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Steeldrifter

Lighting help

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Have a lighting question/problem and could use some help.

 

I'm just looking to get some better quality pics of rods I build for my business and not looking to get perfect magazine cover shots, but just some nice quality well lit shots. So I set up a spot on my bench to get some pics taken, started using a tripod and the self timer on the camera to get rid of my non steady hands. The problem I have though is something to do with the lighting as you can see in the pic. It's coming out too yellowish looking. Right now the only lights on the subject is a double tube 40wt florecent overhead, and two 40wt bulbs aimed at it from the sides about 3ft away.

 

I'm not real into all the specifics of photography so this is most likly a simple/common problem but I'm not sure what is causing it. Too much lighting? not enough lighting? the florecent light causing it?

 

Heres the pic

 

IPB Image

 

 

Steve

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It is your light source. Each type of light has its own color tempeture. The eye for the most part corrects this for you but your camera is limited in what corrections it can do.

 

If your camera has different white balances you can set one of them will work better than the default.

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I just looked and there is a white balance setting on it with about 6 different options. One of them says "white balance measure" and when I optioned to that the lens automatically extended a good inch out farther on its own (never knew it could do that) and poped up "measure" on the screen in a little window. Guess I need to dig out the booklet and read up on the white balance feature some huh :lol:

 

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction kargen.

 

Steve

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Here's a quick fix that sometimes works - just open the image in Photoshop; go to adjustment/levels and select the neutral gray eyedropper icon. Find a neutral gray spot in the image and click on it. Here I used a spot on the fur. Sometimes it'll correct a color cast. You can fool with the other icons (black on a black spot, white on a white spot) and see what pops up. It's usually worth a shot anyway.

 

 

IPB Image

 

 

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Hi Steve,

 

You already have some great answers from people who are quite skilled photographers. I'll add two thoughts. First, I still use three "B" bulbs (250 watt each) taken from my slide film days (I get them from B&H in New York) to shoot most of my interior shots. Second, Have you thought about taking the shot outside. Gretchen and I have a Koi pond with a water fall in our back yard that would make a great back ground for your rod picture. I'll bet you could find a good back ground in your back yard or local park. OR just use sun light and use a back ground you move from the house like the one you already have in the pic. When shooting outside I like the early morning or late evening light but other folks might have other preferences. Also to answer one of the other members, it's important to learn the manual controls on your camera. Take care & ...

 

Tight Lines - Al Beatty

www.btsflyfishing.com

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Steve,

 

Sounds like the easiest option may be to just select "fluorescent" in your white balance settings. Doing the custom thing will probably work but depending on your camera you might need a grey card to get "proper" white balance. Since you are using all fluorescent bulbs, changing the setting to that should get rid of the yellow cast.

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Steve,

 

After carefully reading your post, I think you're going to have trouble getting "true" colors because you're using a mixed lighting source -- fluorescent and incandescent combined.

 

Try going with one or the other. Your camera will probably have a setting for incandescent (looks like a little light bulb) or fluorescent (looks like a little horizontal bar). Warning: If you add flash to either of those, you'll again end up with mixed results. Camera flash is balanced for daylight.

 

If you get a yellowish cast to your photos, chances are your camera is set for daylight and your dominant light source is incandescent. If you get a greenish cast, the camera is set for daylight and your dominant light source is fluorescent. If you get a bluish cast, your camera is set for fluorescent or incandescent and your dominant light source is daylight.

 

Hope this helps.

John

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Appeciate all the good input guys. I couldnt find my user manual for it but I did go online and downloaded the user guide in a PDF file so that should help me to figure out what some of these settings are. I'm going to try all the suggestions and see what works out the best.

 

Al- I've taken a number of pics of rods outside but for some reason it seems like close up outside pics are a real hit or miss thing for me. Seems like the pic ethier comes out really good or really bad, almost like there's just no happy medium for me with outside pics of rods. I think mainly the reason for that is I just dont understand photography lighting well enough to realize where to take the pic and what time of day the lighting works best outside. Here's an example. These were taken yesterday and looked good to the naked eye, but when I see them on "film" I see the morning light really made alot of shadows as well as almost looking like it was just took much harsh light which kind of washes the real color out of the rods.

IPB Image

 

I think I'll try getting the higher watt bulbs as you mentioned Al and also cut the fluorescent light out of the deal and just stick to one type of light source.

 

John- Yupp it has four settings for light source...incandescent, fluorescent, cloudy, and daylight. I'll put all the advice to use and try a few different suggestions and see what I come up with.

