A trip to the aquarium isn’t complete without admiring the wildlife. I quickly gained a newfound respect for wildlife photographers, which is infinitely harder than photographing an animal in an enclosed tank. With that being said, shooting in an aquarium is not without its challenges. Glare and reflections from light behind me was always a problem and made certain tanks impossible to photograph. I also noticed that the tanks themselves had interesting optical properties. I could get the animal in focus in the viewfinder, but the photo would always be slightly out of focus. Towards the last half of my trip, I learned to grab focus, and then pull it a tad closer to me to compensate.
Most of the shots were done with my 50mm f1.8, which allowed me to really isolate the animals while blurring out the background. Early shots were done with my Sigma 17-50mm, but I didn’t really need the lower focal lengths when there’s nothing overly large to photograph. Of everything I shot, I’m oddly fond of the sea lion(?), stonefish, and jelly fish. Oh, and the sleeping anaconda is also neat. In the future, I might do individual posts on my favorites to talk about my thought processes when taking and editing the shot.
After this trip, I now have a strong urge to go to my nearest zoo or wildlife preserve to capture wild animals. They’re definitely unique photo subjects that I would otherwise probably never be able to see in the wild.
The world is wide. Take the time and see what it has to offer.
Andy Chen Photography 
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