# 60mm or 100mm?



## ljenningsphotog (Mar 30, 2012)

I have a client that owns an aquaculture fish store.  I've been taking photos of his fish and corals for a few weeks now.  He's been pretty happy with the results, has made some great sales from being able to produce decent photos to show what he owns, but is ready to take it to the next level.  This is a my chance to get my macro!
What do you recommend for corals?  I'm torn between the 60mm and the 100mm.  I have a Canon.  I'm just not sure which would give me more of what I'm looking for; close, detailed photos of coral and fish.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Here are a few that I've gotten recently


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## Thunder_o_b (Mar 30, 2012)

If you have seen my aquarium shots on this site, you have seen shots taken with a 150mm Sig. Depends on how close you have to get. If the subject is deeper in the aquarium, the 100mm is the better bet, if it is near the glass then the 60mm. I personally think the tel macros are a vastly better bet because of the greater MFD. 

http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/...ots-our-fishies-past-present.html#post2549076

More shots


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## Big Mike (Mar 30, 2012)

Yes, that should likely be your deciding factor.  The longer your macro lens, the farther way you can be to get that close up shot.  For this type of stuff, you are obviously limited to keep the camera outside the aquarium, so the longer lens would seem to be the better choice.


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## Natalie (Mar 30, 2012)

+1 for Big Mike.

If the fish is small and more than like 6" from the front of the aquarium (and a lot of reef fish don't come to front), a 60mm just isn't going to cut it.


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## Derrel (Mar 30, 2012)

Big Mike said:


> Yes, that should likely be your deciding factor.  The longer your macro lens, the farther way you can be to get that close up shot.  For this type of stuff, you are obviously limited to keep the camera outside the aquarium, so the longer lens would seem to be the better choice.



I dunno...I've actually photographed a few fish in aquariums...the angle of view of my 60mm macro was almost perfect on a 1.5x crop-body.I found the 60mm length to be wonderful. Also, if you use a rubber lens hood and press it right against the glass, you can absolutely KILL reflections from flash or light sources, so...I think the 60mm might actually be the best macro FL for this type of work. For really TINY fish, like guppies, the 60mm might be a bit low on magnification unless they are really,really close to the glass.


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