NEW app that color corrects Actinic LED light in your reef aquarium in real-time

[John Ostler]

LED blue and actinic light has been destroying photos of my corals and aquariums since day 1.

I did the whole, turn off the blue and actinic lights for shots, put the flash in the top of the aquarium, hang a yellow bulb light over the tank, dip pvc in the tank for calibration, put a orange filter over my phone, photoshop hue and curves adjustments, etc etc.

When I get out my DSLR I shoot in raw and that gives me the full control I need. Problem is, I have to plan on setting all that up and then have to do a ton of post-production. I needed something FAST on my phone with no fuss that didn't force me into editing. I cannot believe nobody has done this yet!

So, after some budget approvals from home, I set off on building an app that color corrects blue LED aquarium light, in real-time. That way, you can match what you see with your eye with what you're seeing behind your device.

Well, I think it worked. Just to make sure I wasn't wearing orange-colored glasses, I had @Jake Adams from ReefBuilders and Carlos Chacun from CoralVue try it out and the verdict is "it works!" haha

'Aquarium Camera' just went live and I hope it's useful to a lot of you!
It's just for iOS (iphone+ipad) but Android is coming (if you guys don't think this sucks). http://aquariumcameraapp.com

I'd love your feedback! and any feature requests! All proceeds will go to paying the production bills and hopefully buying more SPS frags that I hope to have some good posts on in the next few months.

 

[CNDReef]

Just bought it but not home to test it.
It would be nice if we could correct existing photos that we have already

 

[John Ostler]

Just bought it but not home to test it.
It would be nice if we could correct existing photos that we have already

I agree! that'd be huge. I definitely have regrets about my old aquarium photos. I looked into it before starting the app and you can do some work with hue filters in OpenGL but it ends up making the photos look fake or super HDR'd. Just crappier. So, I'm all for it, but really once that pic is taken on a cell phone, it's compressed and that's it. The pixels are written. That's why the DSLR forums have you shoot in raw, because it allows you to take EVERYTHING that hits the sensor and color correct it in post. Still a pain in the butt because you have to spend all that time in color correcting, but at least you can get the photos looking decent.

Thanks for the download! Definitely post your results here if you don't mind!

 

[CNDReef]

Will do

 

[chuckfu5]

I like it....much better then using the stupid plastic filters.

I just took a few tonight. The only thing I noticed is sometimes it would have a hard time focusing.

 

[SashimiTurtle]

My Galaxy S8+ has a "pro mode" in the camera app and a color temp slider within pro mode. It adjusts from 2300k to 10000k. Does this do the same thing?

 

[IC3NIN3]

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

Photos were taken with my iPhone 7 Plus. Great app...good for taking quick photos of my tank. The camera did have some difficulty focusing, but I'm not sure if that was due to lighting. The lights on my tank were all blues as they are winding down. Great job on this app!

 

[RArnone]

Just bought it. Anxious to try tonight on my tank. Thanks for the efforts on our behalf to improve a part of our hobby.

 

[John Ostler]

Thanks for sharing your results! guys. I'd LOVE to know what your lights are and the settings. Tweaks to be made!

You can tap to focus and that should work but you're right, maybe there's something we can do in a more manual focus-way.
Hmm, I'll have to look into that.

This is a pretty sophisticated process, not just a simple K slider. Also, are you guys feeling okay about the brightness in your shots? I have some background processes working for that but these shots are looking a touch dark. Might need to do something about that as well.

Let me know everyone if there are other things you're seeing. If you download it I plan on continuing to make it better thru this feedback. All proceeds will go back into the app or to buying frags if everyone is happy, haha

 

[CNDReef]

 

[CNDReef]

On my tank I think I need more white light to take out more of the blue

 

[John Ostler]

On my tank I think I need more white light to take out more of the blue

Hm, yeah what lights do you have over this one? This is much bluer than I'd expect to see with the app so the camera sensor must be getting bombarded. I'd be interested to see what your normal camera took to compare.

 

[CNDReef]

I’ll take a comparison shot tomorrow

 

[CNDReef]

I run nanobox large retro plus

 

[sleeper]

Just downloaded, I'll take some pics later today when my lights come on. I have a nano with a Kessil A80 tuna blue. It's pretty easy to just turn the spectrum all the way to white and take pics with this light. But, for $2, I'll give it a shot and give feedback. Thanks for your efforts and I hope this proves to be useful to many and profitable to you.

 

[sleeper]

I'll have to say, it was worth the two bucks and I like it. I'll attach some pictures, you can clearly see the difference between the ones taken with the app and without.

 

[John Ostler]

Hey everyone,

I'm working on an update to the app to get even more blue out of your aquarium pics.

I got a ton of feedback from users saying that they need color correction when the lights are mostly blue/actinic (yikes). If you're interested in testing the next version to help make sure it rocks, there's a link on the website to be a beta tester which gets you a free version of the app in beta.

I'd LOVE anyone, particularly that had mixed results to get in that group!
The link is at http://aquariumcameraapp.com

 

[CNDReef]

I’m in

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Worked exactly like the camera app on the iPhone 7.
Same exact results using both.

 

[tupes]

Android version, how soon? Looking forward to it.