Assignment 4 - Applying Lighting Techniques 4

Texture (continued)

I rearranged the previous set to light the side of the object, instead of the underneath. I was again using the bare bulb without any diffuser to pick out the surface texture of the shell. I moved the shell into various positions so that different parts of the shell were featured in the frame. I selected one of these pictures which I felt best presented the surface texture.

Sea shell surface texture 2

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 5 seconds

Observations

In this picture, it is the smooth delicate shapes around the opening of the shell which are the main visual focus. The lamp light is shining on the left hand side of the shell, and I used a silver reflector to fill in the shadow areas on the inside and outside of the shell. The rippled shapes around the shell opening are revealed as edges or by gradations of light.

As in the previous texture photograph, I tightly cropped frame around the edges of the shell. I tried including just the top portion of the shell, but as noted earlier in relation to Texture 1 photograph, I felt that the photograph of the whole shell was more interesting. I converted the image to black and white, adjusting the settings so that the folds around the opening showed up as clearly as possible.

The two texture pictures present quite different aspects of the shell's surface:

• Texture 1 is the pattern of the rough wrinkled surface around the back of the shell
• Texture 2 is the smooth rippling shapes around the opening of the shell where the creatures body would emerge.

Colour

The body of the shell has a pattern of tiny white and milk chocolate coloured spots built up in a spiral shape which give an overall appearance of a pale brown body with darker brown spots. The sides of the opening of the shell, on the other hand, are white with some pale orange flecks on the outer rim.

It seemed to me that the main colour interest in the shell is the the white area with orange flecks around the edge of the opening. I reviewed the photographs I had taken so far to find the ones where the colours in this area were clearly visible and reasonably intense. It was the one with a dark background which was the stongest visually. It turned out to be the same photograph that I had used to convert to black and white in Texture 2 above.

Sea shell colour 1

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 5 seconds

Whilst I like this photograph as a record of the natural colours, the colours do not particularly stand out. I experimented placing the shell against various background colours both similar hues, complimentary hues and contrasting hues. A lilac colour appeared to work best, as this complimented the orange making it more vibrant, without being too discordant with the brown colour of the other parts of the shell. In Photoshop, I experimented by changing the background colour from black in the above photograph to a lilac hue as below.

Sea shell colour 1 with background colour modified to violet

The change of background colour makes the shell appear more richly coloured than the neutral background. Having confirmed that the change of colour background was potentially worthwhile, I bought some artists paper of roughly this colour to use as a background in further photographs of the shell.

Using the lilac background, I took numerous photographs some trying to recreate the lighting of the Colour 1 photograph above and others with different lighting and positions.

This is the photograph that I selected from this group of photographs.

Sea shell colour 2

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 1.3 seconds

Observations

I used the lilac paper as both a surface on which to place the shell as well as a backdrop by hanging the top edge from board standing vertically behind the board. There is the therefore no horizon on the backdrop, and no reflection of the shell.

I needed to deal with a number of issues in order to optimize the portrayal of colours in the photograph:-

