April Stlll-Life

[cjbroadbent]

An umbrella is not a particularly good light source for a still life. It's hard to control, spills light everywhere and does not serve reflective surfaces very well. You'd be better served by using diffusion material, which can be hung, curved, sloped over, stretched on a frame and be made to reflect a gradated highlight.

Brian, I beg to differ. Soft-boxes spill everywhere. Diffusion stuff on a frame spill worse unless you use a fresnel source.
An umbrella, with the source pushed well inside, has no spill, feathers naturally, has a nice controllable hot spot for making a delicate penumbra (like hazy sunlight) and is round (rectangular sources cut shadows short under edges that are parallel to to the source).
I agree for reflective glass surfaces, but nowadays there are remedies for the shape of reflections.

[Brian K]

Brian, I beg to differ. Soft-boxes spill everywhere. Diffusion stuff on a frame spill worse unless you use a fresnel source.
An umbrella, with the source pushed well inside, has no spill, feathers naturally, has a nice controllable hot spot for making a delicate penumbra (like hazy sunlight) and is round (rectangular sources cut shadows short under edges that are parallel to to the source).
I agree for reflective glass surfaces, but nowadays there are remedies for the shape of reflections.

Chris, the lighting on most of your other images is lovely, but in the case of this one it simply does not work. Lighting a single object on the plainest of backgrounds, without any propping or colors or textures to add to the "atmosphere" requires a degree of control that is almost surgical, especially if that object is metallic and reflective.

Shooting through an umbrella you are not able to control the gradation of the light with much variability ON the umbrella's diffusion surface itself, which is absolutely critical when shooting highly reflective objects. Bouncing off an umbrella spills everywhere. And the size of the light is critical to a still life, too large a light yields a flat dull light. And there aren't many umbrellas small enough for your razor shot, in fact there are none. And given that they are reflective surfaces they would have greatly benefitted from gradating highlights, the kind only possible by aiming a reflectored light at a diffuser and inserting a gobo between light source and diffuser to create a gradated light on the diffuser itself. It is that gradated diffusion surface that is reflected in the surface of the subject.

The secret to using softboxes is to use the right size one for the job and at the right distance to the subject. I had over 14 different sizes of soft box and even then used sheets of diffusion most often on still lifes similar to your razor photograph. I think if you play more with simple sheets of diffusion you'll find that it works in many more circumstances and to a better degree with this type of image.

[Tom J McDonald]

I think the lighting works well here considering that it's probably meant to (presumably) resemble a bright window in a white bathroom.

[argos33]

Here are some recent images from a macro series I have been working on. I think of them as tiny still life scenes just because everything is so carefully planned and placed in each scene. I am really starting to play around with the objects a lot more and create a sense of landscape with them.










Evan

[argos33]

and for scale:

[cjbroadbent]

.... And given that they are reflective surfaces they would have greatly benefitted from gradating highlights, the kind only possible by aiming a reflectored light at a diffuser and inserting a gobo between light source and diffuser to create a gradated light on the diffuser itself. It is that gradated diffusion surface that is reflected in the surface of the subject.
....

Brian, Lots of good advice, and in particular this part about grading the diffuser.

[taulen]

Argos33:
That is just incredible !
Holy s***, that "person" is small...
Really impressed.

[Brian K]

Brian, Lots of good advice, and in particular this part about grading the diffuser.

Thanks Chris, And thanks for taking it constructively. You do some really well lit work so this one kind of stood out compared to the quality of the rest of it. These types of shots were my bread and butter for a very long time, cosmetics, jewelry and other small scale objects so i know what's possible with them. I think that once you start playing around with a small diffuser you'll start applying gradations to reflective surfaces and even have checker board gradation on adjoining reflective surfaces which can lend a great sense of depth, you'll get all excited about what you see.

The fact that you keep your mind open to trying new techniques can only mean that over time your work will continuously improve, and you're already at a good place, so just imagine where you'll end up!.

[Scratched Glass]

argos33

That's fantastic. Unfortunately I think I've been down that path before.

[argos33]

Thanks - those little figures are hard to work with, but at that scale the possibilities are endless!

Evan