Interview: Darek Falkowski on MondoDiscus
Interview: Darek Falkowski on MondoDiscus
By Luigi Del Favero
Hello international friend of MD!
Thanking Darek Falkowski for his kindness, today
we can show you a different point of view on discus…..We will discover the
secrets of artistic acquarium photography!
Darek
without speaking have already shown us what he’s able to do. As usual without
stealing you other time let’s know him
more and let’s enter “inside” his works and amazing world!
Have a
nice reading!
Who is Darek Falkowski
Since when have you been breeding
discus?
I’m 38 years old and I’m managing a
company (furniture accessories).
since many years but my adventure with these fish begun , 4 years ago.
flat. As you all know discus needs a lot
of water to feel good. It is difficult to fit a big tank into a 60 sq.m flat.
Since my housing conditions have improved greatly I can now breed discus more
seriously.
You breed discus just
for passion or you work with this fish?
But I’m thinking of real full-scale breeding and reproduction as a source of
income. I’d like to stress that I’m more interested in quality than in quantity
of fish. But now I don’t have time to take up professional breeding.
Which is your favourite kind of discus and
why?
Haeckle’s harvest because they are very demanding and that’s why I like them.
It might sound strange but I don’t have a single Heckle. Mainly because I keep
learning these fish. When I’m 100% ready, I will introduce them into my tanks.
According to your opinion the discus is a difficult or easy fish to
breed? And for you exist a particular kind of discus more difficult than others
to breed?
them proper environment, then they’re easy. But if you don’t have time for
changing water and have overcrowded tanks, then there’s no chance of good
results. That’s my view.
the most difficult to keep, because they come from an environment completely
different than a small, closed tank. That’s the real challenge for the breeder,
not to mention reproduction.
Which
are the principal aspects in managing your
preparing for that just now. I’d like to have a
farm. I know I can fit such volume at my house.
reproduce discus R&W. I have 2 pairs
with good prospects but before I will be able to obtain pure R&W I will
have to change some of the water in the tanks.
We have already seen your wonderful pictures,
would you like to explain us the principal techniques you use and how you
manage the light for obtaining such dreaming pictures?
want. And you have to forget about the camera’s automatic settings.
picture of a fish on a black background you need to provide extra light from
above. Set the shortest possible exposure time, usually 1/500 and minimum
aperture. The lens is also very important; let’s say that standard lenses allow
closing the aperture up to F 22. And there can be nothing behind the fish,
e.g. other fish, a plant etc. You can see that below.
If you want to take a
picture of your tank without highlighting any details, i.e. to make it look natural
you can’t use flash. Set aperture to 1/50; a lot depends on the lens and the
lighting inside the tank, e.g. F 5,6. You will get a really nice effect
but your fish will be blurred because they move all the time. You can see that on
the picture below.
If you want to take a
picture of a detail, e.g. a fish’s eye and you want the rest of the fish blurry,
set the biggest aperture. A lot depends on the lens, I have a lens that allows
setting F 1.8. Set exposure to 1/500 and the effect will be that the eye will
be sharp and the rest blurred. But remember, a lot depends on the camera and
lens.
If you want to get a
dark and shady world with the sun ray effect penetrating the tank in a picture
you have to place a lamp at a 45 degree angle above the tank. Go back
about
from the tank, set exposure to 1/500 and F22 aperture and shoot the picture.
You should get something like this
If I’d like to start to do acquarium
photography wich are for you the basic things I must know to do a good work?
First – the basics of photography.
Terms like exposure time and aperture. These are the two settings that make
your photos look exactly like you want them.
The shorter the exposure, the
sharper the image
The longer the exposure, the more
blurry and muzzy the image
The smaller the aperture, the more
details
The bigger the aperture, the less
details (depth of focus)
You use Nikon D70… For you what kind of
minimum equipement is required to do a good work with Acquarium Photography?
Everything depends on what you want
from a picture. If you want to take pictures like mine, you need to invest in
equipment. In my opinion the most important are the lens and flash, secondly
the body. My advice would be to get the cheapest reflex camera body coupled
with good lens and a wireless flash.
My equipment:
Nikon D 70s
Tamron 90mm, Nikon 50mm lenses
SB600 flash and SB29 for macros.
I want to say that you can take decent photos that
look really good with a simple camera. See example:
The two above pictures were taken
using Cannon 530 that costs about 100 euros.
In percentual for you haw is important the
kind of digital camera you use respect the experience of the photographer?
I think it’s 50/50 but I will keep
stressing that it all depends what kind of pictures you want to take and how
much time you devote to it. I take approx. 70 pictures during a session and choose
about 5 nice ones.
9) Do you prepare the water or the tank in a particular way before start
making pictures?
I don’t prepare it in any way, I just come to the
tank and shoot. Only when I want to make something different like light
reflexes on a fish or creating a special mood.
You use software to
improve your picture from the point of sight of light, exposition ecc? If yes
what kind of program?
The only software I use is
PictureProject that came with the camera, my intervention is minimal. All I do
is increase or decrease of lighting, that’s all. My picture processing takes
2 seconds if I process it at all.
What do you think about the culture in your
country about acquarium in general and in particular….obviously about discus?
I think we’re making big progress in
breeding of discus. There are new Internet forums where you can really learn a
lot. People are really helpful and I sometimes think it is like a big family.
There are exhibitions from time to time, like Aquzoom Poznań coming
08-10.02.2008.
We have a lot of imported fish, e.g.
from the
breeders that offer fish of very good quality.
In your
experience exist particular assumptions
for breeding healthy discus and which are the most common problems or illnesses
that can happened in breeding?
Illnesses are a curse that can
really put you off from breeding discus.
The most common illnesses are gill
and skin flukes, nematodes and flagellata.
Of course you can fight these
illnesses, there are efficient medicines, but unfortunately they are only good
in quarantine tanks. Not everybody are able to keep multiple tanks. I won’t describe
the methods of curing because I don’t feel an expert. One thing is for sure,
the best cure is clean water.
Speaking about
know any italian breeder or italian name in association with discus?
Unfortunately I don’t know any
discus breeders in
I hope I will meet nice people thanks to MD to talk about many things, not only
about discus.
What do you think
about our web site “Mondodiscus” ? In
does exist any similar web site?
MD is a very professional site with
a lot of interesting information you can’t find on other pages about discus.
That is why I visit it quite often. I am really, really impressed with your professionalism.
There’s a Polish professional forum of
discus lovers called PKMD. Besides, that is where I found about your webpage.
PKMD is a big family with everybody
supporting each other. Nobody will leave the other in need and you can always
count on a piece of advice. I can honestly say that this is the forum where I
”grew up” and got to know discus like the back of my hand.
This last question is
the question we do to all we virtually
visit: If I ask you to give only one advise to a person that want to start
breeding discus what would be?
Change water a lot and do it often
and your fish will be beautiful and healthy.
Tank
you again Darek and “See” you soon on MD!
| L’intervista: Darek Falkowski su MondoDiscus | Photogallery di Darek Falkowski |
| L’intervista: Darek Falkowski su MondoDiscus | |
| Photogallery di Darek Falkowski |