• White balance: On the tungsten settings that I used for the previous photographs, there was little noticeable colour cast in the photographs. However, under the same lamp and lighting conditions, the lilac paper became pure blue with the tungsten WB setting. I tried various ways available in my D200 camera to adjust white balance to a more accurate colour without success: the background became a purplish red with WB set to fluorescent, I set up a custom white balance setting using a white card as the reference which resulted in the same pure blue background as with tungsten setting. Even the "fine tuning" adjustment of white balance did not produce a colour that was close to the lilac colour visible in daylight. The solution I eventually used was to adjust the "Colour temperature" and "Tint" settings in the RAW converter panel in Lightroom. This should not have been necessary had I used photographic lighting, rather than a normal domestic desk lamp with a tungten bulb. (This desk lamp has a dimmer switch and I assume that the colour temperature of the tungsten light would vary with how high the light was switched to. Unfortunately, there was no calibration or marking so it was not readily possible to keep the lamp on the same setting. This no doubt was one of the reasons making it difficult to control the white balance.)
• Position of lighting: The same lamp was used to illuminate the shell and the backdrop. The lamp was placed to the left side of the camera pointing towards the subject. A silver reflector highlighted the right hand side of the shell. Another board was used to minimize flare by shielding the lens from the direct lamp light. In the Colour 2 photograph, the opening of the shell is facing towards the lamp so that the orange colour is bright and stands out. The white area surrounding the rim is evenly lit and the ripples and form are barely visible as I used a screen of tracing paper at an angle over the shell to diffuse the light and minimize shadows. This contrasts with the Colour 1 photograph above where the ripples and shapes are accentuate by placing the lamp light to shine sideways onto the shell, using the reflector to provide secondary lighting to the surfaces facing the lens.
• Exposure level: I used manual exposure settings and bracketed the photographs. I was looking to see if a degree of underexposure would intensify the orange colours in the shell. However, in the set up I was using, I found that underexposure was counterproductive because the darkening of the backdrop reduced the impact of the contrasting orange and lilac. One of the reasons for selecting Colour 2 photograph was that I liked the balance of lighting: the shell is brighter than the background, but the lilac colour is still reasonably powerful as a colour contrast to the orange flecks in the shell.
• Cropping: I cropped the frame close to the shell as I did not want the colour of the shell to be overpowered by a colourful background.

Conclusions

I was maybe fortunate that the colours of the sea shell that I used as the subject of this assignment were not badly distorted in tungsten light. Had the object that I had selected been more brightly coloured, the white balance complications would probably have appeared much earlier. This is a salutary experience confirming the comments in the notes on the often unsatisfactory character of colours in photographs taken in artificial light situations.

Assignment 4 - Applying Lighting Techniques 3

Texture

I used a table with a glass top for the third photographic session so that I could illuminate the shell from underneath. I thought that this might be a way to capture the colours and translucence of the shell. I had done a workshop at my local photographic club which involved photographing glass objects by placing them on lightboxes with quite effective results, and hoped for a similar result with the shell.

A diagram of the lighting set up is shown below.

I took the photos with the lamp unshaded to bring out the surface texture of the shell, and I also took some photographs with the lamp pointed from the side (see part 4).

I took no further photographs of the silver sea horse as I was fairly confident that I would get some reasonable results with the sea shell photographs.

I selected two photos with the lamp shining from underneath the subject.

Sea shell surface texture 1

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f16 for 1/2 second

Sea shell translucence

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 2 seconds

Observations

The camera settings were virtually the same as above; white balance set to tungsten, manual focus and exposure.

In order to minimize flare, I fixed a piece of cardboard underneath the table top so that it shaded the camera lens. I used a silver foil reflector held over the shell in various positions to light up shadow areas and add highlights to the dark side of the shell.

The glass surface of the table is far more reflective than the black paper surface used in the last group of photographs. The reflection seemed generally to draw attention to the outline of the shell rather than its texture and colour. I therefore chose to include only the narrowest band of the reflection in the glass.

I took some photos with a white board background and others with the black velvet. The white background was obliquely lit by the lamp under the table so that it appeared to be pale beige in the photographs. Whilst similar in hue to the colours of the shell, the photographs with the white background were quite pleasing. It was just chance that the two photos that I selected from this group were both against the black background.

• Texture 1, the shell is viewed sideways on. The foot opening is not visible and the pointed top of the shell is seen in profile at the bottom right of the frame. (The position is similar to that in Form 3 image in part 2.) The lighting of this curved surface is fairly even so that the curvature is not emphasized. The hard-edged light is picking up the pattern of parallel lines of small blobs across the surface. There are highlights on the tops of these spots so that they stand out against the rest of the shell. I tightly cropped the frame around the edges of the shell as this seemed to emphasize the surface texture and downplay the edges of the shell. I also converted the photograph to black and white as this draws attention to the texture of the shell surface in the picture.
• In Translucence, I placed the shell in a position where the interior of the shell is lit from within by the lamp below. This area of translucence is reasonably in balance with the brightly lid underside of the shell, and the reflected light on the upper surface. I found by trial and error that the reflected light needed to illuminate the pointed end of the shell rather than the other end. It also improved the visual impact if there were small highlights on the spikes along the upper surface. I also like the yellow stripes along the bottom edge of the shell. The colours in this photograph are otherwise relatively muted.

