I rock my 200mm to compensate for the [PHOTO]

bombardier

Jake: the centered horizon is cool, but I can tell it's slightly crooked. Sweet picture otherwise and you probably couldn't get that composition if you corrected the tilt.

Cycophant

nO: Loving the grass triptych. I like the combination of hard edges and angles with the smooooothness of it all

CommunistCow

So I decided to take another stab at some product type photography with stuff that was laying around and I'm not very happy with the results. So any suggestions guys? I don't have any interesting backgrounds so I just had to use a black sheet on a table as my background.

Lucid

I think the lace on the right shoe in the first picture could be placed in some way where it doesn't look as if it's just hanging off into space. The other laces are kind of wrapped with/into the shoes, that other lace just seems not to flow well with the rest.

Other than that the black background just kind of envelopes the shoes and the grey, like they're being absorbed. Unless that's what you were going for?

I like the positioning of the shoes though. It looks very natural as if you've just kicked them off and put them at the side of the door to rest.

CommunistCow

After browsing the first 2 or 3 pages of flickr's "explore by day", I feel like I have no creativity and I should just punch myself in the nuts for even trying. Then I have to remember I'm looking at the best photos submitted from around the world.

I am in a photo slump. :\

saltiness

Cow, I think you're treating your product shots too much like you treat your people photos. You need to step back and think about the material you're shooting and how best to light and compose it based on its form, function, texture and color. Try to think about ways to present the object that are incongruous or unexpected.

EggyToast

CommunistCow wrote: »

After browsing the first 2 or 3 pages of flickr's "explore by day", I feel like I have no creativity and I should just punch myself in the nuts for even trying. Then I have to remember I'm looking at the best photos submitted from around the world.

I am in a photo slump. :\

If it gets you down, spend some time in the "uploads" section where it's just people uploading random junk. It'll perk you up

muninn

nO: Dig those grass shots, but the last two photos in the triptych seem a bit too similar, as the color temp is the only thing of difference between them. It might have flowed better if the first photo wasnt as dramatic, or if one of the other two shots had a bit more variety to them.

And here is a cellphone shot from a moving car processed by a polaroid app. Low fidelity of the image, combined with the retro-chic of the processing method and haphazard method of composing the shot make it ART.

CommunistCow

saltiness wrote: »

Cow, I think you're treating your product shots too much like you treat your people photos. You need to step back and think about the material you're shooting and how best to light and compose it based on its form, function, texture and color. Try to think about ways to present the object that are incongruous or unexpected.

Could you give me an example using the shoes?

Lucid

CommunistCow wrote: »

After browsing the first 2 or 3 pages of flickr's "explore by day", I feel like I have no creativity and I should just punch myself in the nuts for even trying. Then I have to remember I'm looking at the best photos submitted from around the world.

I am in a photo slump. :\

Hey, I totally know how you feel. Though, I think it's important to realize that sometimes it's just chance with people viewing your stuff online, being 'discovered' so to speak and elevated to a certain place amongst others.

I've found there's a lot of good stuff in exploring on flickr, but a lot of not so great stuff as well.

Linksville

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkWsk9rXpcU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7T7BDeMU_Ks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpkAWZTwqI4

Jake!

Cheers Cow. As usual I agree completely with your objective analysis, and disagree with much of your subjective analysis

With your product shots, they could both really do with a rim to separate the background. The shoes could do with more of a diffuse light to soften the shadows, or possibly some fill.

Aneurhythmia

Dang, Linksville, that's a pretty interesting look into the manufacturing of inferior lenses.

needOptic

Not for critique or anything, but thought it would be cool if we posted our work desks...



Running a DELL Precision laptop, DELL 24" U2410 monitor, ms wireless kb, Wacom Intous 4 (eh, large, I guess?), and a secondary 21" DELL monitor in portrait mode.

KAJed

The picture of your boring desk is more interesting than a lot of the normal stuff I shoot... I hate you...

Also you're strange for using a widescreen vertically!

Of course I'm a programmer so I generally need more text width wise than height wise at work. Also, I would post my work desk but I wonder what sort of NDA's I would be breaking with Nintendo for posting pictures of the dev kits.

erisian pope

I took this to show a friend that I do, in fact, sit on a yoga-ball (aka swedish exercise ball) at work:


I took this a while back - not a perfect pan-stitch but it gets the point across:

CommunistCow

My desk in my old office spoilered for hscroll breakage:

Spoiler:

Gogo gadget cheap DA prints for cube art.

Cutethulu the cocktopus made by Passerby in D&D in my new office:


I'll have to take a picture of my desk at home where I do all my photo editing.

needOptic

KAJed wrote: »

The picture of your boring desk is more interesting than a lot of the normal stuff I shoot... I hate you...

Also you're strange for using a widescreen vertically!

Of course I'm a programmer so I generally need more text width wise than height wise at work. Also, I would post my work desk but I wonder what sort of NDA's I would be breaking with Nintendo for posting pictures of the dev kits.

lolzies.

I'm a dev, too, so I understand the initial reaction. However I noticed that I never used the right monitor to its fullest (the rightmost area of the monitor is uncomfortably close to the limit of peripheral vision.

In it's current state it's great for websites as it perfectly fits a 1024px wide site. I use it mostly for reference material, my SQL Management studio, etc.

The main monitor is the one that always has the source code open and 24" is plenty of horizontal space for even the longest lines. And if you have longer lines than that - you're probably not writing friendly code! :winky::mrgreen:


EDIT: so what do you fuckers do? I am a creative lead at http://www.devbridge.com, which includes a bit of everything... Web development, design, project management.

KAJed

.... You'd be surprised how bad some of the code I go through is ... not mine though!

