What's Wrong?

[Tom_Proctor]

I'm doing pictures for WickedLasers.com and I cant really get a few pictures right. This was taken on 100% manual mode with my D50.



Just....seems weird? Any comments and help would be greatly appreciated

[schrackman]

Hi Tom,

It's really kind of hard to determine what went wrong if we don't know how you set up this shot, i.e. lighting, camera settings, lens used, etc. Just from looking at it I think your lighting, white balance and exposure may need some work. There seems to be a cyanish cast on the image and the shadows are a bit too harsh for this kind of shot, not to mention it's a bit hot around the chrome tip of the pen. But then again, silver or chrome objects are particularly difficult to shoot. I think someone here who knows a bit more about lighting than me would be better qualified to give you some tips on how to properly set up this shot.

[Tom_Proctor]

I just put it on some white paper, used my laptop screen with a white screensaver for some light, and used like 15 second shutter speed at f/11 WITH flash. I don't know if those are right, but you can look at it in the properties of the picture.

Nikon D50
Nikkor 28-80mm 3.3-5.6

[schrackman]

Well first thing I would recommend is not using your laptop for lighting. In fact you can go out and buy yourself a couple of 500W tungsten bulbs and then go to home depot and buy a couple 10" aluminum light reflectors w/clamps and screw your bulbs into them. They're only about $7-10 each, and thus you've got yourself a very inexpensive light setup. Position the lights to where they cast the least amount of shadow on your product as it sits on the paper but to where it lights the product well all around, then custom white balance your camera to the paper itself. Shoot in RAW so after the shot you can adjust in your software program the proper white balance and exposure if necessary, then take it into photoshop and do whatever adjustments necessary there.

This is how I used to take product shots of skin care jars and bottles for the company that I used to work for. I used to come out with some very nice and clean images. It took a bit more work than if I had the proper light setup, but since I was on a budget (as most of us are) it seemed to work out fairly well. Give it a try. I am sure you will come out with better results than the photo above.

p.s. make sure you use a tripod.

Again, perhaps someone else with a bit more knowledge about lighting can give you some better tips.

[Tom_Proctor]

Well first thing I would recommend is not using your laptop for lighting. In fact you can go out and buy yourself a couple of 500W tungsten bulbs and then go to home depot and buy a couple 10" aluminum light reflectors w/clamps and screw your bulbs into them. They're only about $7-10 each, and thus you've got yourself a very inexpensive light setup. Position the lights to where they cast the least amount of shadow on your product as it sits on the paper but to where it lights the product well all around, then custom white balance your camera to the paper itself. Shoot in RAW so after the shot you can adjust in your software program the proper white balance and exposure if necessary, then take it into photoshop and do whatever adjustments necessary there.

This is how I used to take product shots of skin care jars and bottles for the company that I used to work for. I used to come out with some very nice and clean images. It took a bit more work than if I had the proper light setup, but since I was on a budget (as most of us are) it seemed to work out fairly well. Give it a try. I am sure you will come out with better results than the photo above.

p.s. make sure you use a tripod.

Again, perhaps someone else with a bit more knowledge about lighting can give you some better tips.

I just filled my car up, and now I have $5 I have to eat on today . Thanks for the help anyways, I might try this in the future.

[Photo-John]

It's a lighting problem. Try window light. You want more diffused light coming from a source that's farther away. Can't get much farther away than the sun - unless you use starlight

You might want to post this on the Studio and Lighting forum. That's really where it belongs and you might get some good advice there from other starving studio photographers.