Today I’ve been very busy taking pictures like the ones above – my dear mother paints for a living and sells reproductions in a huge amount of different frames, and sizes. She has an online store today but the images there is un-buyable and I decided to help her out and make it a little bit more welcoming. The empty frames could be filled with whatever selected art in the online store (at least that’s my thinking – that’s my next headache)..

Sigma SD14 – Sigma 70mm and Sigma 530 strobe.

Here’s a short wrap up on how far I’ve come to date. I now actively use my home built opal plastic tube thingi that some of you have seen and I want to thank Ted who gave me the idea (the round shape that was). Also a big thanks’ to all of you that gave suggestions and comments in my “HELP ME” post – for you that missed it, please visit and read. Great comments!

On the right is my original sketch of how I thought the opal stuff could be used and my setup right now more or less looks the same, although I only use three light sources – One from beneath as the picture show and one from the left and the big soft box from right, tilted 45 degrees. So it’s not exactly as the sketch but very close.

Here is the video I made that shows how I built the box.

And yes, it’s very irritating that the video size came up wrong – Mom looks fat! :D I tried to use the built in uploader within ScreenFlow – but as you see it doesn’t cope well with my wide screen iMac. I better export using x264 in the future as well.

I also try to eliminate the need to paint those rings – and by painting I mean using the curve tool and then paint in Photoshop using the brush – which you need to do if you have bad reflections – and with this setup I more or less eliminated any unwanted, unfriendly reflection. The thing that looks like a light source is actually a white paper thing that I put inside to give a shape. (Clive). I’m still experimenting.

In order to make it look as goldish as possible I needed to see gold because these rings are all made out of different materials – and has slightly different tones of metal color – kind of goldish but often not so I have to work on each to make them look kind of the same. Although I do feel that I over did it some on these below. I used this shot / illustration as gold model.

All images developed and edited using Photoshop Lightroom 3 and Photoshop. No painting this time – I might do that with the final thing but I’ll try to avoid it as much as possible. ISO100 used. Might change back to ISO50 as it’s MUCH denser to work with.

I have some left to do, but something tells me that the hardest part is behind me now.

Here’s a second movie about the set in action. :)

I now tried so many different setups – and I’m still not satisfied with how my ring shots come out. I do make one or two images here and there that looks perfectly ok but as soon as I change ring with a different shape everything has to be changed / or lots of work in post (PS) has to be done. See video for more info on what I want from you, you could help me more than you think. :)

The opal plastic sheet that I have is 1.5 x 2.5m (about). I have four flashes that I can use, although I think two or three around and one below shining through somehow could be the best solution. (I need it to be a really white background).

Watch it in HD please. :) Also, for my Chinese audience. I have 500MB per week to upload in VIMEO and my limit for this week is up, I will try to post stuff there as well so that you can see videos. If you want any video (like the videos from last post and post it on some chinese version of youtube, then please mail me and I’ll send those to you!.

Now I moved so much away from my initial setup that I feel that I will show you a picture or two of what my current setup actually looks like. Woohoo! I will post some in the comments section.  The above shot is slightly cleaned up – the gold surface was slightly scratched and some dents so I repainted the middle reflection and the bottom left - but other than that it’s the original photo – I’m now very satisfied with how reflections works – and if I change ring reflections still look beautiful. I must say that the pure IQ that the Sigma SD15 gives is extremely high. I’ve been looking at other photographers works with jewelry and once you go closer it just doesn’t look good. This shot is available in full size as well. A bit too full really. :)

This time I didn’t use anything else than LR3 and PS5. The only thing left now is to continue with OOF – and see where I should stop before text is readable. This shot is ISO50, 105mm, f11, 1/160s.

I noticed that it’s more or less impossible to get correct focus at more then one ring at a time (at f7.1) – so I took three shots and combined them in PS.. :)  It’s really late too, I should go to bed. hmm.. This is a Lightroom 3 conversion of SD15 file, not bad – but not as good as from SPP.

I’m pretty much set now with my setup – this last shot had no changes, no painting except taking away a little dust – although getting the background WHITE is time consuming when there is so much blur to deal with. The foremost black corners will also be a little bit less black – one white foam infront of camera is missing.

Final capture for day four: We had a long talk today, me and the jewelry guy. He wanted the text within each ring to be unreadable so we decided that taking each text away using PS would take way to long, but using a wider aperture could work instead. I had to move the light quite a bit (I used lowest power at f20 on those last shots) and now I had to use  a semitransparent white circular reflector in-between the softbox and the “set” . I finally got a working F8. I could go all the way down to f5.6 but then it was hard to see anything exept one or two diamonds in focus.

I also wrapped the whole sets bottom in golden reflective material – and it seams to work pretty nicely. There is a 3000px version of the below image.

Slightly older part, posted this morning: Today I wanted to try something real and off went Linns ring. I told her to clean it carefully because of all the dirt seen by the mighty 105mm Sigma lens. But wow, we didn’t expect this much scratches to be there – and thanks to photoshop and my great painting skills I was able to partly save her ring. :)

This time I added the Sigma 530 DG, snooted from the right – and the big softbox as always from the top, slightly tilted so that I can reach with the Sigma SD15. Developed using Sigma Photo Pro 4.1 using vivid color mode.

After:

Before:

Also, here’s another shot, another ring, this time a fake one – just trying different ways to reflect. This time I’m holding a long hard, white paper above the ring, infront of the flash. Creates a light, pretty OK looking thingi. And don’t look too close on this one, at 100% size it looks horrible!! Sooo much dirt. (although I didn’t upload the full size of this one).

