Shiny metal things

[Photodiva]

Hi. I need to shoot the football club's large metal cup tomorrow for them. The best they have is a compact shot with horrid shadow on the wall behind and awful color balance and the bottom cut off!!

Not really shot this sort of thing before. I recall from some studio course before that its tricky. Can anyone give me some pointers so that tomorrow isn't a complete waste of time. I'm usually more comfortable with fast moving action!

I have some 2 studio lights and softboxes, can probably use something for a background. Is there a 'good' position for the lights? Is dark background better than white? Do I need white boards or dark boards for reflectors? Should I try to completely avoid daylight and go for a darkened room and use the studio lights?

I foresee a large learning curve ahead of me ...

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[Garry Edwards]

Like anything else, it's only hard if you don't how
And you'll know how once you've looked at this tutorial on creating diffused specular reflections on the Lencarta lighting blog. The subject here is tomatoes and things but the principles are identical.

 

[Photodiva]

Thanks Garry. I've seen that before, given it a re-read. OK. Large softbox (my largest will have to suffice), a reflector, light high. Don't have a boom so what I have will have to do I guess.

 

[Garry Edwards]

Thanks Garry. I've seen that before, given it a re-read. OK. Large softbox (my largest will have to suffice), a reflector, light high. Don't have a boom so what I have will have to do I guess.

Light high (but so close that it's only just out of shot) in that example, but with your trophy thing the light (softbox) will need to be at the front/one side, obviously, not above. It will also need to be as close as it can possibly be, and dead straight.

Then place a reflector of some sort in the opposing position, white would be the best choice.

I can't over-emphasise how close the softbox and reflector will need to be to the subject, and how important it is for them to be dead square.

 

[London Headshots]

If you can encase the entire thing in white card it'll be much easier to shoot.

You can then position black card to reflect and define edges. Use card with a hole in the middle to shoot through and you'll be good to go.

If you want it perfect, build an enclosure out of Lee 216 diffusion paper and fire bare strobes through for giant invisible highlights.

 

[Photodiva]

Hi. Thanks for the advice. I had to shoot in the bar area, which had some translucent blinds and some skylight. I turned off the artificial lights. I bought some A1 white foamboard and sellotaped 3 together for a backdrop/side and stood the trophy on the 4th. It is a blinkin big trophy when on its stand, and its old, dating back to 1890 or something. I thought it could do with a clean, but I guess its 'patina'. I set up my two softboxes, metered the light to 1/125 f8 and shot raw. Here is a result. I don't think I could have done any better given my equipment and experience. Any comments/thoughts for another time would be appreciated.

The one thing that bugged me was not being able to get any light on the bottom row of shields, front. Oh well.

 

[Simon photo]

Looks a bit, pink!
I would have shot against black with a touch of background light, perhaps In the clubs colour

 

[Garry Edwards]

Leaving aside the colour issue, I think you've done a pretty good job of lighting it.

Told you it wasn't tricky

 

[Photodiva]

Hi. Thanks for the feedback. Ill address the color issue. Glad you think i did a reasonable job!