Model Photography

wotan

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There has been lots of how to threads posted on photography for models. I have always tried to present decent photos however I have recently been digging a little further into the craft, and I have to say spending some time on preparing a photograph makes a huge difference, to me at least. Some folks may consider this cheating, for me. since we share our models mostly by photos, I think it makes sense to attempt to give our hours of building and painting work the show case it deserves.

These examples are older models that I have taken some time to light creatively and to photoshop in order to bring out their best, at least as far as I am concerned. Lighting can make a huge difference on its own and need not be very expensive if you use cheap dollar store LED flash lights with maybe the odd piece of colored gel on them.

Anyway judge for yourselves.

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Just another technique to play around with.

John
 

spanner570

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John, apart from the different photographic techniques, time should also be spent on the presentation, especially the background content.

So often I see photos of excellent models ruined by the background. Many hours are spent making kits yet sometimes no thought is given as to how present them.

It doesn't have to be anything special. Just a big piece of card would suffice. Anything to hide some washing, cornflake packets etc.

Just a few minutes that's all it takes - But what a difference it makes to the final picture.

Ron
 

Tim Marlow

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Hi John
Settings info such as lens focal distance, F number, time value, iso value etc would be useful to help the uninitiated. I see you have used a shallow depth of field on the bridge, but a deeper setting for the figures, for example....
 

wotan

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It doesn't take much to get good photos. As far as the technical stuff is concerned you don't really need to over sweat it. My camera allows me to use a fairly automatic shooting style but then to stop down, or lessen the exposure, in order to get darker or more dramatic images. When you use lighting on small models it is easy to over expose so I deliberately speed up the shutter speed to compensate. The size of the model will also make a difference to the depth of field setting. A big model requiring more depth than a small model such as a figure. Most of the time I add backgrounds after shooting. So I will shoot the model against plain black or white backgrounds and then change them inside photoshop. I do try to get the lighting right before I shoot. The Joan of Arc photo for instance used 4 lights and some deliberately created shadows with what real photographers call a gobo. In simple terms this is just something put in front of the light to cast a shadow in the right place. In the case of this photo I tried to cast shadow lines on the face to give the impression of light coming through prison bars.

Sometimes I will use a macro lens but most often I simply use my Nikkor 18-70mm zoom lens, typically I shoot at about 50mm although often it is just a matter of how close I can get to the model with all the lights and stuff in the way.

You really don't need to worry too much about all the technical details, start shooting on an automatic setting and only change something if you are not happy with the results. Just remember faster shutter speeds,higher fstops (aperture) and lower ISO will produce darker pictures while slow shutter speeds, low fstops and higher ISO will make lighter more exposed pictures.

Finally take the time to learn some very basic photo manipulation techniques in your computer. Photoshop is the grand daddy of programs but many simpler, cheaper and some free programs will let you do a lot. This inludes the most important thing CROPPING so that you can cut the photo down to only show what you want to show.

By the way Tim I actually used quite a small aperture (high fstop) on the bridge photo but I added a vignette mask over the photo. This means I added a layer of very pale blue over the whole photo but cut away a sort of oval shape in the middle of the picture. This tended to blur some of the edges but more importantly it helped me to get the model to fit in better with the background.

John
 
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