EDIT. Late Evening, day three. Last edit for tonight.
This last one has very strong colors because I selected “vivid” color mode in SPP. No added saturation - actually I pulled it back a bit in PS. The full size shot, with all it’s flaws.

Morning part: The basic setup is taken from www.ImagingPrep.com so I don’t feel right about showing you too much, but you will be able to follow my progress thru the reflections and before after shots. Anyone know where to get transparent white wax that I can use as glue? Now I’m using the yellow bee thingi..

In day two I really felt I didn’t get the shape right, and so I put small pieces of black foam board around until I got the shape that I wanted. Now I did a very quick PS5 fix and no dirt removal (just a tiny bit) and I now understand the importans of gloves! :D

Before

How do you feel? Better than day 2?

Alright, it’s not really day two, but at least it’s first shot! I dealed a little with it in Photoshop and will play more with reflections to get the right feel (but not in Photoshop, but on the set). What do you think? It’s ISO50. I think I will get more black in the corners of the ring, like a black frame somehow. Also it’s a little too tilted. :) But that’s not the important part right now.

Right now, I only play with fake rings – will get the real stuff when it’s time for the real deal. About 200 of them.

Light from above, two paper reflectors on the side. Elinchrom Quadra. Sigma SD15, Sigma 70mm.

The knife maker. Shot on Marstrand using SD14 + Sigma 50mm 1.4 and using sun as main light and Sigma 530 DG and back shape light.  ISO50. Now, ISO50 is such a compressed format that you really need to expose with great care. His shoulder is totally white and if it was shot at ISo100 it would still be information there. There is, if I convert to Monochrome but because it’s only info from one or two channels (Showing strange colors if still shown) Sigma has decided to erase everything in those areas.. I had lots of overexposed ISO50 shots yesterday and I regret shooting at ISO50. Stupid me.

If you look closer you’ll see a light shadow in his glasses, that’s where the round shape of a tiny beauty dish were before I erased it using LR3. Strong sun from the back and the Sigma 530 DG from slight above using a beauty dish making the sharp light disappear. SD14 + 50mm 1.4 + ISO50 (or more ISO25). Too much light entered the 50mm so I had to emphasizes those shadows and the hat quite a lot.

The oldish couple. Shot using 10-20 with sun as main and 530 DG as side light. Slight green color on the left shows where 530 is placed. SD14 and ISO50.  This came out slightly dark, best viewed at full size.

The above shot was slightly overexposed ISO50 shot, skin was overexposed in the color version – this version is equal to ISO25.  These two guys are well known over at www.99.se Goflorp (handle) and Rei Trulsson.. Nice to talk a bit with to of my readers in real life. :)

Childhood friends passing by, had to take their picture. The 530 from the far right. I should have used one more flash on their legs, that would probably make this shot a lot better. And yes, the 530 was a little too powerful this time. SD14 10-20mm ISO50

And finally, three shots of Linn. I’m so happy to have her around so I can play!! :D

These last two could have been more worked on in SPP or LR but.. I didn’t. In the last shot the flash was slightly to close to her and skin is a little overexposed. Could work better as monochrome. All three  shot using SD14 and 10-20mm. ISO50 on all.

All above images available as full size on flickr. Handle with care.

Just had to put up something developed using SPP4. Very smooth tones. ISO100. NO PS except text and cropping. AML-1 used. (close up lens from Sigma)
Full size (slightly cropped)

A shot from Wednesday evening.  DP2. Quadra.
Check out: Full size

A basic tour in how to produce nice black and white images with the help of Sigma Photo Pro. And in case I didn’t make myself clear in the video, no flash or strobes has been used in any of these images. Only halogen “flood” light, a 1000w of it - pretty bad really and therefor black and white is a really good solution. Also, camera used? Dp2. Surprise! :D

www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBUOC2ioow0

You made some successful attempts? Please add images to your comments. :)

Raw Developer is my preferred tool when dealing with images that I think of in terms of black and white and the SD14 is my preferred camera. Last week I had one of my studio classes (that’s when we did the milk thingi) I took some shots when preparing the light – also because I wanted to test a lens that I’ll come back to later.  Raw Developer has lots of interesting settings to play with – today I played with the curve tool and “lightness” channel. Recommended!

This whole post is Bob’s fault and can be viewed as full size (some saved at 200%)

And some in color: (Photo of Dad is ISo200 with noise reduction turned off)

Last shot has been saved at 200% size – Have a look!
OBS! Noise reduction is turned off.. (on all above images)

Wondering where I’ve been hiding? Well, truth is that I’m planning my wedding. Plus lots of things to do. :) So if anyone wanna come to my wedding the 26/6 2010, please send me an email so I know.. Make sure to bring your camera! :D

Oh, and above shot(s) is taken a few hours ago with my young photo students. I promised them to have fun with milk one day, and today was that day. This is a series of shots put together to one. I’m not sure what we wanted, but milky was maybe the word. The guy on the pictures is Danny, he’s a musicians and was on his way to play with his band but we asked him very kindly (and I gave him cash for coffee) and he did smell a little sweet after. :D

EDIT: You saw it? Please check it out again as it’s now much nicer looking, especially full screen” Make sure you have HD selected.

This video is made for Linn to show on her last day at work for colleges. But I think it might be fun for you to see it as it shows how I work a bit. :)

And here’s a picture of Linn, in case you don’t know what she looks like. She’s the shorter of them two.