Finally, as promised some finish pics for Wheelie

[Mike Jory]

You may have seen these items before in a group photo, but that was when I was first trying to upload. I've gotten my camera together and figured it out. Plus, I had made a reply to a posted question about finishing with sanding sealer and lacquer. I promised then that I would return with these as finishing examples/trials.
I went outside to try to use the sun for intensity and reflection, and a natural out of focus background. Some shots sort of ok, some not so much. Please feel free to critique or comment.

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This 8" x 1.24" Canary Wood Platter is finished with Sanding Sealer then EEE, then Friction Polish. It's a little more of a Satin look than gloss.
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This 8" x 2" Black Cherry Platter has the same treatment.
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The 6" x 2" Padauk bowl was sanded to 400, then several coats of Wipe On Polyurithane. Wet sanding w/600 between coats. The last coat not sanded hardly at all.
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This 6" x 3" unknown wood was also finished with wipe on Polyurithane. Again not sanded much at all. I wish I know what this was so I could get more of it!
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I had trouble with this exposure to get to bright enough in the sun. This 6" x 1.75" Yellowhart bowl was sanded to about 400, then I went right to spray lacqer. I've heard that it's not the way to do it. But it was kind of a trial to see if it would work.
The thing that didn't work was lacquer over sanding sealer, or friction polish. Bad Idea!

Thanks,
Mike

[Henry C. Gernhardt, III]

Mike, the work is absolutely beautiful. I will, however, give you a little critique on using natural light.

Did you know that white foamboard makes an excellent diffuse reflector? You could rig up a tripod or three to hold the cards, and then direct the lighting to help remove shadows and fill in the blank spots. This would be especially useful during f16 days (cloudless, bright, harsh sunlight).

How familiar are you with the more technical aspects of photography (exposure, focus, and the sort)? I'd be happy to trade PMs with you if I can be of any assistance.

[Lloyd Frisbee]

They look good but I am not too keen on the terracotta foot you put on each of them. :D

[John Kain]

They all look great, but the black cherry is stunning!

Great work!

[Corey Hallagan]

Nice work Mike! Some great looking stuff!

Corey

[Bernie Weishapl]

Beautiful work Mike. I like the black cherry but all are awesome. Nice work.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

They are all beautiful! If you find out what kind of wood that one is let us know! I like it too!

[Brad Kimbrell]

That wood looks like some of the Camphor Burl that Gilmer shows on their web site.

Just a guess...they get quite a bit of $$$$ for theirs....but they're pretty high on everything they have. Of course it's all beautiful high quality stuff.

They list it as:
Camphor Burl
(Cinnamomum sp.)

[Mike Jory]

Thank you all for the kind replies. I do enjoy the feedback I get.

Henry, Thanks for your reply. I was being lazy, it was super hot 100+, here yesterday. You are absoutly correct. In fact, as you may know, another even better way to do this would be to use a silk, (as we call it, large soft white thin silk sheet) over the piece to diffuse the light. Your suggestion of a white reflector board to fill in is a good one, I could have easily brought home some white board from my work. The Yellow Heart shot was the wost, yet shot the same.

Yes, I know exactly what your talking about. To help set this up. I've been a television broadcast engineer / senior post production editor for 35 years. I specialized in large sale sound stage & remote productions. (including Major League Baseball & the NFL)

What I would like to figure out is why, I when I make the photo the proper resolution, my photo are small thimbnail boxes as I expected. But some photos in posts are rather large images that show great detail :confused:

Lloyd, That made me laugh out loud :D :D I shot those on top of my recycling bin:eek: I was looking for some sort of pedistal, to elevate the piece to get some background included. I was going to set the work on white cloth, but then I though that would close down my old automatic camera.
I'm going tp have to put a bit more effort into this.

[Andy Hoyt]

Mike - You're turning some nice stuff, but you owe it yourself (and us) to post a bigger pic.

Set your camera to shoot a pic of 1600 pixels wide by whatever tall. Move the camera away from the piece - about two feet or so. Take pic. Use software to edit photo size and resolution.

Try to eliminate as much background stuff as possible as it distracts from the piece.

This link will help - http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?t=31106