Point of Interest

After shooting my BMW die cast toy car for the last couple of weeks (the post can be found here and here), I decided that I should start shooting something else. Again, flickr has become my source of inspiration. I started to browse through flickr to find what image should I take. Inspired by one of the picture I found, I decided to shoot something from my daily use.. Spoon and fork.

I always love the idea on how normal simple stuff like spoon and fork becomes very interesting photograph if you compose and lit it correctly. That's why I'm so excited to start this 'project'. I started by arranging my spoon and fork so that it would look nice. After a few try, I decided that I will cross the spoon and the fork together.

Still using my Nikon D40 camera and a Nikon SB-20 as my light source, I lit the spoon and fork using a bare flash. The result? Not good. Since spoon and fork are very reflective, I got a hot spot on one part of the spoon while the rest are dark. I need more diffused light. That's when I decide to make a light box.

Try to do a MacGyver, if you don't have something then try to create one!

What if you don't have something that you need? Well then either you could buy it or you could make it yourself. A few months ago, I was about to list my lens to sell it on ebay and needed to get several snaps of it for the ads. I could simply go out and buy a $80 lightbox but then again I thought I would rather spend it on something else so it is the MIY (make it yourself) solution. One would ask why would you need a lightbox in the first place. Well as we all know that if we could make it as attractive as possible. then the item would sell at a higher price That is why you see people use decorations in shops and all sort of other elements to attract buyers. Well it's the same case here, by using a lightbox you are basically creating a nicer lighting and cleaner  background larger. The lightings are improved when the lightbox is used when compared to  using a bare bulb as the larger diffusion materials creates a larger lightsource which in turns softens the light (see strobist.blogspot.com to know more about lightings).  To put it simple, basically I am trying to imitate the how the PROS shoot their products for ads. To create the lightbox, I need to find a frame which can hold my diffusion materials, so basically searched and found an unused box which I could use as a frame to attach my diffusion materials, then I started cutting a few of the sides off. Then, I went to the kitchen to find baking paper to be used for diffusion materials. The baking paper were glued to the sides of the box. As I've got only two lights at that time, I covered one side using aluminium foil with the intention of it acting as a reflector.  Furthermore, I went and bought a $1.50 white cardboard to be used as my backdrop. My finished lightbox is shown above. I know it is not pretty, but then again it'll do the job, :).