Conclusions

In order to portray the texture of the shell surface without a macro lens, I had intended to select a small part of the shell with an interesting texture to make a composition which I could crop out of the larger frame. However, I found that the pictures of just part of the shell were not as strong as those of the complete shell. Apart from the visual interest, another factor was the reduction in quality of the image at smaller sizes from the original photograph.

Assignment 4 - Applying Lighting Techniques 2

Form

In order to describe the form and volume of the sea shell and sea-horse, I modified the set used in part 1 so that the tungsten lamp was pointed to the side of the subject, surrounded by a circular lamp shade diffuser.

For the background, I draped black velvet over the white board. The white mounting board by itself was a problem as I had no satisfactory means of lighting it separately from the subject.

In the initial sequence of photos I tried different placements of the subject

• Subject on table top - I did not like the contrast between the pale surface and the dark background.
• Subject on black velvet - the velvet surface was catching the light which was not attractive.
• Subject on black paper - the surface of the paper was almost as dark as the velvet. The surface was matte and I liked the blurred reflection of the shell.

I then varied the position of the shell and lamp, using a reflector to lighten the shadow areas. After reviewing the results on screen, I chose the three most interesting photos from this sequence.

Sea shell three dimensional form 1

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 8 seconds

Sea shell three dimensional form 2

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 8 seconds

Sea shell three dimensional form 3

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 8 seconds

Observations

The camera settings were the same as part 1. As the subject is brightly lit, reflections from the ceiling and walls are minor, and hence I did not use boards to keep such light away from the subject.

I should have used a board between the lamp and my lens to reduce flare. It was only when I viewed the photos subsequently that I noticed some flare. Fortunately this was not close to the subject and I could crop this out.

• In Form 1, the shell is dominated by the foot opening in the top half of the frame. The edges of this opening are lighter in colour and smooth textured. The body of the shell is just catching the light revealing the spiral layers and rounded body. However, the body of the shell seems low key relative to the foot opening. There is significant foreshortening so that the elongated shape of the shell from front to back is less apparent. The shape of the shell in this position is quite square which I have reflected in the square frame. The overall effect is a relatively static image.
• In Form 2, the visual focus is on the spiral layers of the body of the shell. The "tail" of the shell is visible in the background, but this is less brightly lit. The sideways view has a more dramatic shape, this was clearly a snail with attitude. This is supported by the triangular shape in the frame. The depth of of the subject is emphasized by the perspective lines and difference in light from front to back.
• In Form 3, on the other hand, the shell appears to have a gently rounded surface. The spirals, steps and spikes are barely visible. Nevertheless, the vertical stance seems to make this a reasonably lively picture. This photo surprisingly stood out when viewed in an array of thumbnails when I was reviewing my results. There is a reasonably prominent diagonal from bottom right to top left. In addition, there is possibly visual interest in the contrast with Form 2 - it is not easy to work out that that both are photographs of the same object.

In these photographs, the surface of the shell adds visual interest for the viewer, but the texture is not the main interest in these photographs.

I took a similar sequence of the silver sea horse against a black background with the objective of modelling its three dimensional form. The figure is decorated with small humanoid figures around the head and on the tail, and I felt that it was important to show these as well as the physical shape of the ornament. As before, there is less freedom to position the ornament compared to the sea shell as this object needs to stand on its legs with the head pointing forward towards the lens.

I found that the most lively photographs were those where both sides of the humanoid figures were visible and the lamp was used to illuminate the far side, as below.

Sea horse three dimensional form

Nikon 18-200mm at 82mm: Iso 200 f32 for 13 seconds

The lamp was on the right hand side, illuminating the far side of the creatures head, neck and tail. A reflector on the left hand side is illuminating the near side. The strong side lights brings our the three dimensional shape of the humanoid figures and seems to give far more vitality than where the lamp is facing towards the figure:

Sea horse illuminated from the front side

Whilst the humanoid figures are visible in this photograph, they seem quite flat like paper cut outs in comparison to the previous picture.

