Reef Raft SPS rant... Let's see real pics of your Reef Raft Pieces....
 

I have a few pieces and I just don't see them look like any of the vendor related pics... How are yours turning out? Care to share your pics and how you get yours to have any resemblance to Reef Raft pics?

Vendors welcome too...

Mine are all too new to tell. Honestly so far I have much nicer aquacultured pieces in my tank. But I haven't given these frags near enough time for them to develop their colour.

RR Ultimate Orange Passion (via Incredible Aquariums)
http://www.lithicimages.com/photos/i...-SDpjkNX-L.jpg

RR Wolverine (via I.A.)
http://www.lithicimages.com/photos/i...-qSg66c3-L.jpg

RR Tropical hurricane (via I.A.)
http://www.lithicimages.com/photos/i...-xhzkZkR-L.jpg

RR Blue Matrix (via I.A.)
http://www.lithicimages.com/photos/i...-XrV6xqr-L.jpg

LOL... I've been waiting for this thread for a long time.

I have 3 pieces this is my wolverine about 8 weeks ago I will take a current pic later, at this point it has grown a lot from this pic I also bleached it a bit when I added a third halide but it fine. http://i864.photobucket.com/albums/a...pskjfeejtz.jpg
Old pink Floyd pic very slow grower but love the colour
http://i864.photobucket.com/albums/a...ps0zpbuwfx.jpg
My pieces are under 2 400w radiums and a single 250 14 k Hamilton bulb in 12" frag tank

These are my "name brand" frags...
Wolverine
http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps1af8bc0f.jpg
Diablo
http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...psbb7aef0a.jpg
Pink Floyd... The yellow tip piece...
http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps3d03be62.jpg
Poison Ivy... Pink piece
http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps2eefb81a.jpg

Here are the no name Reef Raft stuff...
Top row... Sec from the right


http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps145a164b.jpg
Orange Millie in top row

http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...ps2eefb81a.jpg
Deep water red acro

http://i406.photobucket.com/albums/p...psab335d17.jpg

I have a few more but this gives you an idea of the incredible hype in the brand name pieces that lead to bitterly dissapointment for the money you pay.

Reef Raft have an amazing ability to colour up corals in their systems. For most mortals it's fought to achieve the same levels of colour in their systems. I don't hate on RR for their spa and colours, that's why I paid big bucks for some of the pieces. Will I do it again, time will tell. I have to see how these look in 6 months or so. If they don't colour up to at least 80% of what the pictures look like, I won't buy anymore RR stuff.

What I'm trying to get across is don't hate someone for buying RR stuff, it's their right and their money :)

Eh? Who is hating someone for buying RR stuff? I've had the diablo for a yr now. It's still s nice piece but it does not look like any of the reef raft pictures. I've had the wolverine, pink Floyd and. Poison ivy for five mths now and these three also came from IA. Since you got yours also from IA, let me know how yours look in month 5.

All the other pieces came from Frag Box and for the no name RR pieces I have not been disappointed in how they have turned out based on what I paid for them.

Ive had the pleasure of getting all giddy from ordering rr corals multiple times. My rr corals are the same as everyone else. I always understood that these wild pieces they bring in take time to there true captivity colors and I've actually emailed Jason on several occasions to ask for updated pics, and like the rest of us his corals are mostly the same subpar colors.
I've honestly gotten nicer maricultured corals at a quarter the cost

Yeah, I had Jason sending me pics then as well and I still have them from couple hrs ago. back then the pics had some sense of truth to them however, within the last yr, I see more extreme colour saturation being used in their pics, especially these ultimate pieces... Yeah ultimate PS (oops I meant BS)

If y'all are waiting for them to get to the same colors as the marketing pictures, you're going to be waiting a long time.

As the Reef Raft SPS pieces came on the market I was able to drive over and see many of the actual mother colonies in person. Around the time Reef Raft USA was started, the pipeline going through Reef Raft Canada to Reef Raft USA brought some of the most amazing SPS I have ever seen.

