Recent piece-working on photo

[Steve Trauthwein]

Hello All,

Trying to get my photos better. I like this one for sharpness but it seems a little cool to me and it doesn't show the high gloss wet looking finish. Any suggestions? I am using daylight bulbs in a home made photo tent.

Regards, Steve

[Toney Robertson]

Steve,

First, nice looking piece. The grain and color are wonderful.

I am by any means an expert on photography but I will put in my .02. Everything looks pretty good to me but for this particular piece I think a darker background would highlight it better. It would pop the piece.

I believe there are lighting techniques that can achieve that goal but I don't know how to do it so for me it would be changing the background.

Maybe some of the resident photo experts will weigh in.

Toney

[Steve Schlumpf]

Steve - first thing is to watch the size of your photos. Max size of 800 x 600 pixels with a file size of no more than 107 KB. If you go over that size, then the vBulletin software kicks in and changes it for you - so you lose control over the end photo.

I agree - focus is nice. Color looks a little washed out - so, to me, that means that it is slightly over-exposed. You can adjust your camera settings or you can change your exposure levels using a graphics editing program. I use FastStone and Paint.net - both free programs.

To show how glossy the piece is can be tricky without having hot spots on your photo. Play around with where you have your lights placed and see if that doesn't change the way your finish shows up. Sometimes it helps to bounce the light off of something else to illuminate the subject without causing the hot spots - just play with it. I have one of my lights pointed to the ceiling - another towards the back of the photo tent.

Very nice vase! Really good color and I like the worm holes!

Have fun playing with your photo setup!

[John Keeton]

I think the darker background would help, as well. That may contribute to some of the washed out feeling about the pic.

Also, when I checked the size of your image, it says 113KB - and, I wonder how you got past the VBulletin software on that one!

Nice crispness to the focus, and a very nice turning!!

[charlie knighton]

very nice, i cannot help on photo

[Don Rogers]

I'm no expert on photography either but it appears that the focus is on the very front of the object and the sides are not in focus.

Try increasing the depth of field by increasing the f stop (toward larger numbers). This will require a slower shutter speed and/or more light.The use of a tripod will help steady the camera if slower shutter speed is necessary.

Hopefully this will get the entire object in focus.

Good luck

[Jeff Moffett]

Steve, I hope you don't mind that I downloaded your jpeg file, made some tweaks and re-uploaded. In my opinion, your focus and exposure are spot on. You are correct that the image was slightly cool, so I adjusted the white balance and added a bit of contrast and saturation. Beautiful piece!

[John Keeton]

Much better!!

[Roland Martin]

Very nice color & grain on this piece. Love the collar on the vase.