Adventures in photography and other such failures

[aur0ra145]

Howdy!

I have decided to add to this wonderful hobby of model making and learn to take pictures more better. As it turns out I know nothing about photography.

I have been shooting all the pictures of my models with my Galaxy S7. Cool little gadget and does okay with the picture taking. However, I wanted one of those cool cameras that make an actual shutter noise. Most people call them a Digital single-lens reflex camera or DSLR for short. They have neat features that allow you to manipulate how the camera catches light. Pretty neat.

First thing was first. I needed knowledge to dive into this new world. It's only day 2 of my endeavor; but, I feel like I've learned a lot so far. I'll take this time to recommend Scale Model Art: A Guide To Photographing Scale Models by Jeff Bartlet. (Available here for download: http://www.scalephotography.com/ very fair price for what you get!) This is now my picture taking bible for the time being.

After reading through Jeff's book and reading a ton of online reviews I settled on a Canon Eos T6. It has stuff and I like it. I kind of made the purchase on faith. So, we'll see how the longevity of it is. I also bought a medium priced tripod to use for now. Another cool thing is that this camera can connect via wifi to your phone or tablet. Then you can use your phone/tablet to adjust stuff or trigger the shutter. It's super cool and behaves a lot like the GoPro app.

I think my biggest gap right now is lighting. I'll try and figure out a good way to get a better setup. Currently I'm using tissue paper and a cardboard box. (as described here: viewtopic.php?f=63&t=21931 ) Any economical suggestions are welcome.

As for camera gear. My fiance has an older Canon T3 with some lenses and stuff. I'll look through her things when she moves here and see if they work or not. Other than that, I'm not really going to be buying much camera equipment.... yet. I want to learn exactly what my needs are, rather than my perceived needs (wants) in regards to scale photography.

At this point I really don't know what post processing softwarer to use. So I won't at this time.

Todays session was about 2 hours long and I'll sum it up with best 3 and worst 3 photos. This will sort of be the format from now on when trying out new techniques.

Criticism welcome. Note: this is day 2 of picture taking with DSLR for me. Be gentle.

Worst 3:







Best 3:

[Tay99]

Great work, I have a Nikon dslr its mind blowing the amount of features you get and like you said you can spend hours playing about with it, I brought a light box this will help defuse the light, also have a look at getting a macro lens.

[ElCapitan]

I really need to work on my photography too - I have a Nikon D3200, but can't seem to match the quality of photo I can get using my Samsung Galaxy S8, so I tend to fall back on that.

[bfrd]

One suggestion that I have is to pick up Lightroom from Adobe. It is a wonderful post processing tool. One thing that I see in your pictures is the white balance is off. The backgrounds look cream instead of white. At least I assume it should have been a white background. White balance is one of the things that can dramatically change the tone of photo.

I have long since decided to not try and fix white balance in camera, but rather in post. Lightroom is easily the best tool I have found for digital photography, at least for the home enthusiast. Also, when using a program like Lightroom, make sure you shoot your images in RAW format. JPG images are 8 bit, while RAW is usually 12 bit. RAW format captures more information from the sensor than the image in JPG mode. With more information to manipulate, the changes you make in post are much better. Changing the white balance or making changes to the exposure are much easier with RAW files. Once you have the images "fixed" you can easily export images in any format you like.

[SprueSurgeon]

[Twokidsnosleep]

Great thread idea for a thread
I like the focus from someone normal struggling to get better and showing good and bad with out all the mumbo jumbo of photography
Lighting is a B.
My best model pics are Sunday mornings midsummer on a clear day with light coming in from my model room's E and S windows
It is a bit like Lord of the Rings where the moon has to be just right to see the key hole.....or light the top of a space freaking shuttle and not shadow everything else

[aur0ra145]

Well this topic blew up. Glad to see others willing to follow along in this endevour.

With that said, I got the Adobe photo suite thing. It's basically Lightroom CC and Photoshop CC. I have lots of experience with photoshop in the past, mostly related to graphic design stuff for some video games I used to mod. And... I made a lot of propoganda for Brave Newbies Inc. in a game called EVE: Online; but, that was several years ago.

However, I have no experience with editing photos taken with a camera. Should be fun.

I'm rather excited about the Photoshop thing. It will make it much easier to create the things I did with "Photo & Graphic Designer 12 Steam Edition" which was packaged with MAGIX Video deluxe (used to be called Sony Vegas.)

Two examples from recent:





Two from my EVE propaganda days. I loved The Rocketeer as a kid, so I used him as a character of the H.E.R.O. Coalition back in the Sendaya days. Most of these didn't require much docotoring.





Anyways, I'm going to let the Adobe stuff install and do some adult things for the time being. Should have some updates later tonight.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Hey, I think we just found someone to do the bomber sig signature badges....hmmmm

[aur0ra145]

Hey, I think we just found someone to do the bomber sig signature badges....hmmmm

[Twokidsnosleep]

Oh, we are going to get along as friends just fine!

