Problem with photographing bowls in photo tent

[Dave Kartzman]

Hi...

I am having a problem taking photos in a photo tent. I purchased one from amazon that had two lights, 4 colored backgrounds and a tent. The problem is that no matter what I do, the bowls I am trying to photograph appear bleached out. I have tried moving the lights far away from the tent, pointing the lights into the ceiling and even moving the lights inside the tent facing up, but in all cases, the color appears to be bleached out.

The holly bowl is not really true white; it is more yellowish, the cherry bowl is a deeper red, and the tambouti stoppers are much deeper brown (for example). If anyone has any suggestions as to what I need to do to get the coloring right using a point and shoot camera (SonyDSC-W80) other than to get an SLR and use HDR software... I would greatly appreciate it.

Thanks in advance.

Dave Kartzman

[David E Keller]

I'd invest in a photogradient background... It's made all the difference in my photographs using a little pink point and shoot camera(It belongs to my wife). I can't remember where I got mine, but Steve S. or John K will have the details.

[Ed Morgano]

Dave,
See if this is any closer. I used paint shop pro to adjust the brightness & contrast and changed the color a little.


196410196411196412
http://www.sawmillcreek.org/images/misc/pencil.png

[Kurt Barker]

What Dave said. Your camera is programmed to assume that the world is 17% gray. To get that, it needs to make your subjects light enough so that the average of the entire image is about 17% gray. If you were to use a bleached white background, your camera would try to make your subjects very dark - much darker than they probably are. To test my theory, shoot the center image again, but zoom in on the bowl and try to exclude as much of the black background as possible. I'm betting the image will be darker than the example above. With less black in the background it won't need to lighten your subject as much.

Very nice turnings!

ktb

[Dave Kartzman]

Hi Ed...

Thanks for your response... I have paint shop pro, and messed around with it, but the colors were not right.. For example.... the ikebana on the right was rainbow poplar and actually had a green tint... I couldn't get paint shop pro to mimic that without changing all of them more green. I have a great deal to learn about photographing my woodturnings, and I sincerely appreciate all responses.. One of these days I will get better.... I just don't have the money right now for a SLR so I could do the HDR processes...

Dave

[Dave Kartzman]

Thank you Dave and Kurt for responding....

I went out to B&H Photo and found both of the patterns... Thunder gray is more of a gradient and the studio gray is solid.... if I get the thunder gray gradient and angle it down, won't it show the difference in the colors? I am sorry for the question, but I don't really understand at this point how the gradients make the photo more accurate.

Thanks again....Dave

[David E Keller]

I just posted a thread called 'cherry burl', and the photos were taken using the gradient background in my photo cube(same one you've got I think). That should give you a pretty good idea of what the gradient looks like in a photo. Actually, nearly everything I've posted in the past year uses the gradient. I've noticed that I can get a lot more detail in the photos while still staying within the limits for kB when I use the gradient... I can't explain that. Jamie Donaldson has been showing up around here a bit lately, and he's forgotten more about photographing woodturnings than I'll ever know.

[Tim Thiebaut]

Background #39 is the one a lot of folks here use....

http://www.phototechinc.com/graduate.htm

[David E Keller]

Background #39 is the one a lot of folks here use....

http://www.phototechinc.com/graduate.htm

Yep, that's the one I got. Thanks, Tim.

[Dave Kartzman]

David,

Those are great photographs. I have read a number of Jamie Donaldson's posts and he seems to have it down pat as to how to photograph wood. I am going to be ordering one of the photogradient films and try that. Tim Thiebault suggested #39 Varitone.

I do have one more question if you don't mind... One of the things I have been playing around with is the positioning of the lights... do you find that aiming the lights behind the wood that you are photographing works better? It seems that when I have the lights positioned toward the front of the tent or the middle, it washes out the photo.

[Dave Kartzman]

Thank you Tim.... I went out to the phototecnic site and ordered the suggested photogradient. If I have any questions after receiving it, I hope you won't mind if I pose any additional questions.

Thanks again....

Dave

[David E Keller]

David,

Those are great photographs. I have read a number of Jamie Donaldson's posts and he seems to have it down pat as to how to photograph wood. I am going to be ordering one of the photogradient films and try that. Tim Thiebault suggested #39 Varitone.

I do have one more question if you don't mind... One of the things I have been playing around with is the positioning of the lights... do you find that aiming the lights behind the wood that you are photographing works better? It seems that when I have the lights positioned toward the front of the tent or the middle, it washes out the photo...

Honestly, I quit using the lights when I put the tent out in the shop. There are several windows in the shop, and I just use natural light. I'm not suggesting that's the best way, but that's the way I do it. I'm not terribly interested in photography, so 'easy' and 'good enough' are generally my mottos for photographing.

