crazy experiments

I promised to share some of my crazy experiments, so here goes. I'm obsessed with lighting, as all photographers should be. I love to see the behind-the-scenes setup on where the lights are placed, modified... This book Light: Science and Magic especially appealed to the scientist in me. The authors not only talk about how light behaves, they also demonstrate how light interacts with different materials, like metal, glass, skin, etc etc. Glass is especially a tough one, because it is reflective and transparent at the same time. The trick, as it turns out, is to light it from behind, either white with black edges, or black with white edges.

how many shots in a bottle of wine??

Last summer my wife took the kids to visit her parents in Chicago. Home alone, I took out a bottle of Pinot, but I had no one to drink it with. So I shot it.

Take one. 3'x4' softbox camera left to produce a highligh that runs down the side of the bottle. White reflector camera right. Not enough separation especially on the right side, can use a little kicker light.

Take two. Switched to a lighter background (newsprint on cardboard). Shows more depth and separation, but right side still too dark.

Take three. Added kicker light camera right. Better, but the front of the label still has a dark band.

Take four. Added a piece of white paper cut out to the shape of the bottle, and taped to the back of the bottle. Snooted flash from behind point at the cutout. A different look.

 Take five. Snooted flash from behind without the paper cutout. Er, kinda cool, but no.

Take six. Back to black background. Hmm... need to tweak kicker.

Take seven. Kicker only. I like that...

Take eight. Snooted on-axis flash to light the label. Interesting...

Take nine. Silver reflector camera right as kicker.

Take ten. Switched main light to camera right, and used a gold/silver zebra reflector for fill. I like this one the best. With that, I went to bed with a smile...

Setup shot. So I'd remember what I did...