[TommyKillander]

That result is great after only 2 days into your DSLR photography career.

You seem to have found a good DoF setting and the focus seems good too. Getting a tripod is also a great step.
Next I think you should get a light tent and a couple of lightsources with ~5000K colour temperature, so you get better contol of the light-conditions. A greycard as also useful - I will explain that below.


If I just want to document a build with nice photos I have the following procedure:

1. I set up a light-tent with four 15W 5400K fluorescent lamps around the tent so I get a nice even spread (diffused) light.

2. Setup my DSLR on a tripod with a laptop attached over USB (thethered mode), so I can use the screen as a viewfinder to check focus, DoF, and do the exposure. My default settings in the remote control software are:
ISO 100 (gives me a noice-free picture)
A-priority with A = f/22 (long depth of field)
Spot metering (exposure time is not affected by the background)
Store RAW files

Normally this will give me an exposure time ~1 sec, so a tripod is a must

3. First photo I take is of the model with a gray-card beside it.

4. Then I shoot all the photos in that session.

5. Next stop is the post-processing software where I make the whitebalance adjustments and convert the RAW-files to JPG.

6. Final step is a photo editing software where I crop the images (and do editing of the background if needed).

So what is that gray-card and what is it used for, you might wonder?
That graycard will help me to get the whitebalance right in the postprocessing software; I just click on graycard in the first picture to tell the software "Hey, this is a 18% gray surface - please adjust the whitebalance to it looks grey". The software will do that and then you apply that whitebalance adjustment to all you photos.

This is an example of a graycard. You can buy them in a photo-store and they are very cheap, because you dont need a big one


Hope this makes sense and helps you

BTW. I bought the book and I will read it this weekend. Seems to be full of good tips

Good luck!


Tommy

[Twokidsnosleep]

hang on, I am feeling woozy...f stop talk
I am a professional idiot, not a professional photographer

[aur0ra145]

That result is great after only 2 days into your DSLR photography career.

Thanks! I actually bought a set of the white/gray/black cards and they arrived in the mail today. The book said they're good to have; but, I had no idea how to use them when I bought them. Thanks for the explanation!

Oh, we are going to get along as friends just fine!

Well, I think some of my skills are coming back. I have a few ideas for badges/hype images. I think the little sprue-type badges is something Lee likes to do.

Any who, this is the result of about 45 minutes. To include finding the images, fixing them, taking photos of my airbrushes and uploading. Photoshop has gotten much much better since the last time I got to use it. I'm quite impressed with it all.

Airbrushes aren't blended that well; but, I may come back to it later. This was just a first attempt.

I sort of like the idea of shot of a crew in front of their bomber with Bomber SiG nose art. I'll mess around with that a little bit later.



Original image

[aur0ra145]

I'm really liking the software. I can understand why so many people use it.

So, I used the images from yesterday-both good and bad-to give the software a whirl. Results as attached.

Also, I bought some of those daylight bulbs to try out and see how it goes. In other good news, the fiance has a macro lens that will fit my camera!

I've got a long ways to go; but, I'm really enjoying learning all this stuff!

From Worse 2 yesterday:



That's actually dust on the spitfire.


From Best 3 yesterday:

[Twokidsnosleep]

I am going to send you an awesome bomber cartoon via PM
It is slightly riské so might need some adjustment to the ahhh chestal areas..certain round portions shall we say need to be blocked out
Let me know what you think
S

[aur0ra145]

Kept at it a bit more. Tried some new lighting stuff and got better light bulbs. By no means a professional setup, but it works?

Lighting seems to be one of the places I have the most learning to do it.

Subjects for tonight was a Sherman Easy 8 and a A-1J Skyraider. Skyraider is by far my favorite build I've done since getting into the hobby. It was a lovely birthday gift from my loving girlfriend at the time (now up graded to fiance.) It even won a local modelling contest. The Sherman is one of my better tank builds thus far. Green on the tank seems difficult to shoot. It might just be me though. Haven't really figured out a good routine for using the software and such yet.



Sherman







Skyraider!

[Tomcat64]

Really great start with your new playground mate

A couple more things to add to the mix from me.

Even at f-22 there will be more in focus behind the focal point than in front of it so choose your focal point with that in mind and tend towards a point on the model nearer to the camera. There's also the option of focus stacking which effectively composites different versions of the same photo with varying focal points - I know this is possible in Photoshop but haven't tried it yet. There's some dedicated software that allows you to do it and I think Paul Budzik did a review of one of them last year from memory. Edit - might be worth a look here

Tommy rightly mentioned that ISO-100 will give you the most noise-free images, but with the sensors on modern cameras don't be afraid of upping the ISO and popping the camera off the tripod if you want a little freedom. Sometimes I'll actually fire off a bunch of hand-held shots, review them and then setup the tripod to reshoot a couple of the angles that I really like.

