If Elon did Reef Lighting...

[Boaz]

Ecotech Radions using the mobius app does this exactly.

will check the Radions out also. Thanks

 

[Boaz]

Thanks everyone for the great ideas. Much appreciated and I've got my weekend research defined.
Apex control would work for me, however it doesn't integrate with RS LED90's. (I find the Red Sea app a little clunky compared to some others. I will say their Reef Mat is awesome so far. Installed about 10 days ago).
Mobius button looks like a strong contender and I use MP40's now. I'll need to dig in on the setup.

Neptune Sky has photo mode. This was taken with a plain old iPhone Xs, straight out of the camera -- no edits.

If you have lights that are controlled by an apex, you can easily make a photo mode.

I set up my apex so when I turn on photo mode, I get up to 5 minutes where the powerheads turn off to minimize motion blur and my lights adjust to my optimal spectrum.

Sounds like a good option. Are you also using Sky?

 

[Boaz]

will check the Radions out also. Thanks

Doing a quick check this looks promising. I have Mobius for the MP40's. Right on the dashboard.

 

[Sean Clark]

Kessils do this natively and you can set the time before it reverts to its scheduled programing to whatever you like.

 

[Boaz]

Kessils do this natively and you can set the time before it reverts to its scheduled programing to whatever you like.

I'm not surprised by that. I put a Kessil on the refuguim and bought the cable to connect to my Apex. Being new, I still haven't programmed it to control intensity/spectrum with Apex. Note to self: Stop buying new stuff until you finish setting up the things you already bought.

 

[flashsmith]

If Elon did reef lighting he would just buy someone out. That's what he does. Dude just buys ideas...

 

[MaxTremors]

…I would not buy them on principle.

 

[LiamPM]

Your original post just describes what “scenes” were created for with Radions and Mobius. It’s nothing new.

 

[rtparty]

Or just use lights that don't require a bunch of features to simply take photos of the tank

 

[Boaz]

Your original post just describes what “scenes” were created for with Radions and Mobius. It’s nothing new.

True and I agree. My RS 90's have scenes also. It's just not that user friendly to use them. And they need to upgrade their wi-fi firmware to use Wi-Fi ver 5 or 6. My guess is they went cheap on the chips and can't or don't know how. The question was not posed from the "Can it be done with my existing lighting?" angle. It's about SW user friendliness for those of us who want some quick help with the lighting and photos. Eventually, I'll spend more time learning to take better photo's. But right now, I'm spending my time learning water quality and reef chemistry and coral requirements and dosing and Apex programming and it seems like a billion other topics. Most of those seem more important than photography right now. I just want a shortcut to better photos so I can document the reefing journey, while I'm learning everything else I need to learn. My early tank photos are, well, pretty bad. Actually horrible.

I think of it like this. I'm old enough to remember the many years it took car companies to get bluetooth right, just so we could play music from our phones. Twenty years later, I don't even carry a car key, just my phone. My car unlocks when I carry my phone close to it. The phone connects and my favorite music plays when I get it. The car starts, as long as I have my phone with me. The car locks when I walk away from it. Heck, I can even have the car come to me when it's raining and I don't want to walk through the parking lot in the rain. It's just well designed software and understanding the user needs.

I'm looking for modest improvements to my photos and ease of use. I look at the first few months of my tank photos and wish I'd done better at documenting it with better photos. It's come a long way fast.

I really appreciate all the leads. Thanks R2R members! Such a great forum. Another education topic on my list....

 

[LiamPM]

True and I agree. My RS 90's have scenes also. It's just not that user friendly to use them. And they need to upgrade their wi-fi firmware to use Wi-Fi ver 5 or 6. My guess is they went cheap on the chips and can't or don't know how.

The "Mobius" chips within the Radions are wifi capable - Those on the BETA programme are able to connect via wifi as we speak so its not a case of cant or cheap. Its been in this BETA state for a very long time so no idea why in that sense but Radions already have the ability, its just locked for most currently.

I hear what your saying on the user friendly aspect - But as an app developer, you have to take into account the thousands of differing opinions and that you just wont please everyone. I find Mobius and the whole SCENES UI spot on and couldnt be any easier for me. Then some hate it and say its unusable. How do you please all at the same time

SCENES does exactly what your original post was on about for me. I have 1 button on the Mobius homepage thats called PHOTO. I click it and it sets my lights to a cusotm schedule, heavy on white lighting, becaus ethats how i like my photos to look, for my cusotm set time of 30 minutes. Once the 30 minutes is up, it goes back to the programmed schedule.

