My first HDR,,watcha think?

Capt Rick Hiott

Here is my first HDR using PhotoShop CS3.

Travis

The image doesn't have that overprocessed HDR effect which is nice. I'm kind of wondering why it needed HDR in the 1st place. You can control the lighting on still life images so there shouldn't be a huge stretch in dynamic range.

I like the composition itself, almost like an image you would see in Finest Kind. A couple of small nits... the diagonal of the white is distracting. I think it would benefit from the entire background/surface being black. The black background is too gray. This may be a result of the HDR or too much light spillling onto the background. Since there is really no detail of relevance in the background, I suggest pushing the background to pure black using a curves or levels adjustment layer. Lastly I would burn in the edges a little to draw focus to the shiny reels.

I think this is a good start with plenty of room to experiment. There is however one very glaring error in the image - those should be Shimanos.

Capt Rick Hiott

Thanks Travis! Im limited on my P/S editing skills.

"Shimanos",,,is that a Indian tribe in China? Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha.

Penn is one of my sponsors.

jstpeter

Capt Rick, When are we going fishing??? For off shroe you can't beat Penn! Are you a tournament fisherman or do you just guide?

I think this shot would benefit more from some directional studio lighting and less HDR. For a product shot you want some shadows to create seperation from the product and the back drop. I would look at using some spots and highlighting the gold on the reels. Then as Travis suggested us black for both the foreground and blackground and use your levels to take this to solid black.

Travis

Capt Rick Hiott wrote:

Thanks Travis! Im limited on my P/S editing skills.

"Shimanos",,,is that a Indian tribe in China? Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha.

Penn is one of my sponsors.

I know it is off-topic, but what series do you fish?

Capt Rick Hiott

Are you talking about using soft boxes or umbrellas,,,or something else?

I used to fish tournaments and guide,,but now I just guide here in Charleston,SC. I do fill in on other boats when they fish tournaments need an extra man.

The fishing supports the photography..............

Travis

Capt Rick Hiott wrote:

Are you talking about using soft boxes or umbrellas,,,or something else?

I used to fish tournaments and guide,,but now I just guide here in Charleston,SC. I do fill in on other boats when they fish tournaments need an extra man.

The fishing supports the photography..............

Just curious because your name sounded familiar. I fished the SKA circuit from 1998 - '01.

Product lighting really depends on the size of the objects being photographed. A light tent is really good for soft, even lighting. The smaller kits (24"x24") are relatively inexpensive and would be good for reels, lures, etc. Of course you can go much larger for several more dollars. The link above will take you to B&H Photo's light tent selection for comparison.

Adjusting the blacks in PS is fairly easy. On your layers palette, select the adjustment layer icon and select "levels". When the levels dialogue opens, drag the left slider to the right and you will see the blacks darken. Click ok to save. If other blacks that you did not want darkened were darkened, grab a black paint brush, select the layer mask icon (it will be a white rectangle right next to the Levels icon in the layer's palette) and begin painting black over those items that you want to reveal. Think of it as punching a hole in the adjustment that you just made. Good luck!

rwells

Capt Rick Hiott wrote:

Here is my first HDR using PhotoShop CS3.

Hey Capt Rick,

Welcome aboard the good ship dgrin!

I'm partial to fishin' stuff. I owned a fishing tackle store for 11 years.

To show what the fellas are saying, I made some changes to curves & levels, plus a crop to get rid of the distracting white table edge & to get the reels more into the "rule of thirds" so that the eye is drawn where you want it to be.

I disagree about having the table black. You would loose the rods to this.

Not trying to step on toes here with your pic, just showing what they mean. I'll immediately take the modified pic down if you wish.

IMHO, you now have a very nice product shot of the reels, the rods should be of little importance in this shot, other than for context.



Looking forward to more of your work

Capt Rick Hiott

Thanks for the help Randy and Travis. I don't mind at all if you edit my pic's.

So what you are saying is that I should use a tent instead of a soft box or umbrella for this kind of work?


I fished a lot of SKA events here in Charleston and a finial in Savannah.
I only have one first place King tournament that was here in Charleston back in 2005 at the James Island tournament. The boat was the "Trophy Hunter"

rwells

Capt Rick Hiott wrote:

So what you are saying is that I should use a tent instead of a soft box or umbrella for this kind of work?

I'm not saying that. To me, the way most use a light tent (ie: light evenly all around) does not give the items a good "modeling" effect. Your lighting, with attention paid to post work, almost has a 3D dimension to it. Looks like you could reach in and pick them up. Besides, that would be one heck of a large light tent to fit the rods in


The lighting you have is great, just needed a little more post work, IMHO

Travis

I was saying that a light tent is used by most for product shots. It is especially good for those that do high volume and aren't as concerned with taking time to work with balancing the lighting for specific effects. Truth is that you can get away with any form of lighting if you are creative.

Randy, great job on the edits - made those reels shine! I hear what you are saying about the white also. I wasn't thinking about the rods.

Oddly enough I never fished the Savannah tournament. I qualified my team (Team BadFish) out of Morehead City for the Nationals in Biloxi, Ft. Pierce, and Morehead. I did fish several tournaments in SC crewing for Winslow on the Hooligan. Fun times but had to drop it in the economic downturn in 2001. The boat has been on the trailer for several years now waiting for restoration. Hoping to get it back on the water this summer for cobia and drum season.

Capt Rick Hiott

I gotcha,,,This is the way I have been doing most of it.
With the new floroesent lights in the little clip on fixtures.




I can make a light tent with PVC and some white cloth or thin white paper to cover just the reels when I shoot this again