You mentioned you were having a few problems with capturing the Green on a tank - there's a whole bunch of things that affect the way colour is displayed these days including the sensor on the camera, the screen you're viewing and editing on and the screen that the finished shot is viewed on - chances are it'll look different on all three. The third shot of the Sherman above looks fine to me, but might look different to you so don't get too hung up on it at this stage - chances are if you get the white balance and exposure right that'll look after itself for the most part.

Hope that helps a little, but keep playing with it - that's definitely the key to it all

[aur0ra145]

Well, I'm back from a short work trip. I read the rest of the photography book while I was gone. Looking forward to getting back into it!

[aur0ra145]

Finished up a Corsair. I think my picture taking is getting better!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Excellent photography and a gorgeous model
You are an A++ student mastering this skill

[digger303]

I am going to send you an awesome bomber cartoon via PM
It is slightly riské so might need some adjustment to the ahhh chestal areas..certain round portions shall we say need to be blocked out
Let me know what you think
S

titch titch... blocking all the good stuff

[DrSprue]

Really great start with your new playground mate

A couple more things to add to the mix from me.

Even at f-22 there will be more in focus behind the focal point than in front of it so choose your focal point with that in mind and tend towards a point on the model nearer to the camera. There's also the option of focus stacking which effectively composites different versions of the same photo with varying focal points - I know this is possible in Photoshop but haven't tried it yet. There's some dedicated software that allows you to do it and I think Paul Budzik did a review of one of them last year from memory. Edit - might be worth a look here

Tommy rightly mentioned that ISO-100 will give you the most noise-free images, but with the sensors on modern cameras don't be afraid of upping the ISO and popping the camera off the tripod if you want a little freedom. Sometimes I'll actually fire off a bunch of hand-held shots, review them and then setup the tripod to reshoot a couple of the angles that I really like.

You mentioned you were having a few problems with capturing the Green on a tank - there's a whole bunch of things that affect the way colour is displayed these days including the sensor on the camera, the screen you're viewing and editing on and the screen that the finished shot is viewed on - chances are it'll look different on all three. The third shot of the Sherman above looks fine to me, but might look different to you so don't get too hung up on it at this stage - chances are if you get the white balance and exposure right that'll look after itself for the most part.

Hope that helps a little, but keep playing with it - that's definitely the key to it all

Really great info Neil.. gonna keep this in mind when I do some work with my new camera, Im hoping to get soon.

[Tomcat64]

Finished up a Corsair. I think my picture taking is getting better!

Just saw this on the Dan thread - great work on the model and the photos

... my new camera, Im hoping to get soon.

Oooh new toys! What are you getting??

[DrSprue]

Finished up a Corsair. I think my picture taking is getting better!

Just saw this on the Dan thread - great work on the model and the photos

... my new camera, Im hoping to get soon.

Oooh new toys! What are you getting??

An older Nikon D series one and a bit used. A friend is going for a bit better one and will give me a good deal on it when hes ready to upgrade. Cool lens too. Great tips tho Neil and so appreciate it as well, it must have taken a while to do that too!

[TommyKillander]

Brilliant building and photography!


Tommy

[aur0ra145]

Reviving this thread a bit. In the past I've used Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Lightroom for photo editing. Now those programs packaged together cost $240 USD a year, with no option to buy them permanently. It's a software subscription, which I dislike immensely.

So, I've set out to find a free alternative. First one I've tested is the web-based Pixlr. Upside, is it's web based and pretty easy to use if you understand the work flow from Photoshop. Downside, is for "free" edits, you only get 3 you can save per day. I cheated out a fourth one by using the snipping tool of the last photo. If you do subscribe for unlimited edits/saves per day. It comes to roughly $18/year.

The other program I'm testing today is GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP). Which is completely free and open-source. In the past I've tried to use it and found Photoshop much easier to navigate. Though, this could be because all of my experience was solely with Photoshop. Using it today, it seems a bit easier to use; but, the controls are very clunky. I'll have to see if there are any mods to make it more Photoshop like.

For the experiment, I took a few pictures of my P-40 build with my cell phone and pulled some photos I've taken previously with my DSLR. I don't think I retouched any of the previous photos based on the exposure and temperature levels present in the photos.

The baseline un-edited photos:














Pixlr edited photos:








GIMP edited photos:












It seems that GIMP is MUCH MUCH better at correcting light temperature than Pixlr. Pixlr seems like it's got a better handle on how to reset exposure. Though, both of these things can be fixed with a better starting picture to begin with. Some of the details seem to be lost as I'm color correcting for the light temperature. More experimenting is warranted and I'll open up my aperture to see what other free software is out there.

[digger303]