash ONLY for a very few species, such as the octopus. Most of mine were shot without flash. As often as I preach about setting your ISO at 100 and leave it there, these extremely low light conditions resulted in my shooting mostly at ISO's of 1600 and 3200 without flash. These were shot with a Canon 5D Mark II using a Canon 70-200mm IS II lens. All were hand held due to the crowded conditions.

Bob

You DO NOT want to be using a flash in the aquarium. In addition to the stress on the fish, it also tends to bother the viewers. Your guy with the assistant and three bulb flash was either courting disaster, or someone they hired to take special shots.

1) Clean kid fingerprints off glass.
2) Put Lens DIRECTLY on glass. (no filters, please)
3) No Flash. Depending on the ambient light, adjust aperture.

Since you're holding the camera fairly steady, shutter speed is not too critical.

Here's a couple I took at the National Aquarium in Baltimore about three years ago. Pure dumb luck.

I could not agree with you more! The materials the tanks are made of really want to reflect light, many of the habitats in the tanks are highly prone to have lots of sediment, the colors of the lighting varies with each habitat and the refraction of the light (and focus) varies radically with the distance of the fish from the sides of the tank. These were shot in Baltimore at the national aquarium...they prohibited flash ONLY for a very few species, such as the octopus. Most of mine were shot without flash. As often as I preach about setting your ISO at 100 and leave it there, these extremely low light conditions resulted in my shooting mostly at ISO's of 1600 and 3200 without flash. These were shot with a Canon 5D Mark II using a Canon 70-200mm IS II lens. All were hand held due to the crowded conditions.

Bob