Am getting disillusioned with getting whites but using the tripod, the +/- button to overexposed and the newly discovered whitebalance button things have gone from grey to cream.
My best whitish photo was taken using this set up
@30pics4jackiesdiamond I loved that photo! And I've just been asked by a friend to photograph all their products - isolated on white - which kinda freaks me out. Especially as it's my first paid job...
@joansmor great tutorial. Still doesn't help much when the table top is only about two ft square. (Can't get far enough from the background) or your subject is only a couple of inches,( no way to hide the flash)
😜🤔🙃
I thought that I would do a little demo of how I do shots like this. Hopefully this will help some of you out.
First off, I am using a flash but that isn't really necessary, any light source will work. What I am doing is making my small light, flash in this case, bigger by shooting it through an umbrella. The umbrella is shooting light into my background and subject pretty equally because of its size and proximity to the subject and background. I like to do it this way because it gives very soft shadows, the larger and closer that light source is relative to the subject the softer that shadows will be. If you wanted to eliminate that shadows you could do that with another light source or a reflector.
finished shot with minimal adjustments in Lightroom
You could achieve a white background by moving a small light further away from your subject as well but if your light source is very small like a bare flash you will have very hard shadows. The reason this works is because of the inverse square law. I know that sounds scary but stay with me. Lets say you are using a flash to light your object and the flash is one foot away from the object and the background is one foot behind your object. Your set your exposure to expose your object properly and your background is going to be underexposed because the light is only half a bright by the time it hits your background because it is traveling twice as far to get to the background. Now if you move your flash 10 feet away from your setup and you set your exposure to properly expose your object your white background that is still 1 foot behind your object will not be nearly as under exposed because the the light doesn't have to travel twice as far relative to the light source, the object, and the background, it only has to travel a 10th of the total distance further to the background. This means that the exposure on the object and the background will be much similar.
Hope this helps
I could have just as easily bounced that flash into the ceiling and got a very similar result, just make sure the flash is flagged (for example use a black piece of paper in front between the flash that is pointed up and your subject) to make sure no direct flash is hitting your subject.
If anyone has any questions I will be happy to try to answer them.
@deadschool Thank you for your timely help.. one of the things i really like about this demo is that you show how little space is needed for this type of shot.. your narrative is extremely welcome too - very easily understood. i can imagine i will be re-visiting this article of yours for some time yet.
@pixiemac Thanks Sarah, I always shoot RAW to give me as much information as possible in post processing. If I had to shoot JPEG for this image I would have set it my white balance to daylight or flash as most flashes are color balanced at 5500k
I understood some of that. We have a brolly and a wireless flas, so will endeavour to experiment. Don't have lightroom, only what's on Ribbett and that seems to wash out colours when I brighten white. Thank you, @deadschool
@cottiac
I know that your familiar with Snapseed editing. Have you tried the selective edit under tools. You can use this to select your white background and just increase the brightness, anywhere up to 100%. This really helps to take the grey out of the white.
Umbrellas that are designed for photography are excellent light modifiers are are relatively inexpensive. Umbrellas that are not designed for photography would likely cause lots of challenges
@andrina it's okay to not know something, we all start off not knowing anything..
something new to us?? if we have any sense, we will question someone who knows.. Some, like you, will ask.. others are too embarrassed/scared of looking silly, so don't ask..
those who question, are the winners.. :-)
What a great thread - thank you so much. I always have to ask my husband where I should put a light because it just does not make sense to me. Good explanations.
@cottiac Sorry about that, for some reason i thought you used Snapseed to edit your phone shots. If you haven't tried it yet, it's a 'free' ap that is absolutely brilliant for basic editing. It doesn't have all the bells and whistles that Picsart does, but does a brilliant job with all of the basics + some other filters.
I occasionally 'wifi' my camera shots over to my phone so that I can edit with Snapseed when I don't have access to my laptop.
@deborah63 You've tempted me enough to get it. I thought maybe I had it before but didn't find it offered much more than those I already had but will give it another go.
Husband set up a little studio in the dining room with his white umbrella and wireless flash, ready for when I got home from work tonight. This is the best white I've achieved and I've put a link to how the studio was set up with a little critique!
On a separate note, I changed it to B&W using tools that came with my laptop and it went very grey! :(
@30pics4jackiesdiamond awesome Jackie that is looking much better. A few more pointers you could move the light closer and see how you like that, just remember your exposure is going to change everytime you move the light. I like to have it almost perpendicular the the angle that I am shooting at and almost over the top of the subject so it almost forms and L ( you are the top of the L the subject is where the two lines of the L come together and the Light is at the end of the short line of the L) hope that makes sense. Also I see you are shooting on a reflective white surface. For this type of photography I like a very matte white surface to shoot on so I don't get reflections, I also find a matte surface easier to make go white. I use poster board which usually has a glossy side and a more matte side. When I shoot more low key shots I like a reflective surface and use the refection to add to the image like this
great work, with a little more experimenting you will have this style nailed
as far as your back and white version going more gray it is because of the reflections on the reflective white surface I think.
@deadschool hello Jake and thank you! I am using poster boord and it has the sane surface both sides. Am I right in thinking that only really successful with editing for really white whites??
Will go on hunt for matt white and practice with His umbrella again. It's just such a faph setting up nd then dismantling ( because we need to eat a meal!!)
.
