How to annoy GAD

GAD

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Send him a cool new white background, then send him an almost white guitar to photograph on it. Oy...

I don't have the right equipment (always need more) for this kind of job so all of the pics look like amateur crap to me. I could bore you with a dissertation of what "white" means to a digital camera along with some long boring talks about light temperatures, but just understand that I spent my money on guitars instead of the new monolights I've been eying.

At least the white on white hides the fingerprints.

The worst part for me is that I know how to fix this. I just need more equipment. Always more...

Guild-S280-Flyer-TopFulAngled2.jpg
 

walrus

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My bar may be lower than yours, but that photo looks good to me!

walrus
 

rampside

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I don't know if you have made mention of this before, but just out of curiosity, GAD, do you use photo editing software, such as Lightroom?
 

GAD

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Wow, that's the crappiest photo of a guitar I've ever seen. What'd you take it with a "Brownie"?

I whipped out my first camera for the job:

vintage-kodak-instamatic-104-viewfinder-126-film-camera_10039120.jpeg



Then I nabbed my first Digital:

PRODPIC-218.jpg



BTW those were literally my first film and digital cameras. I still have the Kodak DC120 and it still works! I do not still have the 110 Instamatic, though I do have my dad's Minolta SRT-102. Never had a Brownie.

SRT102-Shadow.png
 
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The Guilds of Grot

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This was my first digital camera:

kodakdx4530_front.jpeg



I took these with it:

MKS-10CE.jpg


100_6787.jpg


100_6407.jpg



While certainly not GAD level, they're not the worst, for an amateur.

I'd love to shoot them all again with the digital SLR but what a daunting task that would be at this time!
 
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Quantum Strummer

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Photography is my other thing besides music, but it's the observational type. Setting up even a makeshift studio with lights & such strikes me as too much like work, so I tend to take guitar pics with my smartgizmo. :) But I have an acquaintance with a proper studio…I should get her to do some guitars.

I had a Brownie when I was around five. It took 127 film and had already belonged to my mom for awhile before she gave it to me. Don't know what happened to it, but I moved on to an Instamatic (not instant film but 126 cartridges) and used that for years. When I headed off to the Middle East after college I bought a Canon AE-1 with 50mm lens and snapped away like crazy while I was there. Digital-wise my first was one of the early Nikon compacts, less than 2mp I think.

Here's my dad's (now my) Kodak Retina IIc, his favorite camera. He used it to take, among many others, the pic I use as my avatar here.

1A4CB67E-9451-4354-A5F5-B5798BD97710_zpsqkw6f4mq.jpg


FWIW here's the whole avatar pic. The two young ladies flanking little ol' me are now ~70 years old.

D1179F70-7071-4D79-A038-8217035F8547_zps66uvawhp.jpg


-Dave-
 
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GAD

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Take a great puc Ba people ask, "What kind of canera did you yse?"

Take a crappy pic and people ask, "Who took that photo?"

Grot's pics prove that it's the photographer who knows how to use angles and light that make a photo great.
 

JohnW63

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People who don't know always assume the equipment makes the picture and the person using it just points it.

I've gotten that. A number of years ago, I handed my Nikon F4S ( 2.5lbs ) to my brother-in-laws wife to take our picture. The first thing she did was look for the screen on the back. I told her is was a film camera and you had to look through the little window, like was all used to do. After feeling how heavy it was, she remarked, " Wow. I bet it takes nice pictures ! " . I think I said, " Only if I make it take them nice. "
 

rampside

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Making a good photo, takes a good eye.

Making good music, takes a good ear.

....and that's just for starters. It gets a whole lot more complicated after that!

The equipment certainly helps, but either you got it or you don't.

Making a really good photo of a white guitar against a white background with limited equipment and limited space, is a daunting task for sure.

I been thinking about that ever since I first looked at this thread. If only I had a white guitar and a white background, it could be a good learning experience. I'd have to find the ambition first, though.
 

D30Man

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My two cents is that your initial photo is excellent. I like that the contrast shows the characteristics of the guitar and the shade of white that it really is. Some of this for me comes from a general preference for off white / cream colored guitars as opposed to stark white. The crisp white background highlights this IMHO.
 

GAD

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My two cents is that your initial photo is excellent. I like that the contrast shows the characteristics of the guitar and the shade of white that it really is. Some of this for me comes from a general preference for off white / cream colored guitars as opposed to stark white. The crisp white background highlights this IMHO.


Thanks. It's actually not the photo that bugs me so much as the fact that it looks like a bad photoshop to me.

This one came out much better.

Guild-S280-Flyer-NeckJoint2.jpg



The other problem is that doing white on white properly involves proper white balance which I usually do in post and I've misplaced my grey card because I used it so rarely. Thus, some of the pics look like this (same guitar). Note the very sexy roll of blue tape holding the guitar off the background in order to force a shadow and possibly contrast.

Guild-S280-Flyer-NeckJoint.jpg


The right way to do this is to further remove the guitar from the background and have a separate light blow out the paper while one or more (preferably softboxeed) lights exposes the guitar. Grot gets this effect by completely removing the guitar from the background by shooting them vertically in a stand and having a textured background. I like the blown out white background for my blog which is usually pretty easy with a guitar that's got color and texture.

Anyway, our brains interpret what white is and make amazing perception changes when we know something is white while a digital camera perceives different kinds of grey (for exposure purposes) and uses something called white balance to decide what is "white". If you look at both of the above pictures independently, you'll fully accept that the guitar is "white". One of them looks more ivory, though. Which one is correct? That depends on what the type of light in which you see the guitar. It also depends on what other white is in the room for you to compare it with.

White is complicated. I need more lights but I don't have room for them because I'm hip-deep in guitars. It's a clash of hobbies. :livid:
 

rampside

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GAD, I like how you achieved the separation of the whites, that I believe you were looking for, with use of the shadows. The photos have depth and the guitar jumps out at you. Very nice!

As you pointed out, getting that separation with a full shot of the guitar against that white backdrop would take a little different approach and of course, more LIGHTS/EQUIP, lol!

I haven't done much photography for illustrative purposes, so you've given some great insight and information here, Thank you.

With the white on white thing, I wondered if it would be possible to achieve a pleasing separation by creating edge highlights using strong side lighting from both sides and the guitar just slightly off the white backdrop? Easier said than done, right?
 
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