This was the Red Diablo photo circulating at that time……..

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps111b4647.jpg

These are my frags, from the original mother colony shown in the above picture, and set them up in my SPS system. Fingers crossed I was going to be able to keep the insane colour…..

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps51f6ba7d.jpg

Here is what the colony and frags look like today…

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps659f0288.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps889f9455.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...pscbc06ae1.jpg


RR Wolverine

Original colony……

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...psfb92e3d6.png

My frag from that original colony….

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...pse422c6f0.jpg

And what it looks like today……..

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...psf57a7175.jpg

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps3ed13851.jpg

RR Pink Floyd

Original Colony

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps8e9cd036.jpg

My frag from the original colony

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps916756d3.jpg

What it looks like today….

http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...pse1e2aae3.jpg
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y75...ps3196c051.jpg

Bill, thanks for sharing. Comparing your pics to those from RR I can see that they are not quite the same. If RR wishes to market their products with saturated colours the least they can do is to provide more information or have a disclaimer to some extent. It would also be nice to see vendors using their own pics of the same coral rather than to use provided pics from RR. when I am buying a Ferrari I expect it to be the Ferrari like the picture I was sold on. If it looks anything else it is not morally correct advertising. For example... From your website at the time when I made my purchase in the group order in April and May of this year, you used only the pink Floyd pic provided by RR. To be honest, I was not impressed when I received it. It was dull brown and grey looking. When local reefers came by to see the new pieces, many and incl myself thought the pink Floyd was the wolverine. Anyways, I was confident that it would color up and five mths later it is still colouring up and there has been vast improvement from what it looked like five mths ago. What I am trying to say is if I had the chance to see the real pic of it I may not have made the purchase. From the group order I spent close to $400 myself so I do have some expectations, especially when a $10 or $20 dollar frag looks way better.

I have heard through the grapevine and understand how RR gets its colours but to some degree the pics may have some half truths to it. I did an experiment over the last three months to see if it works. I increased my phosphate level from 0'to .03-.04 range and I saw more colours but no where close to that of the pics. I have thought of increasing the phosphate level ( increasing dosage of amino acids) but then I decided not to as I do not want other corals to suffer for the sake of a couple.

I also want to say that the no name RR frags I got from fragbox arrived as they are in the pics taken by March and his group. I paid anywhere between 35-99 dollars for the pieces and I was quite pleased with the purchase. For the Diablo I purchased from fragbox a yr ago, it does not have the colors anywhere close to that in the RR pic. It is still a very nice piece even though it does not have that deep red colouring.

From my overall experience, i would rather buy maricultured pieces from Non RR origination as they look no different than the RR pieces, have way better coloration and fraction of RR prices. I'm sure that RR gets their selection from the same source so why pay $400 for a 1/2 - 3/4 inch frag when I could get 4-6 nice mini colonies.

Anyways, this is just my experience and opinion and is not to stop people from buying RR corals.

I'm just going to step in here for a sec. This topic really irks me, having seen several of my friends throw out thousands of $$$ over false advertising.

Just to use Bill's examples:

http://i.imgur.com/JENheEK.jpg

Here I've placed the two images side by side. Let's first hype the contrast and vibrancy by making modeling the levels after the source material. After a ton of tweaking, I end up with this:

http://i.imgur.com/pjyyvZC.jpg

At this point, we have an over saturation of white levels, so let's tone that down using the curves adjustments and some other tools. We'll also adjust the blues a little to compensate for the dominance of the reds:

http://i.imgur.com/6rOK4jj.jpg

Which gets us to here:

http://i.imgur.com/RHHfPJR.jpg

Average color sample for referrence:

http://i.imgur.com/LaScTfv.jpg

For the record - getting from points A to B too no less than 15 adjustments using Levels, Color balance, Saturation, Hue, and multiple channel effects. There were a few instances where I dragged the slider from one end of the bar to the damn near the other end. IMO, I wouldn't be saying anything if I had gotten within 90% accuracy with just the white balance step.