Conclusions

The portrayal of three dimensional form seems to really enhance the vitality photographs.

Assignment 4 - Applying Lighting Techniques 1

Introduction

The objective of this assignment is to use lighting techniques to bring out the physical characteristics of a single object: its shape, three dimensional form, texture and colour in about eight photographs.

I used a couple of objects for these photographs, one a sea shell similar in shape to a snail's shell which is about 6 cms long, and the other an ornate silver sea-horse shaped ornament which is larger at about 14 cms long. I was worried that the sea shell was going to be too small to fill the frame with my zoom lens (I do not have a macro lens). On the other hand, I was concerned that photos of the crude surface of the silver ornament would be rather bland and uninteresting.

The idea of using a shell as the subject was attractive as I could refer to similar exercises in a book called "Light", part of the Collins Photography Workshop series from 2000 byMichael Freeman which used a clam shell.

I decided to use artificial light for these photographs as I am doing the assignment in December in UK when daylight is short and unpredictable. I debated whether I should try to rent or buy some equipment suitable for taking small objects. However, I first tried using a desk light and other props that we have at home. I thought the results were satisfactory, so I did not try to get hold of specialist photographic lighting.

Shape

The shape of an object is best shown in silhouette and for this purpose, I posed the objects on the smooth surface of our kitchen table set up as in the following diagram. This replicates the set used for contre-jour lighting on the studio photography course at City and Islington College.

As I wanted the sea shell to fill the frame, I started using a close up lens (Hoya +2 dioptres) attached to my Nikon 18-200mm zoom lens. Whilst the photographs looked sharp on the camera's screen, the quality of the photographs was less good when viewed at 100% magnification on the computer screen. There was significant chromatic aberration around the silhouetted edges of the shell. I used the chromatic aberration correction in Lightroom, which reduced the fringing, but the edges were still slightly soft.

I therefore repeated the sequence of photographs without the close up lens. On maximum magnification, the shell filled about a quarter of the frame at the close focussing distance. My photographs are ten megapixel, so I felt that 2.5 megapixel was still ample for the purpose of this assignment. At full magnification, the photographs were still reasonably sharp and there was no significant chromatic aberration.

The two best photographs of the sea shell in silhouette are shown below.

Sea shell silhouette 1

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 0.7 seconds

Sea shell silhouette 2

Nikon 18-200mm at 200mm: Iso 200 f32 for 0.6 seconds

Observations

I placed the shell directly on the table surface which has a slightly reflective satin varnish finish. I positioned a white mounting board on the back of a chair with a book to hold it in place. I positioned the tungsten desk lamp to illuminate the white surface as evenly as possible, directed away from the subject.

I placed the camera on a tripod looking along the table top on manual focus. I set the white balance to tungsten and took a number of photos at maximum magnification to fix the exposure settings and check the depth of field. The shell is quite spherical and I found that I needed f32 to ensure that the edges were reasonably sharp from front to back.

To minimise light reaching around the sides of the shell which would reduce contrast, I placed two cardboard lids vertically at either side of the subject just out of the frame. I reduced light reflections from the ceiling and walls onto the shell by placing books on either side and across the top of the shell. The shell was therefore inside a dark "tunnel".

The shell has small protuberances on which it could stand in various positions. Most of the photos were not visually interesting, just a dark central dark blob with bits sticking out. I liked two of the photos (shown above) for the following reasons.

• In silhouette 1, the shell is in a supine position with a diagonal stretching between the pointed top of the shell and the curved and flattened area which is standing on the table top. There is no detail or colour in the body of the shell, but I think that there is enough information that a viewer could recognize this as a shell. The shape from this viewpoint is quite abstract, but it has a certain natural elegance.
• In silhouette 2, the shell is standing in a vertical position. The right hand edge of the shell curves round in a tightening circle indicating a spiral that is not otherwise visible. There is an intersecting curve on the upper left of the shell which is the foot opening. A small area of translucence just above centre gives the viewer just enough information to detect the distinguish the two curved shapes. If this light area is not present, the picture loses visual interest.

