Sometimes, the photography isn't the hard part. Finding a full bottle in an apartment shared by a college grad and a student can be a challenge sometimes. When all your booze bottles are half empty, it probably means its time to start shooting something else, or go grocery shopping.
Even this bottle of perfume is only 3/4 full, I rather like how it came out. The way the liquid is diffracting the light is just too cool. It wouldn't fly as a real commercial ad, solely because of that, but it was a bit more challenging than the Corona or Bombay bottles, because of its lack of color and size. More after the jump.
That bottle is tiny tiny tiny, and not only is it one giant highlight, but you can see straight through it, unlike the Bombay bottle. The Corona bottle was also completely clear, but was full of beer, whereas the perfume bottle was half full. I think you can actually see the sides of the table I was working on in the bottom corners of the bottle.
This one was also shot a little differently than the bottles, because of its size, and me getting sick of cleaning my sensor over and over again. But thats for another post. I actually positioned the first sofbox directly behind the bottle, thats now the background. The second softbox was then put in front and above of the bottle. I probably could have shot it with just the one sofbox behind, but then the front of the neck would have been dark, and I've been trying to shoot lighter colored objects.
Also, a technique used but not visible in the end result of the Corona shot that was used and evident in this shot is the reflection of the bottle in the foamcore. Foamcore is not particularly reflective, you can get a shadow, but not much distinguishable detail. I duplicate and inverse the entire object, erase a little bit of the bottom, and then line up the edges until it looks like it was shot on a highly mirrored surface. It may not work forever, but its fairly easy for straight on product shots.
One reason I've been sticking with simple product shots this week is due to space. My apartment isn't all that big, I do share it, and there's only one work surface. Of course, all my products do fit easily on this table, the problem is my lens of choice for products. A 180mm lens is not exactly practical, despite the stunningly sharp results. I'm backing off a full 6 or 7 feet to fit a bottle of beer inside the frame. Throw a 1.4 extender on it, ditch the autofocus, and I could stitch together a several hundred megapixel image with that thing. We're talking Times Square size posters.
One of the main complaints of any home studio is lack of space, but to be honest, I don't think I'll ever be happy with the space I have until I can fit a car inside my infinity wall and have to use walkie talkies to talk across the room.
follow me on twitter
Join the SAA/AMP mailing list
Buy prints and more on CafePress
0 comments:
Post a Comment