lokki

Thanks for that, Mark. However, I do charge full rates for post work, as well as for shoots for which I have experience. The client in this case is someone I know, and they offered a flat fee to the general public on a forum which I help run; I accepted with eyes wide open, and we have a very sound contract. I otherwise would not have bothered with learning this type of photography, and I wouldn't have used a typical client as a guinea pig.

I'm getting full pay for production/Photoshop work, and throwing in the photography for free. In exchange, I am allowed considerable leeway in execution, time, and specifics - it's an excuse to learn something new. We both win ;)

However, back to the original question... I'm still poring over the images to try and pick out what's important and what's not. I've got pretty good consistency in the lighting all the way down the bottles, as well as the transparency. There is very little post work needed for color and balance.

So, what should I be looking for in other stock/product shots to try and emulate in my own?

Thanks John. I'm currently using a variety of translucent white fabrics, some vellum (translucent parchment), and construction paper. In other words, I'm broke :)

The shower curtain idea sounds good, but I don't really have any frames. I've been doing a tinker-toy approach with some wooden dowels and small plastic fittings, as well as some resurrected mic and speaker stands.

The problem I find is that I still see the folds of the fabric, or the stands, or seams. Trying for uniform lighting with the ghetto gear I'm using is definately an exercise in patience. The two hot lights I have cost me $40 for the pair (used), with thin stands and a diffuser that promptly melted (literally within 2 minutes, it was developing a hole).

A major obstacle at this point is the white screening. In order to show the color of the liquid, I've had to light a reflector card behind the bottle. Without oblique lighting, the screen pretty much vanishes. Putting light on the text causes much higher contrast in the liquid, so it no longer looks uniform. In the extreme case, I'll just 'shop the two images together, but I'd rather learn how to do it the right way.

Maybe once this gig is done, I can afford some light modifiers...

Unfortunately, any additional equipment is right out at the moment. However, I will try the single side light, with a strong overhead. Hadn't thought about moving the reflector card to one side, as I figured there'd be too much light loss... however, distance shouldn't be a problem.

What do you suggest for the reflector material? Plain white card stock, or something with more gloss?

Also, what should I really be paying attention to in the final exposure? I'm going to aim for uniform brightness in the liquid, and hard edges on the bottle.

One more thing - I'm using a 70-180 macro zoom, and adjusting zoom for each bottle to fill the frame as much as possible. Would it be more typical/appropriate to leave the frame for every shot, and only adjust for exposure (then crop at the end)?

I really appreciate the help, Brooks!

Hi Brooks - great questions!

The bottles are very inexpensive, standard sized cylindrical plastic, with welded seams. The color of the liquid is reasonably important, as is the 'white' screened print. The reflector card (white cardstock) shows this off pretty nicely, with a gradient due to shadow - a problem of having only two lights and virtually no experience.

I'd say that most of the details of the bottles are less important, since the images will be going on a web catalog, at most up to 600px on the longest side.

I've asked the client about black or white matte, and haven't gotten a response yet. I will be masking the bottles. The key request was for consistent color and lighting, not necessarily exact shade or hue of the liquid. I am only charging for my time in Photoshop, as the client and I have agreed that the photography part is a learning exercise.

Cheers!

I've got a handful of small, clear plastic bottles with screened

printing. The contents will be a translucent, but dark liquid (think

water with purple food coloring).

I'm using two 3200K hot lights, without a soft box or diffuser. The

table is covered in black construction paper, with black silk as the

backdrop. To round things off, there is a white reflector card behind

the bottle, two black strips angled for the edges, and a thin

translucent vellum strip to diffuse and shade the light hitting the

white cap.

I'm not so worried about the reflection of the lamps, but what should

I be looking for in an image like this for product/catalog work? I've

tried searching, but I know so little about this kind of shot that I'm

having trouble coming up with the right vocabulary. Any links or terms

that would be helpful? Of course, suggestions and hints are always

welcome!

Thanks,

-Scott

While the answer has been given, maybe this will help with visualization...

For the simple case of a point source, light radiates in all directions. The amount of light can be described in terms of how much of it passes through a spherical shell surrounding the point (assume the point is in the exact center of the sphere so all areas are uniformly lit).

In the mathematical model, the total amount of light passing through the sphere is exactly the same *regardless* of the size of the sphere. What changes is the areal density. Blah blah calculus blah blah conservation of energy. Moving on...

We now limit ourselves to a circle on the sphere (from a 'solid angle'). As the sphere gets arbitrarily large, the circle grows with it. The total amount of light in the circle is exactly the same. But it appears to be dimmer because the light is being spread out. The inverse square law actually relies on geometry of radiating energy. If you were to model with a cube, instead of a sphere, then you'd have lossless squares of light shooting out in 6 directions (to first approximations assuming absolute coherence). This is why flashlights and lasers don't follow the inverse-square 'law' - but the geometry can be figured out and accounted for using the integral of intensity with respect to surface area.

I took a trip to my local hobby/fabric store and picked through the scraps. For about US$5, I brought home 4 different kinds of white, translucent cloth of varying thickness and sheen (and two black silks and a red velvet). I've been playing with these bits to get different looks, and when I find something I like, I will go back with the sample and ask for more of it.

Try hitting some upholstry suppliers, industrial liquidators, and even your local *-Mart, buy some odds and ends, and give it a shot. Chances are you'll end up with a small library for various situations.