Sea horse silhouette

Nikon 18-200mm at 105 mm: Iso 200 f16 for 1/20th second

The set for this was similar to that for the seashell, except that the light screens and cover over the object were moved back as the object is twice the size.

The side view is the most interesting silhouette for this ornament, as shown above. The edges of the silhouette are almost in the same plane and hence an aperture of f16 was sufficient to ensure that these edges were all reasonably sharp.

This is a subject with a designed shape and the action of photography is more to record and present this shape. This is a contrast to the shell, a relatively familiar object, where the photographer can make several pictures using different positions and viewpoints.

The Wayward Line - Exhibition of photography by Edgar Martins

The third photography exhibition that I saw in Paris was at the Centre Culturel Calouste Gulbenkian. Many of the exhibitions are only open in the afternoons, and this was one of the few open all day.

Edgar Martins is a young photographer who was born in Portugal, but has been based for many years in UK. The images in the exhibition were recent, selected from seven series including "A Metaphysical Survey of British Dwellings", "Reluctant Monoliths", "This is not a house", "Dwarf exoplanets and other sophisms". The notes to the exhibition state that "Martin uses photography to develop a philosophical, quasi-scientific investigation, examining various minimalist concepts of the contemporary urban landscape".

I came to these pictures from the standpoint of photography, rather than contemporary art or philosophy.

"When the light catches the shadow" series

My initial impression of the first group of pictures of the apron of an airport was that they were not photographs. The pictures were printed on large aluminium sheets with one side at least 1 metre or more. The surface of the pictures was totally matte with dense colours as if painted smoothly in acrylic paint.

These pictures were at nightime. However, there was not the slightest glimmer of light in the sky and virtually no horizon. This would be difficult to achieve by photography as there is usually some glimmer of light in the sky and total blackness would only exist in most unusual circumstances.

The main visual element in the photographs were the markings on the runways and parking areas. However, in order to achieve high saturation colours of the runway markings, I would expect that the tarmac surface would also have been illuminated to some extent. However, in the pictures, these surfaces were very dark with just the slightest hint of texture and form.

In some of the photographs, a single "spotlit" vehicle, plane or building was included in the frame, but no people or sign of human occupation.

The pictures were visually interesting because of their size and intensity of colours. Also, however, the world presented in the pictures was a "superworld". It appears to be a manipulated version of the world that we inhabit. I assume that the photographer must have used floodlighting and extensive manipulation to isolate the graphical elements that he wished to include in the final image.

"A metaphysical survey of British dwellings" series

The second series of images in the gallery were similarly unreal:-

These were again night time photographs in which a single isolated building surrounded by a pavement was floodlit as if the photographer was using studio lighting techniques. The skies were totally black.

There were traffic lights, and pedestrian crossings and street lights but not signs of human occupation. Again the road markings were brilliantly illuminated by the tarmac surfaces were unnaturally dark.

I was puzzled by the fact that the walls of the buildings were constructed of grey breezeblocks, rather than brick or stone. Reading the exhibition notes, I found out that for this series, Martins had photographed a special site used by the emergency services to train for fires and other emergencies. The world portrayed was in fact not the real world in this sequence.

"Reluctant monoliths" series

This was another series of night-time pictures with highly saturated colours. One of the most visually attractive pictures was a brightly coloured warehouse. The building was long and low and the photograph was taken square on, so that only the front elevation was visible. The visual impression was reminiscent of an "architects drawing" for a client, with dramatic use of light and colour.

The roof and some walls of the building were totally black, but the doors and surrounding panels were a variety of saturated primary colours: red, yellow and blue.

The sky and ground were totally flat black with the exception of a little texture in the foreground.

I also enjoyed a photograph of a smooth ovoid structure (which I assume was a building) in a totally dark scene. In this case the structure was a neutral off-white colour rather than brightly coloured which was softly lit from above to emphasize the rounded shape of the structure.