 

Thanks

 

Steve

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Steve, are you comfortable shooting RAW?

If so, shoot in raw (auto wb )and adj your white balance post.

 

Re your outside pic.

Couple things.

 

1st:

Shadows. By the shadows Im guessing it was late morning, its look as if the sun was almost overhead. You really want early morning or early evening. Mid day isn't the best time for outdoor photography.

 

If you want to reduce or eliminate the shadows you'll need to use your flash as well. If your using an on board flash you'll need to set the shutter speed at the sync speed.

 

2nd

The BG. Your "meter" will have picked up all the light bouncing back of the stones. Thats causing the rods to be underexposed. Couple ways to deal with that (meter off something else) but the easiest is not to use something thats going to reflect (or absorb ) light. Long story short and in plain english the light bouncing off the light toned stones "blinded" the camera and it in turn stopped down and/or ramped up the SS to compensate. Until your used to metering and understanding how the camera meters and how to compensate yourdself (manual modes) , Id avoid using anything thats going to reflect alot of light or arbsorb light (blacks).

 

3rd.

It looks as though your inside your body/lenses MFD (Minimum Focus Distance), try backing off a few inches.

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Well I think I'm on the right track with your guys help so far. I just sat it back up and took 5 different shots on different settings.

 

So far the best one is with 2 100watt bulbs aimed at the subject (highest watt I have on hand at the moment) settting set to incandescent, no flash and self timer on tri pod.

 

Not perfect but certianlly better than the first one, at least that ugly yellow is mostly gone now.

 

IPB Image

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Hi Steve,

 

That last one does look a bit better. I think you are getting there. You might consider shooting for a shallower depth of field so your background is out of focus OR move it further back. I'm sure the other members on this group will have some great ideas as well. You could shoot a background that was out of focus then do some fancy Photoshop work to cut the rod/creel/decoy,etc. from one pic into another with the out-of-focus background. If you elect to go that route I'm sure some of the more experience Photoshop people on the group can point you in the right direction. I can get it done but not with any great skill on my part; thank goodness for books with instructions. Take care & ...

 

Tight Lines - Al Beatty

www.btsflyfishing.com

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Well I think I'm on the right track with your guys help so far. I just sat it back up and took 5 different shots on different settings.

 

So far the best one is with 2 100watt bulbs aimed at the subject (highest watt I have on hand at the moment) settting set to incandescent, no flash and self timer on tri pod.

 

Not perfect but certianlly better than the first one, at least that ugly yellow is mostly gone now.

 

IPB Image

Nice photo! You can also always go back in with Photoshop or a similar program and tone the background down with a blur....

 

See my example below...

IPB Image

 

JayMorr

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Started messing around with the white balance manual settings now that I have been reading up a bit on that feature. Does this look any better than the last to you guys? :dunno:

IPB Image

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That looks better or what I might expect based solely on the what I think the cork should look like and the black/white in the loon.

 

I tried to adj it a bit by playing with curves and levels to bring it more towards nuetrals tans as what might be expected in the cork and creel and further aiming to reduce the glare a bit off the seat and reduce highlights. But without actually seeing the real deal its just a wild guess at a representation of the actual colours.

 

post-11201-1211408369_thumb.jpg

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Have you tried diffusing the light? That usually helps in taking out some of the harsh cotrast. You can do it two different ways. One is to place a white sheet if front of the light source. I have made them from 1x1 pieces of lumber and stappled the sheet to the frame. You can also bounce the light of a white surface. Instead of aiming the light at the object you aim it at a white board and aim the reflected light back at the object. They use both techniques with portraits and product photography. The photographers that I have worked for always use on of the two. I don't think they ever used a direct light, unless they wanted a single light source and high contrast. You can also use both at the same time. Use the screen as a primary and bounce light back into the picture using a white board on the opposite side.

 

Does this make sense. As far as the color. Most digital cameras have compesation settings for different light sources. I think that one of the problems with adjusting color in photoshop is that if you are not careful you can blast out the contrast. To me it is easier to get the color temp right before you go and change it in photoshop. You can make a good file bad, but you can't make a bad file good. Just substitute file for negative and that is what a profeesor of mine would say to me when setting up my camera for a shot. In the days befor digital, they used color filters to adjust the color temps. But you should stick to one type of light source. I also have taken vasoline and panty hose and streched them accross a spare filter to get a difussed look, before the days of digital and photoshop. Most of the time when I wanted to do that I did it in a darkroom, but that is another story.

 

Randy

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