Anyway, that's how I feel about this.

Edit: And the Wolverine (!!!!), don't even get me started on that one.

Edit #2: I'm just going to leave this here in case anyone is still under the illusion that the contextual surroundings of a featured corals are a reliable indicator of photo tampering:

http://i.imgur.com/8ScjTTU.jpg

Edit #3: I just noticed I was a bit sloppy with some of the edges on the above sample. I submit, before anyone points that out, that if I was in line to make $250/1" frag, that this would not have been the case. I would have invested more than 5 minutes into this and you would have been none the wiser.

F-it. I'm just going to throw all of my credibility out the window by putting out there that if any vendor is interested in hiring someone to assist in the mass deluding and debasing of their clientele, LMK and we'll work something out. i

I WANT IN ON THE $$$ ACTION.

Just make sure you message me here in this thread :D

<3

Thanks for posting that Albert!

Albert, nice post.
We are going to have to have a talk next week :)

BTW guys, I'm highly motivated here:

http://i.imgur.com/WRCUljU.jpg

Thanks, Albert. I thought I was losin it... i am certain that I am done with all the RR boutique corals. They can use all the make up and lip gloss to make the sps stand-out but they won't be seeing anymore of my money.

Funny... Just crickets here now...

Wayne, were you expecting a response from me?? If so, then PM me what you are up to because I have 3 messages here, 2 from Adam and 1 from you, telling me you were happy with the group order, looked forward to the Blue Efflo replacements, and thanking me for my professionalism. There are no messages from you since then and nothing with the tone or with what you are insinuating here.

Bill, no need to get your panties tied up in a knot. I have never accused you of anything. I had even thank you for jumping in. No one attacked you so sit down.
I was merely saying no other vendors or other people jumping in to share their thoughts. Over all, I am still happy with the order ( well at least until now) and I didn't fault you. You completed the order with professionalism however you jumping on me and calling me out isnt. I don't need to pm you in the rr frags as I am only sharing my thoughts on RR corals and not how you do business. If you wish to take this personally then I can't help you.

Great. :big grin: You can never tell with words on a screen what is really going on.

That said, there really is no grapevine or secret to Reef Rafts SPS. Sure they get their SPS from the ocean like everybody else but that is where the similarity ends. Jay and Jenson are able to be very selective right where the collection begins and from there they do a terrific job applying the necessary conditions to bring out the colours they see. They use lots of Metal Halide and T5s.
Lucky locals get to see many of these colonies in person and for the most part they really do get amazing stuff………..seriously. Collecting them and working at keeping those colours while aqua culturing these beauties is a lot of fun and a great challenge to me.

uh-oh, now you're gonna set Wayne off :) (sorry, inside joke)

So... 5 years from now what RR pieces will stand the test of time as "must have" tried and true winners that every sps collector will have in their collection? For example, what RR piece(s) will be the next ORA Red Planet, Hawkins Enchinata, Orange Setosa or Cali Tort?

Your right.. Bill I found that the colors are very dependent on conditions. If you look at Jay's tanks his halides are inches from the water surface.

Indeed they are. That is the reason why I added IAS in front of the RR Acro named pieces on our website from day one. I can prove lineage on all my pieces, from original Colony to Frag to New IAS RR Colony/Frag but I couldn't guarantee they were going to look exactly the same after being under my lights in my water conditions for an extended period. (Or yours)

After viewing everyone's photos in here, and numerous photos on other threads (and other forums, etc), there is one thing that really stands out to me, and it has to do with the photo people post of the corals mounted in their system. In my experience, SPS coloring is HIGHLY dependent on the amount of nutrients in the water - particularly low, but measurable amounts of nitrate. We all talk about lowering nutrients all the time. However, SPS get color saturation from many things, but one of those things is nitrate from my experiences.

