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Assistance with photos


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Hi everyone

 

I'm really struggling with getting good photos.

 

My issue is I'm working on a tight budget with a top end camera phone, to the naked eye my builds look get, but my photos are terrible.

 

I'm using different colour backing cards to get the detail to stand out, but it isn't really working. 

Any advice that can help (I can't go out and buy a camera)

 

I've attached a couple of images

 

-lUh5xjN9xe6dMs8lPJHexar_GbuDOm1bhbf26D3

 

WdDX0NY3KECqHatBOwe2iSLIEV5f-g4j-bNzMNcO

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Hi, as having worked as a lighting technician in film, before giving any advice, I would ask what kind of look are you going for in the photo ? 

 

Do you just want a nice balanced lit picture, or are you trying to give it definition with the light.

Edited by Mark Szeman
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Phone cameras can be tricky, but most allow some basic adjustments within the basic apps. I don't know what you want to achieve, but here's some general advice which works for any camera, even phones.

 

Get as much light as possible, and then some. Taking pictures outside in daylight can help quite a lot, though direct sunlight may be too much.

Place the camera on a sturdy surface or use a tripod (there are tiny ones for phones out there!).

Focus can be a problem. Try to put the focus in areas with lots of detail, plain areas of similar colour are hard to resolve for the algorithm.

The higher the f-number the larger is the depth of field but the longer it takes to take the picture (More light helps here!). With usual cameras a good rool of thumb is f11 to f16 or the likes which is said to give the most natural look.

If you are really after a special detail try low f-numbers to narrow down the depth of field.

To help with colors a good trick is to place a known white item in the picture. White rubbers (nylon?) are superb for this and cheap. You can use this as reference to auto-correct the white balance in gimp (free) or photoshop or maybe some other tools.

 

Even cleaning the lens might improve your pictures.

 

Hope that helps a little.

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1 hour ago, Mark Szeman said:

Hi, as having worked as a lighting technician in film, before giving any advice, I would ask what kind of look are you going for in the photo ? 

 

Do you just want a nice balanced lit picture, or are you trying to give it definition with the light.

 

Mark

 

I'm looking for just a nice balanced picture with everything in focus. I'm doing magazine reviews but my pictures are just not up to scratch. My builds are to a suitable standard but I'm not getting published as much due to my poor photos

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Forgive the poor examples, I threw this together in a few minutes, and the subject is one of the worst to photograph, small and shiny.  Its a 30x165mm round I fired myself from a 2A42 back in the day. 

 

46813862274_023e1b200f_b.jpg

 

46813862254_47a15e044f_b.jpg

 

The first is edited slightly with only the in phone standard options (iPhone 8plus) and the second is straight out of the phone no editing. 

 

And this is where it was taken . 

 

46813862364_231fc55365_b.jpg

 

Light is both your best friend and worst enemy. In my case I have very harsh spotlights pointed at my table and multiple monitors quite close giving bad reflections. I turned the monitors off, or blocked their light.

 

The spot lights were diffused like this

 

46813863764_1063789568_b.jpg

 

Yep, just a piece of paper :)

 

To turn this to your example, diffuse your light.  Try and have multiple sources of diffused light to avoid shadows, unless they are what you are going for. 

 

If you are photographing it in an open area you will need multiple light sources.  Even something as simple as this can make s difference, yes its a torch and a jug of milk :)

 

f1c0e383f32a666ea4b838986cf3c31f.jpg

 

And try and have no interruption in the background, get a bigger piece of card, or hide your seam with the angle of the photo and the subject of the photograph. 

 

And light box is a massive help, I remember the first one I ever made.  It looked something like this.

 

F3TUF3YISCBNA6C.SMALL.jpg?auto=webp&widt

 

Shine lights in from different sides to get different effects, and play around with that effect to your advantage. 

 

It only takes a little time and you can get really great pics from next to no investment and a little creativity. 

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For your aircraft, a simple light box like above would be great, tra and shine lights in from all sides.  If you can put the phone on a tripod on any kind, even rubber banding it to something is great, frame you aircraft in the middle of the box, and move the aircraft round to get multiple angles, not the camera. 

 

Most smartphone cameras give you the possibility of choosing where you want it to focus, keep everything centered it will make your life easier.  Center the aircraft in the frame, and keep the focus in the center of the aircraft.

 

You can do a little editing on the phone, and in post on your computer, but if you have enough light and take the picture from relatively close up you wont have focus problems, of course the distance is going to depend on what you are photographing.  But in the example above I was no more than 20-30 cm (1 foot for the backwards people :) )  away from the shell.  

 

Experiment, its a digital photo take lots and experiment with the light, you will cop on to the correlation yourself when you have examples with different lighting in front of you :)

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11 minutes ago, Mark Szeman said:

Forgive the poor examples, I threw this together in a few minutes, and the subject is one of the worst to photograph, small and shiny.  Its a 30x165mm round I fired myself from a 2A42 back in the day.

 

46813862274_023e1b200f_b.jpg

 

46813862254_47a15e044f_b.jpg

 

And try and have no interruption in the background, get a bigger piece of card, or hide your seam with the angle of the photo and the subject of the photograph. Shine lights in from different sides to get different effects, and play around with that effect to your advantage. 

 

It only takes a little time and you can get really great pics from next to no investment and a little creativity. 

1

 

 

This is the perfect results I'm looking for

 

The downfall of the aircraft I'm photographing is a great deal of the aircraft is white, and should I be using a white background. I'll try and take some shots and come back with results using your tips

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