Conclusions

In total contrast to Bressons photographs, Edgar Martins would appear to be an artist who is using photography for his work, rather than a photographer who aims to produce artistic photographs.

I enjoyed the unreality of the world presented in these series of photographs. There were also series of pictures of planet-like spheres which I did not find as interesting. Another series was closer to photo-reportage. He had photographed houses and land in USA that had been abandoned as a result of the credit crisis. These were daylight photographs which were visually less unique than the night-time pictures noted above.

I was interested to note that Martins work was featured in a cover article in British Journal of Photography in 2008.

Henri Cartier-Bresson at Fondation Henri Cartier Bresson, Paris

Whilst at the Harry Callahan exhibition, I also took the opportunity to look at some of the photographs by Henri Cartier-Bresson. There were handful displayed on the top floor of the FHCB building and I also watched a 45 minute video of Henri Cartier-Bresson talking about his photography and his photographs. I also noted a number of his observations on photography from one of his books on display. Interestingly, he seemed to approach photography in a totally different way to Harry Callahan.

• Rather than concentrate on a few types of photograph, Bresson seemed to have produced photos of so many different subjects and types:-

- Portraits of famous people
- Candid street photography
- War and press photography

- Fine art photography and photography books

• People are frequently the visual point of interest in his photographs. He finds human interest in ways that intrigue the viewer - a fat man in a bowler hat walking through a playground of children - a puddle of perfectly still water about to be disturbed by the foot of a pedestrian - a group of children playing in what appears to be a damaged building, one of whom is on crutches implying some awful previous event. His photographs of street scenes convey the scene in terms of the buildings and passageways in between, but typically this is enlivened by a running child or figure in a patch of sunlight.
• In the film, a woman whose portrait he had taken described how he held her in conversation. He waited until she was making a point when he suddenly took the photo which became the portrait. It was noticeable in the film that the portraits were taken when the subject was actively talking or gesticulating. Also the individuals were in their normal surroundings, not in a studio or set. This is totally unlike the Irving Penn portraits where most were in studio surroundings. For Bresson it seemed that the photographers purpose was to catch the subject's vitality and manner. For Penn it seemed that the photographer wanted to emphasize the persons physical peculiarities in a more static pose.

He is portrayed in the Thames and Hudson book "Henri Cartier - Bresson" as being a man of few words, but I found his comments in the film on the "decisive moment" and other matters as memorable. He seems to be the ultimate "practitioner" of photography, whereas Harry Callahan was both practitioner and theoretician.

I noted a few of Bresson's views paraphrased from the introduction to his book "The choice of Henri Cartier-Bresson":-

• Taking a photo - all the faculties converge in the face of fleeting reality.
• The place and rank of photography as an art form is of no concern. This is purely academic.
• He is amused by the insatiable craving for sharpness of images.

Harry Callahan, Variations Exhibition at Fondation Henri Cartier Bresson, Paris

I took the opportunity of a couple of days in Paris to visit some of the exhibitions of photography taking place there. The first was this exhibition of Harry Callahan's photography called Variations. Harry Callahan (1912 to 1999) was a self taught photographer who before taking up photography in 1938 was an accountant in the motor industry in Chicago. He viewed his photographs as an art form influenced by personal friendships with Ansel Adams, Edward Steichen and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy. He became Professor at the Chicago Institute of Design. Harry specialized in black and white cityscapes, nature, and photographs of his wife Eleanor. The exhibition was a retrospective of his photographs in all categories. His work does not appear to be as well known than these american contemporaries despite recognition from John Szarkowski and Henri Cartier-Breson but I found the photographs interesting as he was succesful despite being a rather quiet and self-effacing character. The prints were quite small most of them being 10 to 20 cms along the longer side.

My observations were as follows.

