5th photo of 365

Well, I don't have much to say about this, so here it is.

 

Now, there are so many things wrong with this photo, I don't even know where to begin. Having said that, I've gotta say, it wasn't as easy as I thought it would be. Nothing is easy in life, of course, but this simple looking photo required three light sources and two v-flats, which is a lot more than what I'd like to use.

I've setup a temporary platform with a sheet of glass on top of a box. Usually this kind of photography would be shot on a piece of plexiglass or acrylics, but I had a piece of glass lying around, so that was my natural choice.

I placed my 430exII with a grid inside the box facing upward at the bottom of the plastic cup at 1/2 power setting. That alone gave me enough illuminations to light the subject, but the problem was that the subject was disappearing into the background. I've tried using my optical slaves to side-light on each side, but that didn't give me the definition I wanted; naturally, next step was to find something to illuminate whites onto the sides of subject. I simply folded two A-4 printing papers, placed them on each sides and lit it with optical slaves. That gave me the definitions that I wanted, but it now looked too even. I wanted to differentiate the intensity of those side lights. From that point on, it was just matter of finding right placement. Oh, by the way, the optical slaves that I used doesn't have power settings, and I think are fixed at Guide Number of 33.

I was inching away my light stands each time after a exposure to figure out the ratio, and after a while, I eventually found the ratio I wanted.

I think I've spent total of 2 hours. Again, that's a lot more time than I'd like to spend on any single subject, and definitely a lot more time than I'd spend on portraiture.I could have reduced the time, if I had lights that I could adjust power settings, but I was too lazy to bring out my "heavy-guns," so to speak.

 

Anyhow, this was my first time attempting such photography, and I've learned a lot. In the end, it was worth it.

What I've really learned, though, is the amount of patience and discipline that is required in doing such product photography. I just cannot imagine doing this type of work myself, and not just doing it, but doing it good, let alone doing it for living. That to me is just a sure way of becoming insane!
 

 I really give my sincerest respect for the people in this business.