[Jamie Donaldson]

All camera meters are calibrated to produce an average 18% gray exposure, so a black or white background will give the meter a false reading for the subject when used on AUTO. A gradient or gray background is not the secret to top quality images so much as accurate exposure, and when making exposures on manual setting, shoot a bracket of exposures, adjusted by using the compensation settings of + (and seldom -) on most cameras. Digital imaging has less exposure latitude than the old films, so exposure for accurate rendering is critical. At least digital film is cheap, and the results immediate! Y'all are spending more on these fancy gradient backgrounds than the entire cost of my Phrugal Photo Studio set-up, and that includes the 500w Q/H worklight!

[Jamie Donaldson]

Dave- your problem with accurate reproduction is due to exposure latitude, in other words, metering errors caused by the different reflectance characteristics of the backgrounds. You are also too close to the turnings with a wide angle lens focal length, causing barrel distortion in these posts. Back the camera away, and zoom in to fill the frame with the longer focal lengths available with your camera. Also move your lights "out of balance" so that 1 light is more dominate than the other, eliminating the 2 "headlight" highlights on the front of your turnings. Painting with light is how we photo guys make a living!

[Dan Hintz]

To add to what everyone else is saying... make sure your light color adjustment on the camera is set to whatever bulb temp you're using. If all you have are fluorescents, make sure your camera is set to that temp range, and a lot of the color adjustment will be done for you.

[Dave Kartzman]

Many thanks to everyone who has responded. I have so much to learn about taking quality photographs of my turnings... I appreciate all of the recommendations and will be working on improving the quality of my photos...

Dave

[Whit AndersonIL]

Dave--

I've adjusted the colors as Ed did, only maybe a little more and in a slightly different color direction.

196495196494

I think there are several things going on here. A more expensive camera may not be the answer to any of them.

1) The color balance is off a little. Check the instruction book with your camera and see if it says anything about white balance. If so, put a white piece of paper in the scene and set the color balance.

2) I don't think the light tent is doing you any favors, especially with the holly bowl. Light tents provide a pretty even illuminated surface. When photographing shiny metal (jewelry, toasters, etc.) the light tent is a simple way to get a light surface reflected in that shiny metal (instead of the photographer and his equipment along with the rest of the room). If your holly bowl is highly polished, it does something similar to a toaster in the light tent. It reflects that flat white surface of the tent. That is sort of like having a little glare over the entire bowl. This washes out some of the grain detail in the bowl.

It would be interesting to see what results you got if you took the bowl and backdrop out of the light tent and photographed it. I think you might get a fairly bright hot spot in one area, and more detail in the rest of the picture.

3) The exposure is off a little. Not a lot, those little cameras are mighty clever. A lighter background (or manual control of your exposure) might help that.

--Whit

[Erik Johanson]

I want to second Whit on the White balancing. That is one of the first things I teach to my photo students. If you have ever taken a photo under florescent lights and had the pictures turn out yellowish that is why. the camera interprets white differently in different lighting situations, by telling the camera what pure white is in that lighting environment will dramatically increase the color.

I personally like the black background, I think it gives nice contrast to the lighter colored pieces. Just my two cents.

[Dan Forman]

Might try reflecting a little light coming in low as well, will give the lower part of the forms a little more definition without completely eliminating the shadow.

Dan

[robert raess]

I have a feature on my Digital Camera, where i can take a pic. of a diff. white and the camera will now use that as a baseline, affecting all the colors.Could i use this in place of a gradient card?... Thanks Rob

[Jamie Donaldson]

That function is called "custom white balance" and works well for color balance, but not exposure. If used with an 18% gray card then color balance and exposure would be correct.

[Karl Card]

I am going to lead towards lighting issues. The bulbs that come with these tents, yes I have one also, are not exactly the greatest. I personally would replace the bulbs and also add one more bulb to shine down from the top of the tent. Another creeker had to do this with his tent. I am also going to say that the black background maybe causing some of the issues. So many variables. I use a nikon d40x and it is a nice dslr but everything still has to be set just right as far as lighting etc... One thing for sure though is that when you get it perfect and locked down you will love it and it will have been worth the effort.

[Jamie Donaldson]

AAahhh Eric- photos captured under fluorescent lights will have a greenish/blue color cast, and tungsten illumination yields an orangish/yellow color cast?

[Dave Kartzman]

I apologize for the delay in responding. I want to thank everyone again for their recommendations. I ended up rereading the user manual for my camera (sony DSC-w80 and could not find anything about modifying the f-stop... I have played around with the white balance and that did have an effect. I am trying to get rid of the reflection of the lights within my photo tent, but I suspect I will have to figure out how to do that with Paint Shop Pro...

Note to Whit... you sure were right about the photo tent and my holly bowl. I took it outside (in a shaded area) and with the gradient background, the colors showed up properly.... I guess that is what I will need to consider when photographing light woods.

Dave