• The photographs appeared to use natural light, and there was no indication of studio lit subjects (unlike for example the still life photos by Edward Weston).
• Many of the photographs used high contrast to create visual impact. For example, there were a number of abstracts with a few dark parallel lines on a white background, where I believe overhead wires were the subject. I also liked a study of a plant and a photograph of bare trees dark against a white and pale grey background.
• He used black and white to emphasise the visual shapes of nature. For example, there were a couple of photographs of grasses where the shapes of the grass leaves were just visible against a very dark background.
• My first impression of the series of nude photographs of his wife was somewhat disappointed as the high contrast and flat lighting emphasised the outlines rather than the contours of the human form. However, a review of two of these photographs by Martine Ravache, a Parisian photo critic and historian, in "Connaissance Des Arts - Photo 25" took the position that these were landmark photographs. Martine argues that the the photographs should not be viewed simply as a portrait, but as an allegory of a real women, neither beautiful nor ugly, but idealized by the high key treatment.
• Apart from the posed photographs of his wife and daughter, he took few portraits. He took quite a variety of candid street photographs of passers by but he was not comfortable taking interacting directly with people to take their portrait.

His character and photography contrasted significantly with that of Henri Cartier-Bresson (see next blog).

Photographic lighting - shiny surfaces

One of the workshop exercises that we did in April was to photograph a shiny subject, and we experimented with a variety of items, apart from the takeaway container lid described above. However, none of the other objects, some soft drinks cans and some keys, had a flat shiny surface in which one could see a reflection. I therefore have tried this exercise at home using a "home-made" lighting arrangement.

The subject I chose was one of my wife's necklaces which has a circular pendant with a silver mirror like surface.

Silver pendant

Nikon 18-200mm lens at 112mm: Iso 200 f32 for 1/6th second

I took the photograph on a table top rather than the floor as follows:-

• I placed the subject on a small block on the level surface covered with black velvet.
• The camera was positioned facing down at about 45% to the subject on a low tripod.
• The desk lamp was placed on the opposite side of the subject with the light facing at about 45% towards the subject.

I needed to spread the velvet and position the lamp so that other parts of the room were in darkness. Otherwise, a light reflection appeared in the surface of the pendant. I set the white balance to tungsten and focus control to manual.

In the first photographs I took, I did not use any diffusion. By moving around the subject and the lamp, I could minimize any direct reflection of the light bulb or the camera in the shiny surface. However, the surface of the pendant was dark as the reflected surroundings were not lit.

I used a roll of grease proof paper as a diffuser. I stretched the diffuser out above the subject from behind the lamp across to the camera lens. The surface of the pendant was now white as it was reflecting the brightly lit paper. It was necessary to hold the diffuser in exactly the right position to ensure even lighting over the face of the pendant.

Conclusions

It was not too difficult to position the pendant so that the reflection of the camera was minimal as the reflective surface was quite flat. This would not have worked if the object was more spherical.

The flat diffuser gave an acceptable result in this set up. It is useful to know that for studio lighting, a cone shaped diffuser around the lamp should be used.

Photographic lighting - concentrating light

We did not have a specific session in the workshop where concentration of light was needed. We did however use flat screens with black surfaces and black velvet to prevent stray light falling on the subjects that we were photographing, as well as screening the area around the camera to reduce flare. The effect of stray light was particularly important in the photograph of the polystyrene wig holder. Light from the bright background was visible on the side edges of the head which reduced the definition of the head against the background.

Without the equipment for studio photography at home, I have not taken this any further.

Photographic lighting - contrast and shadow fill

We used both reflectors and additional lamps to control contrast in the workshop. Photographing the take-away container lid is a good example. In this case the lid was placed on a small block on a table covered with black velvet. The camera and main light were on opposite sides of the table, looking down at about 45 degrees on the subject.

Before bringing in any shadow fill, some parts of the edge of the lid were dark and virtually invisible. Similarly, some of the wrinkles in the crushed metal foil were very dark.

1 Before fill lighting

Nikon D300 18-70mm lens at 56mm: Iso 250 f29 at 1/50th

We had the choice of shiny silver, matte silver and white reflectors. We used a matte silver card, and placed this to the right hand side of the subject on a stand to throw light onto the edge and dark shadow areas nearest to the camera. We took photographs with the reflector at various distances and angles. This method was succesful at lighting the bottom edge of the lid, but it's effect on the shadows in the folds of the lid was only partially succesful. The best version after use of the reflector was as follows.

