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I decided to make a light box tonight. Here is my first try at it with my XDs and a snap cap loaded so I could get the chambered indicator.

Details:
ISO 400
f 5.6
45mm

With this picture, the on board flash was on as I just couldn't get enough detail. I am using 75w CFL 6500K daylight bulbs and two sheets of tissue paper to diffuse. I didn't have my tripod out for these test. In the morning, I will play with increasing the exposure time and I think that will lighten it up a little without resorting to the flash.

Any thoughts or feedback from the group would be great.

RX8er wrote:Any thoughts or feedback from the group would be great.

Sure..... Give me the gun.

XDs are icky, get a Glock....










but the photo looks otherwise good to my untrained eye.

The Annoyed Man wrote:

RX8er wrote:Any thoughts or feedback from the group would be great.

Sure..... Give me the gun.

I'm surprised I could get it out of my holster and play in the spotlight. Generally, it likes to stay concealed.

Do you have a flash you can get off camera? If so, just use that instead of the CFL. If not, you ought to get one for this and so many other things. I have a cheap Yongnuo Y560-II flash and a couple of their radio triggers and I am learning how to use it. You could also use that 5900 K solar power light source to power your light box.

It's funny, I grabbed a cardboard box from work Friday and was going to do the exact same thing this weekend but my better half decided last minute to go to her brother's house in Stockdale. Home now, so maybe this evening I will have some shots to show off. In the meantime...

I took this quick and dirty "product photo" last week. Only post was tilt, crop, and convert to jpg.


This is the "Studio" I used.

gigag04 wrote:XDs are icky, get a Glock....










but the photo looks otherwise good to my untrained eye.

I would agree except the side of rear sight looks a little smudged.

gigag04 wrote:XDs are icky, get a Glock

I have both. I call the XDs my skinny Glock.

Get some frosted glass/plastic and a slave flash for backlighting behind the glass. You should be able to find a smaller piece of plastic at Home Depot or Lowe's.

http://www.homedepot.com/p/t/202038061? ... aPJqUAo6Uk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/control ... &A=details" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

once you get the light right you will need to work on focus, sharpness and DOF

92f-fan wrote:once you get the light right you will need to work on focus, sharpness and DOF

Concentrate the exposure and focus without the backlighting. The brightness of the slave flash will be enough to overexpose rest of the image so that the subject of the photo will appear to be "floating" in space.

There is so much you can do with just a flash. I would suggest you go to David Hobby's blog, http://strobist.blogspot.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; and just read for a while. I am just getting into photography as more than just "snapshots" and Mr. Hobby's blog has moved me along very quickly, I am taking photos now that I did not believe I would ever be able to take.

For me it is fun learning and experimenting and learning some more, so if you have an interest I would suggest you peruse it.

I did this one today trying out my light box, not really happy with the final product. My "infinity background" isn't right and I should have had a way to get the pistol away from the background.

But done with just a flash and a Maglite on the muzzle end to add some orange glow. I had to really crank down the shutter speed to get the glow to even show up - probably need new batteries in the Maglite.

Unless you're determined to make your own, B&H has got a nice little set up for about $50. Two light, studio box*, four back drops.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/8 ... t_and.html

*Being an old film photographer I think of something else when you say light box.

I'll offer this from the perspective of a retired professional photographer. One thing to avoid in photography (in most cases) is direct frontal lighting. Lighting should be angled to allow for both highlight and shadow, for without highlight and shadow there is no "dimenison." Keep in mind that you are photographing a 3 dimensional object that will be viewed on paper or screen in 2 dimensions. Therefore, having both highlight and shadow creates the "appearance" of depth and 3rd dimension. If the angled lighting is natural light, great, but in the studio that dimension must be created with a main light and a fill light (or main light and relector), and perhaps a background or "separation" light. The angled main light creates the highlights and the fill light is the overall illumination that also creates detail in the shadow area. The image below, just googled for illustration, shows how highlight and shadow create a 3d appearance, where direct frontal lighting would be 2d and extremely boring and without impact. However, if you are just trying to say in your photograph, "this is my XDs" any lighting will do. When metering main and fill light, a good rule of thumb is 1 1/2stops difference between the main and fill, but experimentation is always fun. Hey, the pixels are free, so have fun and experiment

Looks like a lot of photographers in the group.
How many in the Boerne/San Antonio area?