 

[GlassMunky]

Darn it..you just made a 950 Ecotech G6 XR30 1,050 on the mere suggestion of a new feature. THANKS A LOT!!

ECOTECH lights have been able to do this since Gen3 it’s not new at all

 

[Boaz]

The "Mobius" chips within the Radions are wifi capable - Those on the BETA programme are able to connect via wifi as we speak so its not a case of cant or cheap. Its been in this BETA state for a very long time so no idea why in that sense but Radions already have the ability, its just locked for most currently.

I hear what your saying on the user friendly aspect - But as an app developer, you have to take into account the thousands of differing opinions and that you just wont please everyone. I find Mobius and the whole SCENES UI spot on and couldnt be any easier for me. Then some hate it and say its unusable. How do you please all at the same time

SCENES does exactly what your original post was on about for me. I have 1 button on the Mobius homepage thats called PHOTO. I click it and it sets my lights to a cusotm schedule, heavy on white lighting, becaus ethats how i like my photos to look, for my cusotm set time of 30 minutes. Once the 30 minutes is up, it goes back to the programmed schedule.

Thanks @LiamPM. I'm an old Infrastructure engineer, now managing infrastructure projects. I get the "can't please everyone" comment. I don't engineer anymore, but one of my current projects is building a new "user friendly" wireless infrastructure and rolling out Wi-Fi to 200 sites, kind of a hot topic for me. I have three access points in my house and the only devices that consistently lose connection are my lights. At least once a week and frustrating to say the least. Usually when I try to change anything, like changing a scene. Meanwhile, the Red Sea Reefer Mat has been very good in the first weeks. I'm thinking they used a newer/better W-Fi chip, but who knows.

I like Mobius. Don't change my settings much, but the app has a great interface and very easy to navigate and find what you are looking for. I'll tweak the settings once I have a good starting point and have time. Initial settings should be "works for most" or "works for iPhones or Androids".

Also looking into Apex controlled options, since I always have Fusion up and I want it as easy as hitting the feed mode button, like someone mentioned earlier. pumps, skimmer, UV, etc. off for 15 minutes, feed, watch as long as you want and walk away when you want. If you get distracted... everything comes back on in the appropriate order. Took maybe 15 minutes to set up and tweak.

Time for work. Thanks!

 

[Steven Garland]

Like the AI Prime,it has numerous spots to save schedules,I just sat one up that worked and when I took pics I clicked that schedule took my pics and clicked back on my original schedule.

 

[FreshCoastReef]

I'd get a button on my lighting app to change the lighting for taking photo's for 5-10 minutes, then auto-magically return to previous settings. I'd even be able to set the time limit in settings. Are there any lights available that have this type of capability? I want user friendly and easy.

On the AI Prime you could use the "Feed Mode" in exactly this manner.

 

[damsels are not mean]

If elon did reef lighting... he'd probably buy ecotech as well as the right to call himself founder and then promise a bunch of silly vanity projects while the original team slowly breaks up due to his toxic management strategies LOL

But to answer the real question...

Most fixtures have preset options which you can set to a good color for photos. But IMO the best way is to do it in camera. Setting white balance manually or using a grey card to set it is the best way to get a good looking photo that is accurate to how you want your tank to usually look.

 

[HB AL]

Didn't read all the posts but I just got a great idea from the op's original question. How about lights with a camera built in, you hit a button on your phone, pick the light filter say orange, you view the look on your phone and snap some pics. Now that would be convenient. If this isn't patented yet somebody get on it.

 

[SPS2020]

AI lights are already fairly close to this. It sits on the schedule setting and all you’d need to do is click the on button. you have to remember to put it back into the schedule setting though after the fact.

What AI light do you have? My GUI doesn't look like that at all for my Hydra 32HDs.

 

[ZombieEngineer]

Didn't read all the posts but I just got a great idea from the op's original question. How about lights with a camera built in, you hit a button on your phone, pick the light filter say orange, you view the look on your phone and snap some pics. Now that would be convenient. If this isn't patented yet somebody get on it.

Ever tried taking a top down pic without a specially made box to block turbulence? Doesn't work very well. Can't see a thing unless you block that flow and remove any screen cover.

 

[HB AL]

Ever tried taking a top down pic without a specially made box to block turbulence? Doesn't work very well. Can't see a thing unless you block that flow and remove any screen cover.

Turning pumps off makes water on surface totally smooth. And it's pretty easy to remove the top for some pics. Not like your gonna be taking pics everyday all day, so that issue is solved.