Pale fish normally come from muddy waters.
Yeah no doubt. I fish a lake here by me that you can't see past 10 inches and the bass out of that lake look like crappie!

The clearer your water the better color your fish will have. Now with that said it's best to try and find a happy medium. Like most say on here about 18 inches to 2 feet is good. The bass in my pond are VERY colorful because you can see 5 feet down in my pond, but that's not always a good thing either, and thats a whole other story.