cute knife - photography help needed

G

godogs57

Joined
Apr 16, 2004
Messages
795
The attached pic shows one of my knives I finished this past week. Since it has pretty stabilized maple handles I wanted to snap a pic before sending it on to the buyer. I have a 10 mp Nikon that is topnotch but I took 40-something pics before I got one that was just "OK". My problem initially was this: I placed the knife on a 12" square bathroom tile that was mottled beige in color...you know what I am talking about. Anyway, the camera's exposure meter registered on the light tile and the blue handle material went dark on me...couldn't pick up the color. If I tried to compensate for the dark blue handle, the light tile would end up crapped up (exposure wise). I then went to a large chunk of South African multi-colored tile to see if that would help..it did to an extent, but the handle was still so so. I utilized the el chepo light box that has been on this forum before...works good. I also use two lights with the "daylight" bulbs in them.

I am afraid that the glare brought on by the mirror polish is hell to photograph right too....lots of time you can see reflections of your camera, the lights, etc if you are not careful.

Any suggestions would be appreciated by the camera experts!

Hank Hammond
littledroppointhunter3.jpg
 
In the "for the newbie....." sticky above are tips on photography and plans on how to build a light box. Follow the advice there and your photos will improve dramatically.
 
godogs, i am interested in how you are putting your logo on the blade... my logo has thin lines similar to yours and i haven't found a stencil supplier that can cut vinyl that thin. is yours a vinyl stencil or a photoetched stencil?
heath
 
Cool looking knife! Cant you control the lighting pretty well on manual settings, regardless of the surrounds? You from SA? Im note sure what a south african tile is?:confused:
 
It is from CPM154CM and I am from South Georgia, not South Africa. We had one of our plantations floor one of their lodges in this stuff and I got me a piece of it after the laying of the floor was completed....pretty stuff. Thanks for the comments!

724WD: I got my stencil from Patricia Bruno....she and her firm are mentioned in here pretty regularly...Electroetch I believe the firm is called? I will research and get you a phone #, etc...she is a great lady to work with.

Yall have a great day.

Hank
 
Entire books have been written on how to reconcile what the human eye and mind sees with how that image is interpreted by the camera's lens and meter.

The simple solution is to play around with the settings and shoot and shoot until you get it. Or just use the setting gotten off the subject/ blade. After all, you're not selling tiles :o

The not so simple solution is to take at least two photos, one with the right exposure of the background, another with the right exposure of the subject, then combine the two photos with software. This is kind of tricky because the resulting image somehow looks "unnatural."

The Old School solution would be to use an incident light meter (Sekonic, Gossen, etc.) to measure the light falling on the set-up, not the light that the set up reflects into your camera's meter. You might still have to play around with the exposure settings but an incident light reading gives you a good place to start.

Hope that helps in some way

Peace
C.....
 
I think you're pretty close right now.

1) The key, for what you're doing, is for everything in the pictire to be the same lightness/darkness. Then the actual exposure doesn't matter that much - you can clean it up in editing without blowing out one part of the photo to see another. You pretty much have that now - the blue and the red are about the same "luminosity".

2) Just point the mirror surface away from the lens - don't reflect the lights into the lens. Set the blade so that it's reflecting something that's about the same luminosity as the handle and tile. Something that looks interseting - some foliage, maybe.
 
Try setting the camera to manual. Switch to the spot meter or center weighted setting. Place your hand palm up in the place and lighting the knife will be photographed. Place the metering spot on the palm of your hand and adjust the aperture and shutter speed until the meter is at zero. Then open the aperture or decrease the shutter speed one stop. This should give you an exposure similar that of an 18% gray card. Take the picture of the knife using these settings. From there you can tweak the exposure using the exposure compensation settings, or adjust the shutter speed up or down.
Ideally you should be using a tripod and have an 18% gray card (keeps you hands free).

Hope this helps.
 
Many thanks folks....will do some more experimentation and let you know what happens.

Hank
 
godogs57 said:
724WD: I got my stencil from Patricia Bruno....she and her firm are mentioned in here pretty regularly...Electroetch I believe the firm is called? I will research and get you a phone #, etc...she is a great lady to work with.

Yall have a great day.

Hank
Click to expand...

http://www.img-electromark.com/
I just ordered mine from them, Patricia made the process pretty painless and quick ;)

That is a great looking knife Hank,I like the logo too:thumbup:
as for photography...I am having my sister shoot my knives from now on she can do waaaay more with her digital SLR than I could with my lil' point and shoot nikon.I couldnt even get the cable pattern to show up in my pics:o wait for a nice day and use outdoor lighting too.
 
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