I have Visual Studio open 99% of the time so my right hand monitor has all my functions lists/files/search results etc on it. As well my MSN window (well Pidgin actually) is there too.

erisian pope

I do internal support for enterprise servers running non-microsoft OSes (i.e. redhat, vmware, etc)

KAJed

Isn't anyone here NOT a complete nerd? =)

erisian pope

There's this one guy in my tabletop D&D group who's not a com....nevermind.


Oh, and photos!


I was really into the leaf on the left (the out of focus one) and I think my composition is possibly less than ideal. I am thinking maybe 10% off the top? Thoughts?


On this one I thought the square crop matched the rigid lines defined by the stems. What do you think?

for a larger copy, click image to go to its flickr page then click "all sizes"

KAJed

That second could almost be mirrored. Fantastic.

JLM-AWP

Yay for workstations!

CommunistCow

I'm a software engineer for Time Warner Cable. I worked for the past 4 years doing embedded Java development on the next generation of cable boxes, but I moved to the server team about 2 months ago. Thats why I have tv and a shit ton of cable boxes in my cube. I usually have one TV tuned to CNN and another tuned to MSNBC all day long.

KAJed remember we are on a internet forum based off a gaming web comic. I would venture to guess PA has exponentially more nerds than the average population.

KAJed

LoL CC I'm well aware. I will try to be less sarcastic in the future

I love the number of nerds around here I fit right in. Heck wednesday is usually our dnd night.

I work as a game developer in SW Ontario. We started with cell phone games but now I mostly do wii ds and pc dev.

Uncle Long

I'm a staff writer and photographer for the Homer News (and then the Wrangell Sentinel a week from Wednesday). But I'm also doing some side work for Frommers and trying to pump up my own business.

needOptic

From Sunday:

CommunistCow

All I'm going to say is....your wife owns leather pants? o_O I didn't think that anyone had those except people in movies.

Also its tilty and thats really bothering me.

saltiness

CommunistCow wrote: »

saltiness wrote: »

Cow, I think you're treating your product shots too much like you treat your people photos. You need to step back and think about the material you're shooting and how best to light and compose it based on its form, function, texture and color. Try to think about ways to present the object that are incongruous or unexpected.

Could you give me an example using the shoes?

They aren't new shoes and they aren't particularly interesting texture-wise so your hard lighting isn't doing much for them. Soft light would bring out the colors more, especially the dirt and junk on the rubber. I would treat it more like a study of someone's worn shoes than a chic new product because well, they just aren't chic or new. Also, the wishy-washy depth of field needs to be addressed. It's half way between deep and shallow DoF which never really works for still-life/product. As far as composition, that's where I would go more incongruous and shoot them in a very rigid and graphic composition to juxtapose the soft and curvy forms of the shoes.

needOptic

It's not leather - it's black leggings, but they do have shinyness. And (not that I know this stuff), but leggings are a hot thing these days.

I had it tilted even more in a different shot but fucking lost focus with the lens. Actually liked it better.

Muncie

I'm a freelance web developer/designer primarily, but over the past year most of my income has come from copy writing and maintenance HTML wrangling. I've been able to earn enough through photography to make my (limited) camera, lighting, and lens expenses to almost even out, though, which has been nice.

I got a Nikon 50mm 1.4 AF-S this weekend but haven't gotten much time to play with it. I have discovered, however, how easy it is to bork a shot I thought was correctly focused when shooting wide open.

needOptic

saltiness wrote: »

CommunistCow wrote: »

saltiness wrote: »

Cow, I think you're treating your product shots too much like you treat your people photos. You need to step back and think about the material you're shooting and how best to light and compose it based on its form, function, texture and color. Try to think about ways to present the object that are incongruous or unexpected.

Could you give me an example using the shoes?

They aren't new shoes and they aren't particularly interesting texture-wise so your hard lighting isn't doing much for them. Soft light would bring out the colors more, especially the dirt and junk on the rubber. I would treat it more like a study of someone's worn shoes than a chic new product because well, they just aren't chic or new. Also, the wishy-washy depth of field needs to be addressed. It's half way between deep and shallow DoF which never really works for still-life/product. As far as composition, that's where I would go more incongruous and shoot them in a very rigid and graphic composition to juxtapose the soft and curvy forms of the shoes.

what salti said. Perhaps from a bit up top, both facing the "bottom" of the frame, parallel to each other. Or perhaps one just a Leeeetle bit off center.

Cow - I think your problem is that you decided to do a product shoot but didn't think of what you're trying to communicate.

CommunistCow

Come on I was trying to communicate "shoes on black stuff".
>_>
<_<

I suck at product shots. I will try and think through it some more the next time I do something like that.

Thanks salti and n0.

rat

my work desk is a little different, I work as a molecular geneticist, i do have a shitty comp to do analysis and surf PA on but that is where i spend most of the day.

JLM-AWP

rat wrote: »

my work desk is a little different, I work as a molecular geneticist, i do have a shitty comp to do analysis and surf PA on but that is where i spend most of the day.

In a lot of ways, I envy you. I was an evolutionary/ecology major, but never really had the knack for lab processes. It drove me crazy. Much respect!

Now I fix computers and manage servers all day long. I belong in the field, dammit!

erisian pope

please don't kill us all with a supervirus or gigantic mutant frogs

Paradise

Do you like your job, Rat? I'm thinking about going into your field. What do you do exactly? If you don't mind sharing, I'd love to hear anything you have to say.

bombardier

This isn't really a photo related discussion. If you want to discuss your workspace and how it relates to photography, then keep it here. If you want to discuss your snapshots, there is a snapshot thread: http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?p=11920417

If you want to discuss anything else, chat thread, PMs, or IM.

Paradise

Rat, if you want, just send me a PM (top right corner of the webpage).