@30pics4jackiesdiamond I set it up to be hijacked this time, A-I want it to be a group effort and B-Moving into retirement I find myself playing with too many things. lol
@tigerdreamer I just left a note on your image but thought that I would add a little more here. The problem here is the angle the light is hitting the background. If you look at the base where your objects are sitting it looks pretty white and you can't make out any texture in the paper but on the background where it is more gray you can see a lot of texture. The reason for this is you are bouncing your flash strait up into the ceiling and the light is coming strait back down more or less. On the bottom where your objects are sitting the light is hitting it at a fairly perpendicular angle which fills in all of that texture with light. On the background which looks like it is sitting pretty much vertical the light is also hitting it pretty much parallel to the paper which will bring out all of the texture of the paper because it is basically causing billions of tiny little shadows. For shooting this style using bounce flash don't let you background go completely vertical have it do a very gradual sweep up and don't let it go completely vertical until it is out of the frame of the image.
I;m really appreciative of all this...haven't had time to really study or try yet, but this thread is now saved on my favorites page for future reference...thanks so much to all
This was my attempt with some "glow" added in Picassa, post processing. Still on the pinkish end of tones, tho.
And below is the sooc version I'll try to add more light in the next attempts. My equipment is limited so did this with an overhead light, a desk lamp, and white copier paper beneath and behind the bulb.
@tigerdreamer I love that we are showing that you don't need an elaborate set up. I have that same reflector haven't thought to hang on my tripod. All of you are encouraging me in my quest to learn, Thank you.
@joansmor I'm not sure if the reflector really made a difference or if it was just in my head. It seemed to bring a little more light in under his hat to his face, but as that would be a triple bounce, it was definitely subtle at best.
Much whiter @deadschool Jake, Do you have the normal lights on when you shoot. I have been working in the dark and I wonder if that makes part of the difference?
@tigerdreamer yeah I have the normal lights on as the flash is easily overpowering the house lights my camera setting are set so that the ambient light isn't being picked up by the sensor
@deadschool has kindly commented that 'the blue color cast is pretty strong, a quick edit to correct for that would make this image really pop.' If anyone can put in laymens terms how I can do that - please be free to let me know. Please also note I do not have PS or LR.
@cottiac In Lightroom you can you can push the temp slighter to the right. Pretty sure you can do something similar in Snapseed. You can do this in PicMonkey under colors. In PicMonkey under colors try the neutral picker and click on background.
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My best whitish photo was taken using this set up
😜🤔🙃
I thought that I would do a little demo of how I do shots like this. Hopefully this will help some of you out.
First off, I am using a flash but that isn't really necessary, any light source will work. What I am doing is making my small light, flash in this case, bigger by shooting it through an umbrella. The umbrella is shooting light into my background and subject pretty equally because of its size and proximity to the subject and background. I like to do it this way because it gives very soft shadows, the larger and closer that light source is relative to the subject the softer that shadows will be. If you wanted to eliminate that shadows you could do that with another light source or a reflector.
finished shot with minimal adjustments in Lightroom
You could achieve a white background by moving a small light further away from your subject as well but if your light source is very small like a bare flash you will have very hard shadows. The reason this works is because of the inverse square law. I know that sounds scary but stay with me. Lets say you are using a flash to light your object and the flash is one foot away from the object and the background is one foot behind your object. Your set your exposure to expose your object properly and your background is going to be underexposed because the light is only half a bright by the time it hits your background because it is traveling twice as far to get to the background. Now if you move your flash 10 feet away from your setup and you set your exposure to properly expose your object your white background that is still 1 foot behind your object will not be nearly as under exposed because the the light doesn't have to travel twice as far relative to the light source, the object, and the background, it only has to travel a 10th of the total distance further to the background. This means that the exposure on the object and the background will be much similar.
Hope this helps
I could have just as easily bounced that flash into the ceiling and got a very similar result, just make sure the flash is flagged (for example use a black piece of paper in front between the flash that is pointed up and your subject) to make sure no direct flash is hitting your subject.
If anyone has any questions I will be happy to try to answer them.
I know that your familiar with Snapseed editing. Have you tried the selective edit under tools. You can use this to select your white background and just increase the brightness, anywhere up to 100%. This really helps to take the grey out of the white.
I don't have a plain brolley so does it work with any brolley or is a plain one better?
Let the giggling commence :-D
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=1175569&gclid=CjwKEAiAq8bEBRDuuOuyspf5oyMSJAAcsEyWSpUSKnVEA_fFaM7MQTnybzsh68Ue5zXek8GsJUlPJRoChJrw_wcB&is=REG&ap=y&m=Y&c3api=1876%2C92051678402%2C&A=details&Q=
Umbrellas that are designed for photography are excellent light modifiers are are relatively inexpensive. Umbrellas that are not designed for photography would likely cause lots of challenges
something new to us?? if we have any sense, we will question someone who knows.. Some, like you, will ask.. others are too embarrassed/scared of looking silly, so don't ask..
those who question, are the winners.. :-)
I occasionally 'wifi' my camera shots over to my phone so that I can edit with Snapseed when I don't have access to my laptop.
On a separate note, I changed it to B&W using tools that came with my laptop and it went very grey! :(
Thank you Jake @deadschool
great work, with a little more experimenting you will have this style nailed
as far as your back and white version going more gray it is because of the reflections on the reflective white surface I think.
Will go on hunt for matt white and practice with His umbrella again. It's just such a faph setting up nd then dismantling ( because we need to eat a meal!!)
.
Hope that makes sense and helps.
And below is the sooc version I'll try to add more light in the next attempts. My equipment is limited so did this with an overhead light, a desk lamp, and white copier paper beneath and behind the bulb.
This is my first try. I get tired so easily at night. Will give a try with something else tomorrow.
@deadschool Jake, Do you have the normal lights on when you shoot. I have been working in the dark and I wonder if that makes part of the difference?
@deadschool has kindly commented that 'the blue color cast is pretty strong, a quick edit to correct for that would make this image really pop.' If anyone can put in laymens terms how I can do that - please be free to let me know. Please also note I do not have PS or LR.
@deborah63 Can I do this in Snapseed?