2. Lid after use of reflector to fill in shadow areas

We also tried using a second lamp to fill in the shadows. Following the steps Richard used in the group session, we switched off the main illumination, and placed the secondary lamp at the side of the camera and directed it to lighten the shadow areas. We took a sequence of photographs adjusting the power and position of the secondary lamp until the fill lighting was about right. We then switched on the main lamp, and took another sequence of photos fine tuning the strength of the two lights together. The end result was as follows:-

3. Lid after use of second lamp to fill in the shadows

The second lamp produces a higher key photograph. The contrast is reduced as many of the shadow areas become mid-tone rather than dark in tone. On balance I prefer the more nuanced photograph produced using the lamp to fill the shadows.

Conclusions

We used in-fill lighting in all of the exercises on the course, sometimes using a reflector and sometimes using a second lamp. Richard also demonstrated the use of a third light from above to create highlights in the hair for a photograph of a live model.

I appreciated from the workshop that the use of fill lighting is equal in importance to setting the main light appropriately.

I also noted how subtle lighting adjustments, in particular in photographing a wig stand, enhanced the visual impression of the smooth forms of the head and shoulders.

Photographic lighting - lighting angle

Setting the lighting angle was a key element in the workshop session four on lighting of form and the subsequent exercise where we used the technique to photograph a single rose.

Prior to this step, we had set up the lighting of the backdrop, and set up the camera, subject and side screens. When we were ready for the main lighting, we set up a lamp with a soft box on a stand a few feet higher than the subject. We took photographs in different positions, side right, back right, behind the camera, back left, side left etc. We then reviewed the results to select the optimum light.

1 Main light from side right

2 Main light from back right

3 Main light from behind camera

4 Main light from back left

Main light from side left

Settings for these photos - Nikon D300 18-70mm lens at 65mm: Iso 250 f29 for 1/160th second

For this subject and its bright white background, photos 2 or 4 seemed to give a reasonable balance between light and shadow. The flower bud seems rather flat in photo 3, whereas in photos 1 and 5, the area of the flower that is most brightly lit is quite a narrow strip close to the side edge of the flower.

We selected photo 3 and returned the lamp to this position before setting up some shadow fill using a separate lamp (next exercise).

Photographic lighting - softening the light

We used various techniques to soften the mains flash lighting during the workshop.

• In the first session, Richard showed how the hard shadows on the subject (a shiny take-away container lid) could be softened by placing a honeycomb on the lamp itself and a large tracing paper screen in front of the lamp.
• In the contre-jour lighting set up, the main light source was inherently diffuse, as the lamps were used to illuminate a huge white screen placed behind the subject.
• We used a soft box on the lamps providing the main light source for the exercise on lighting of form.

In taking the photographs of a take-away container lid ourselves, we used a tracing paper screen as well as a neutral density filter cloth (a scrim) to both reduce the light intensity and further soften the shadow edges.

Enlargement of part of take-away container lid before using scrim

Nikon D300 with 18-70mm lens: Iso 250 f29 for 1/80th second

After using scrim

Nikon D300 with 18-70mm lens: Iso 250 f29 for 1/80th second

Photographic lighting - introduction

In April 2010, I attended a two day studio photography workshop for OCA students at City and Islington College. Richard Maxted, a professional photographer led the course. His web gallery includes stunning images of everyday objects as well as a range of commercial advertising images.

The workshop program was as follows:-

Session 1: Group session - a shiny object

Session 2: Team session - shiny objects

Session 3: Group session - contrejour lighting

Session 4: Team session - lighting of form

In the group sessions, Richard used a large format Linhof tilt and shift camera with a leaf digital back, tethered to a laptop. The college studio was equipped with professional studio equipment in particular mains flash, screens, diffusors, reflectors. In the team sessions, three students worked together using Nikon D300 SLR cameras to photograph similar subjects using this equipment.

In the workshop, I took photographs using the techniques covered in the TAOP exercises "Softening the light", "The lighting angle", "Contrast and shadow fill" and "Shiny surfaces". I have written up these exercises using the photographs and experience from the workshop.