When I look at photos of Reef Raft corals (other SPS too generally) and I can see other corals in the system I can tell by reasonable guess how much nitrate is in the system. OR, it is a system with undetectable nitrate that is fed heavily either by high fish load (lots of fish poop) or feeding SPS directly with small micron foods (powders or liquids). My opinion, is that SPS are the most visually appealing when the tank has as much food in it as the tank can handle without having algae trouble.

Of course, I'm not always right about this, these are animals we're talking about in systems that are anything but alike, so there are MANY variables. Though in my experience, this is certainly a trend.

Here are some photos - the "low nutrient" photos were taken in spring 2011, and the "medium nutrient" photos were taken in winter 2013. These are in the same system, same bulbs (same amount of use on them at the time of photos), etc. Of course these are only a few photos, but take a look at your own tank, at others', and see for yourself.

Here is a piece in my system when the system had undectable nitrate and low fish load:
http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k4...ps94fc7233.jpg

The same exact same piece in the same system when nitrate was barely detectable, fish load was higher, and I was feeding the corals:
http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k4.../Jan320132.jpg




This is Acropora desalwii in low nutrients:
http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k4...Apr2220117.jpg


The same exact same piece in the same system when nitrate was barely detectable, fish load was higher, and I was feeding the corals:
http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k4.../Feb162013.jpg

Myka's Post
 

Bingo. You said it perfectly, and that is what I like about SPS. It is all about finding that choice piece and bringing out, or keeping, the colours.
This can also be about finding a hidden gem. i.e. Taking an ordinary SPS colony or frag and bringing out more colour.

Yes. Those guys have SPS talent! I don't think the photos are adjusted significantly. I've seen some of these pieces at the Reef Raft booth at MACNA 2013 in person. Those guys know how to color up SPS. That's all there is to it. They could make a brown SPS look like the next best thing. This is the trouble with the Reef Raft stuff - most people do not have the talent they do, and thus their RR pieces just do not look like the photos.

I think if people are disappointed in their RR pieces they should be disappointed in their own ability, not the actual coral. From what I've seen, some of the RR pieces are more difficult than others - like the Diablo. If you want something easy to color up, buy a Sunset Monti. ;) I would LOVE to test my own ability with a RR Diablo in my own "medium nutrient" tank, but I don't want to pay that much for an experiment. :lol:

I definitely agree with your thoughts on colours/nutrient levels.

I think Bill and Myka nailed it.

Reef Raft Canada pictures not so much but Reef Raft USA…thats a whole different story. (No matter anyway, ReefRaft USA is no longer)

Talent?? Yes indeed….but I have also seen some very good SPS collectors fail to colour up some pieces while mastering others. Dialing in the right balance of nutrient import/export is one challenge but getting the right amount of light also makes a huge difference. My SPS will take a lot more light when there is more food available for them and colour up more because of it..

Oh for sure. I'm pretty sure the Reef Raft guys don't keep the ones they can't master though. :D

I bought one of the 3 original Diablo colonies when they came in. It did look like the original pictures posted for months after them imported it...it was so nice I let it grow onto my rockwork at the time.


bingo - well put

I'd love to see some of you guys' RR pieces now they've been growing out for a few years. Of course I've seen photos float around in the classifieds, but let's get some Acro Porn in here. :D

This is the only one I have...

RR Canada Orange Passion (taken Aug 11, it's actually put on a heck of a growth spurt since this photo)
https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8827/2...162276fe_z.jpg

Here's mine RR Orange Passion the original photo is wysiwyg from frag box I order it about a year and half ago I think.

http://http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/...psr2agxpg7.jpg

Here is my best I phone pic looks much better in person.

http://http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/...pssaxxuh8x.jpg

Looks good! That's the same lineage as mine. :)

I'll try and take some pics of my RR pieces. Here is one I had taken already though on my phone.

RR Pretty in Pink

http://i1150.photobucket.com/albums/...820_180038.jpg

Let’s see more rr pic maybe today’s up to date ones of these frags or what you have now . Thanks !

RR Pink Cadillac
Got it as the smallest nub less than a 1/4