# Need opinions of my shotty photography



## BradTheNailer (May 8, 2009)

Need to know what I'm doing right and wrong.

If you need more info, let me know and I'll post it.

The follow two pictures are unedited (except they were cropped).

One had a reflector, one doesn't.

Anything you spot that I need to know about, let me know.
I'm open to ANY suggestions...even jumping off a bridge. :biggrin:

Bloodwood / Euro Gold.   

With reflector







Without reflector.


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## ldb2000 (May 8, 2009)

I think they both look about the same , the reflector shot is a little bit lighter but introduced some glare on the tip of the pen . Get rid of the glass edge , it's distracting and crop a little tighter but other then that they both look good to me .


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## BradTheNailer (May 9, 2009)

This better?

First pic is the same pen, w/ reflector. Unedited, cropped only.







Figured Mesquite


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## ldb2000 (May 9, 2009)

Yes the glass edge is gone and the glare is lessened and the tighter cropping fills the pics better . You still have a horizontal line in the pic though , much less distracting but it's still noticable . I don't know what editing program you are using but if it has a "cloning tool" use it to remove the line . I know I'm nit-picking but you did ask .
Overall they are very good pics , clear and well lit . 
I have a white long haired cat and no matter how hard I try I can never get rid of the darn fur on my backgrounds , the cloning tool does a great job of cleaning up the dust and hairs from my pics .
Also resize the pic to 640x400 so they fit on the screen without panning to the right .


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## BradTheNailer (May 9, 2009)

ldb2000 said:


> Yes the glass edge is gone and the glare is lessened and the tighter cropping fills the pics better . You still have a horizontal line in the pic though , much less distracting but it's still noticable . I don't know what editing program you are using but if it has a "cloning tool" use it to remove the line . I know I'm nit-picking but you did ask .
> Overall they are very good pics , clear and well lit .
> I have a white long haired cat and no matter how hard I try I can never get rid of the darn fur on my backgrounds , the cloning tool does a great job of cleaning up the dust and hairs from my pics .
> Also resize the pic to 640x400 so they fit on the screen without panning to the right .




The line in the background is the second sheet of paper. I'll see about getting a much larger sheet.

I use Paint Shop Pro, so I'm able to clone.

I have a 21" wide screen @1440, so 800 or 900 wide is about right for me.  640 is pretty small on my screen.  I can cut them down a little.

Thanks for the help!


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## Neal Addy (May 9, 2009)

Hope you don't mind me tinkering with your photo.  I threw in a dash of contrast, and used curves to add some additional lighting.  You'd have to judge how color accurate this is.






How white was your background?  The original pic had a hint of blue but I can't tell if that's the color of the background or just the lighting.  Should it look like this?


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## ldb2000 (May 9, 2009)

With the cloning tool you don't need the larger paper but it would save you the extra step of cloning out the line . The family computer has a 21" monitor too but I spend allot of time on the shop computer which only has a 15" monitor and allot of people are still using monitors in the 14" to 17" range so all of those people have to pan across to see the whole pic . Food for thought .


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## BradTheNailer (May 9, 2009)

Neal, 


 I don't mind at all!  

The pics do look better. I left the originals unedited so I could show what kind of pic I was getting from my camera settings and light. 

The background is a light to medium gray.  So the background isn't that bright. Nonetheless it does look good.

The Wood saturation looks good, very close to the actually color, but I think the metal is to much. It's actually a Titanium pen kit. I think that is lost with the brightness.  Although, I'm not sure one could tell it was Titanium or Chrome in the original. 

The one thing I absolutely like about your second edited pic is the fact that the background is gone and there nothing but the pen. I really like that!

What filter did you use to do that?


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## Neal Addy (May 9, 2009)

Levels.  You had a light background to start with so I simply picked the 'white' levels eyedropper and clicked on the lightest area of your image (bottom left corner).  That sets the color white to that reference point and adjusts the rest.


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## gketell (May 10, 2009)

When I shoot with the mirror I put the "background" vertically at the back of the tent then move the pen towards the front of the mirror and shoot down at the mirror so that the pen is in the reflection of the background.  Then when I crop there are no lines/seams/transitions.

I actually prefer the shots without the mirror.  True mirrors with back-side reflection cause double reflections when shot at an angle.  Either using no reflector (like in your follow up posts) or something with front side reflection (like shiny, opaque acrylic) looks better.

If your pens are glossy then you need a "reflection light" above the camera coming in unfiltered to cause the reflection that shows off your finish.  If the finish is matt then it isn't needed.

IMHO, your pen stand is kinda disgusting at first glance.  I know it is a polished rock after staring at it but that isn't what comes to mine in the first 1/2-second.  And it is always distracting from the pen.  You want the pen to be #1 in the photo and everything else in it should be there to help you display the pen.  When shooting on a light background I use a piece of clear acrylic as my stand.  When shooting on a black background I use a piece of black acrylic.  They very nearly vanish leaving the pen in all its glory.


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## BradTheNailer (May 10, 2009)

Good point about the pen stand.

It's not want I really wanted to do anyway, it's just what I had at the time.

Thanks for the advice, I'll see about coming up with something different for the pen stand/prop


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