# C & C Please!



## joel28 (Aug 30, 2012)

Hi,

I would appreciate your C & C, Thanks!


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## Parker219 (Aug 30, 2012)

Is there a point to this picture? What I mean is, are you taking this for that company? Or asked to take a picture of a bottle of conditioner? Did you try and pick the most annoying color for the background?

Before I give c&c I would need these questions answered.


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## joel28 (Aug 30, 2012)

Parker219 said:


> Is there a point to this picture? What I mean is, are you taking this for that company? Or asked to take a picture of a bottle of conditioner? Did you try and pick the most annoying color for the background?
> 
> Before I give c&c I would need these questions answered.



I'm trying to practice product photography.

instead of criticizing about an annoying color, give constructive criticism..

Thank you!


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## Parker219 (Aug 30, 2012)

I'd change the background color, so it isnt so in your viewers face, you want to highlight the product.


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## joel28 (Aug 30, 2012)

Thanks! I'll change that. Any other C & C?


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## texkam (Aug 31, 2012)

The above, + underexposed, poor job of clipping the image. I prefer some sort of shadow under the product.


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## bianni (Aug 31, 2012)

Try improving your lighting and exposure. Why don't you use a thin white plexiglas as bg


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## tirediron (Aug 31, 2012)

As mentioned, first and foremost, is your background colour.  When the product is already a greenish colour, choosing a brighter green background isn't necessarily the best choice.  Read up on colour theory, particularily complimentary and contrasting colours.

Next, exposure.  The human is naturally drawn to bright over dark.  The background is significantly brighter than the product...  seem where I'm going?  Drop the background down 2/3 of a stop and get the product exposed correctly.  This really should be done with an incident meter.  

Why is this composited?  It's a hair product, so shoot it in an appropriate environment.  A bathroom, salon, something that makes sense.


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## amolitor (Aug 31, 2012)

The background color is surely for greenscreening, right?

Is the thing cut out in photoshop? There are some weird notches and things that might be the product, or might be poor cutting-out.

It's a little dark as has been noted. I think it should probably be lit nearly evenly from both sides. You want very very mild shadows/modeling, just enough to show that it's a three-dimensional object, for this sort of thing.


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## KmH (Aug 31, 2012)

That part of the product that matters most for advertising purposes is the product's label.

The label of this product is badly underexposed. In ACR it measures as 1.5 stops underexposed. A 1/3 stop of under exposure is a little dark, but 1.5 stops is a lot dark.

The bottle is not level in the image frame. It's tilted to the left 1.25°.

EXIF data indicates a 2 second exposure at f/16 using a 50 mm focal length. The use of f/16 is likely the cause of the overall softness of the focus. Small lens apertures cause diffraction.
That 2 seconds had to be used for the exposure seems to indicate a constant light source was used camera left. Another light source was needed to light the front of the product to make the product labels the most eye grabbing part of the photo. Here is a great resource for learning the fundamentals of product lighting - Light Science and Magic, Fourth Edition: An Introduction to Photographic Lighting 

To illustrate my comments, I did a quick and dirty edit. Using ACR I corrected the white balance, corrected the exposure 1.5 stops, increased the mid-tone contrast slightly. Using CS 5, I leveled the bottle, changed the background color, added a drop shadow to somewhat highlight/separate the bottle from the background, sharpened the product labels, and added a thin black border.



joel28 said:


> View attachment 18881


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## joel28 (Sep 2, 2012)

bianni said:


> Why don't you use a thin white plexiglas as bg



How would that help?


I appreciate your edit, but i think it doesnt really look like the actual item


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## joel28 (Sep 2, 2012)

What do you guy think about this?


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## bianni (Sep 2, 2012)

joel28 said:


> bianni said:
> 
> 
> > Why don't you use a thin white plexiglas as bg
> ...


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## Rick58 (Sep 2, 2012)

joel28 said:


> bianni said:
> 
> 
> > Why don't you use a thin white plexiglas as bg
> ...



Huh? I don't usually get sarcastic but... " it doesn't really look like the actual item"?? You even lost THIS farmboy with that comment


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