# Looking for Feedback on some product style shots...



## sbatson (May 27, 2007)

Hi All,

I'm new to this forum, in fact this is my first post here. So Hi! I'm not a newbie photographer, I graduated from the New York Institute of Photography Home Study course a few years ago. I've been focusing on portraiture and weddings as a part-time business for the past few years, but I'm thinking I want to move more to commercial / product photography. I've thought about Stock as well, but it seems like a pretty diluted market from what I've seen. I don't have a lot of experience in the still life area since it hasn't been my focus.

In any case, here's a couple of images from my experimenting. Any helpful feedback is more than welcome. I just want to improve myself as much as I can in this area.

Thanks in advance. Here's the images:


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## tempra (May 27, 2007)

Welcome to the forum.

The images look a bit soft, might be because of the relatively long exposure of 1/4 of a sec. Might be worth opening up the aperture to f8 - 11 and getting the faster shutter speed rather than f32, you'll still get full focus at those apertures and many lenses are sharper at around that setting.

Are you using flash or continuous light?


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## sbatson (May 27, 2007)

tempra said:


> Welcome to the forum.
> 
> The images look a bit soft, might be because of the relatively long exposure of 1/4 of a sec. Might be worth opening up the aperture to f8 - 11 and getting the faster shutter speed rather than f32, you'll still get full focus at those apertures and many lenses are sharper at around that setting.
> 
> Are you using flash or continuous light?



Thanks...I'll check my focus...I was shooting at f14 and getting get one of the arms a bit soft with the rest being sharp. If you are thinking camera shake, I am shooting using mirror lockup, camera is on a tripod and I'm using a remote shutter release cable.


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## sbatson (May 27, 2007)

I tried with a Black background to eliminate the high contrast issues, how's this look?


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## Captain Ahab (May 27, 2007)

Hey, I like the black background better-more definition to the "head".  Also the red and yellow pop a little more with the black.
I am thinking of the New York Institute of Photography Home Study course. Would you gimme your take on it when you have time? I know this is your thread for your pic, so just msg me however and whenever. Thanks


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## sbatson (May 27, 2007)

Captain Ahab said:


> Hey, I like the black background better-more definition to the "head".  Also the red and yellow pop a little more with the black.
> I am thinking of the New York Institute of Photography Home Study course. Would you gimme your take on it when you have time? I know this is your thread for your pic, so just msg me however and whenever. Thanks



I'll post my response here since that's where it was asked and easier for people to find. I'll keep it short.  

For one that works full time and didn't have time to go to a bunch of classes, I really enjoyed it! I took the course in Professional Photography. While it covers a decent amount of information on the technical aspects, it doesn't get overwhelming. They focus on making you a better photographer, and in every case I've seen, they do that extremely well!

It's worth every penny in my opinion. You or anyone is free to PM me for more details or start a thread if interested.


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## Alpha (May 27, 2007)

Pretty nice work. For some reason, I think slightly warmer light might actually improve the shot.


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## sbatson (May 27, 2007)

MaxBloom said:


> Pretty nice work. For some reason, I think slightly warmer light might actually improve the shot.



Can you enlighten me on why you think that? I know that warmer light temps are often appealing for people shots and other types of shots. For a product shot, I'd think you'd want accurate colors which is why I custom white balanced this one.

I'm not really experienced at this type of photography, so I'm really interested in what any one suggests and why. 

Thanks.


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