Help, Help.... I need all the help in the world, my pictures are horrible. I can never get my lighting right. Yet some peoples pics, look so inviting. It's the biggest wast of my time right now. I have a studio box with lights. At this point, it's usless.

Welcome!!!
I was gonna ad 3 discussion areas:
1)Equipment
2)Tips and techniques
3)Gallery (where you can post your best knife pics)
Comments? Suggestions?

I'm not too sure what the RSS feed is about

I'll organize this group a little better tonight

Thanks for joining!!
I think we can learn a lot collectively
I'm still learning myself...BTW

Trent,

I have a office that's a closed in porch... Some days I have good white light, other's no so... I have found that these $1 to$2 magnetic mechnis flexble lights great for accents. It's a whit light not yellow light a light bulb. Just buy a handfull and find a piece of metal of paper wieght that is magnetic and you can shoot at night. Check out the photos I posted tonight. There was not any sunlight then.

I also like to find a fabric that matches the scale style... tonight I wanted to try a new abalone... so I used a black pillow case I picked up art Walmat... I like leather behind Stags so on and soforth.

I have a Cannon Eos 8.5 MP but use a 4 G memory card so I a shoot till the battery dies.......

FYI

I want a good digital camera I can take around with me that is Wi-Fi enabled or 3G network compatible. My iPhone can't zoom and is not that great, but don't want to spend $7000.

I want to snap a shot, then be able to email, text, or load it at iKC (or facebook)

Any help here?

I hear ya, but when you are a roaming reporter like I am :), gotta catch the action when it's happening and a pocket camera is ideal- the iphone is sweet in that respect. Obviously, I'm not talking about "professional" shots, only real time pics to load on the internet- which aren't hi-res or high quality anyway.

Here is one for example: Sony Cyber-shot DSC-G3 WiFi camera reviewed: wait for generation two

This is my high tech photo setup! It's all in the Cannon Rebel. Great Camera and the new 10+ MP must be a dream.

Good deal there Frank. You wouldn't believe all the crap, oops, I mean stuff I have bought/tried to use- to help me. I've done the styrofoam box, bought a "dome" on and on.

Try taking a pic of a toenail with all their shinny parts/reflections

Hey guys. I've had digital cameras since the dawn of the art. Now I really like the Sony Mavica I've had for 5 years, because the (very slow) CD inside allows me to take 210mb of images, pop in another CD-RW and keep on. It would cost a lot to get memory cards to hold what a pocket-ful of CDs can. It has 2200x1700 resolution which is enough most of the time. I take only uncompressed TIF images in the camera, and reduce their size and JPG appropriately for the web.

Now I have a little Sony Webbie video/still camera which will take a lot of 1400x1000 snaps at what must be 30% compression. Pretty handy for snapshots.

So I'm the world's oldest newbie, and my knowledge/yearsexperience ratio must be the lowest in the civilized world. I'm here to learn.

Here's my "K-Mart Martha Stewart" leather backgound......

#3.99 Matha Steward Placemats from K-Mart make it look like leather.....

JJ.... I know what you are asking now.... It's the look of the bolsters..... Those first short I took at night with room lighting and the diodes (sp). It's the conbination of white light from the little lights and the yellow in what is the light from a regular room bulb. I set my camera either on a tripod or just brace my hold REAL good and put the automatic option to "time exposure". That's not the technical term but it's the oposit of appiture. Sometime it's a full second exposure thus you have to be braced or placed on a trypod. Sorry I did not see your question until just now.

That's what I missed...

That's from a set of old scales I bought at an auction.. I have 1/10 OZ to a pound.

Frank,
Your pics look pretty good, your method is worth trying. I found the lights on ebay.

Good photo, and also your new avatar. A pear is appropriate to the Opinel.

I'm looking forward to being here is this group. I've been taking my own pictures for a few years now but still feel like a novice compared to some of pictures that are posted on these forums.

I'm Sanjay from Khukuri House/Kathmandu/Nepal. I have been taking photographs of my Blades for years and still willing to improve. I hope to meet you all good photographers and learn more from you all. Here 's a shot of one of my blade.

Welcome Sanjay. I too have been taking my own knife pics for a while, but am always wanting learn more and improve. I think I can do that on the forum.

Johnny

Hi Johnny, thank you for welcoming me. The problmes with my pictures are the reflection. The blades are always shiny and no matter how I try to cut them with filters, they are still there.

Sanjay

Hello Sanjay. I will try to help you with the blade problem in your photography. Although the filter idea is good it will not solve the problem, as you have discovered. This lighting problem is one that every professional photographer has to solve at some point in his/her career. From the one photo that i see of yours, it appears that you are using natural light outdoors. You may continue using natural light but will then have to add to it with a small flash unit or other device (off camera). place the flash at a very low angle and "rake" the light across the set. what this does is that it adds light to the handle (non-reflective) usually without the blade picking up most of this added light. The range of intensity of light between the blade and the handle will then be more in balance. There are some other methods that are rather difficult to explain in words to solve the problem so i will have to do a video to demonstrate. Let me just say that this is a challenge and even professionals have a little difficulty with it. I learned it by necessity as i am a prfessional and have worked in the field most of my life. Typically this kind of photogrphy is done in the studio (indoors) with artificial lighting which is very controllable. Otherwise i think the one photo i see of yours is quite well done. good luck and will talk again. michael cassani

Hi Michael, thank you so much for the advises which am gonna try it when shooting my new Khukuri blade very soon. As per your advise, I will look out to buy a flash unit and try it out as you said. Am an ameture in Photography and quite did not get all the tips but will use this flash for my next shoot and post it so you can point out again. I am very glad to meet you and always wanted to learn more from a Pro.
Thanks again.

Sanjay..............

How's everything going in here?
Any suggestions as to how to make the group better?
Seems to be going good?

We got 37 members!! w00t!!!

Keep up the good work, pics, tips!!!!

I'm new here iKC and I'm glad I found it! One thing I really need to do is learn how to get good photographs of my knives. I have a website for selling knives and stores on a couple other sites. I bought a big expensive camera and know JACK about how to use it! My main problem is lighting. So in the coming days and weeks I'll be reading through everything on this group page trying learn what I need to. Keep Posting!

Hi Bob,
I cnn relate to your comment about lighting your photograph sobjects, I have noticed other comments on this subject in this Group, and several advocate using your flash or setting up strobe lights. I've tried using my flash, and the glare from highly polished metal surfaces is just TOO MUCH! I have had much more success with two 100-watt spotlights set at varying angles and distances from the subject (about 4 feet away and at 30 to 45 degrees from the vertical. I'm a novice myself, so I would really like to know how experienced photographers eliminate reflected glare when they use their flash or strobe lights.

Don't use direct light with a flash, it's too harsh, as you have found out. You have to "diffuse" the light coming from a strobe by modifying it in a number of ways. Professional light boxes are one way and the most expensive however, there are a number of other methods that can be used such as: plain old paper towels, tracing paper, translucent mylar, etc. etc. If you have access to a product known as "foamcore" , that works quite well too. Use only direct strobe light as an accent light to bring out some detail as needed. Hope some of this makes sense. ---mick--->

Mick, all I have to work with is a point-and-shoot digital camera with built in-flash, so I have no way of using a remote strobe light. That being the case, is there a way I can simulate strobe lighting with two or three 200-watt incandescent light bulbs?

Dale S.,
Sounds like that would be within my budget. I'll give it a try. THANKS!

I use a Nikon Cool Pix S610 as a carry along camera. For serious work I use a  Nikon D-90. Both cameras have positive and negative aspects.