My equipment:-
Current Camera = Nikon Coolpix 5700 [5 megapixels 8x optical zoom]
Backup Camera = Nikon Coolpix 775 [2.1 megapixels 3x optical zoom]
Location = Up to 2007, Office at work. 2008 on, at home.
Lighting = Up to 2007, mainly fluorescent, halogen desk lamps with plain white paper as a diffuser. Since 2008, I have used a set of Daylight Fluorescent Studio Lights from 1StopPhotoShop (no longer trading).
Accessories = Tripod, AC adapter for camera, plain card for backdrop (available from any craft shop), Light Tent and Lights (1StopPhotoShop), USB Card reader, Adobe Photoshop CS (Adobe) and ACDSee V5 (ACD Systems). For the light tent and lights, here is a link to another shop selling similar equipment Steve's Photo Shop.
Taking the photos:-
After using the 5700 camera for a number of years, I have found the best way to shoot my models, is set the camera to the following:-
Aperture priority - Auto and f8.0.
No Flash
Macro Mode
White balance - measure (I place a sheet of A4 white paper in the shot when measuring)
Photo size - 2560 x 1920
(No Compression)
I will place the model in the center of the card/cloth, place the camera about 4-5 feet from the model, and use to zoom to frame the shot. One pecularity of this camera, is when you use the macro mode, any picture taken not within about 40-80% zoom will be distorted. So I have to engage macro-mode and zoom in until the flower in the display turns yellow. Then I adjust the f-stop as close to f-8.0 as I can get.
Then using the self-timer, take a few test shots. I then remove the memory card from the camera and download onto my PC, check the photos in Photoshop and then make any necessary adjustments to the camera, lighting as required.
I then snap a few shots of each view I want of the model. All shots are taken in macro with self-timer, (self-timer only works in macro on this camera), so as to eliminate any camera shake. For any closeup shots I move the camera to with in 2 feet of the model and zoom in as necessary. Once satisfied I have enough shots, I will once again download on to my PC.
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Setup in 2004 |
Setup in 2007 |
Here are two identical photos one taken at an F-stop of 3.2 and the other at an F-stop of 8.0 (Coolpix 5700)
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f-stop 3.2 |
f-stop 8.0 |
Except for resizing down to 400/800 pixels, no other further editing has been done, but you can see the difference between the photos. The f-Stop 8.0 is slightly brighter and the Thunderbird text on the back wall is not blurred.
Editing the photos:-
Once the shots are on my PC, I load them one at a time into Photoshop and crop each image to frame the model. Then I adjust the levels, and apply an "Auto Colour" adjustment.|
Original photo...
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and after being tweaked in Photoshop
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Once happy with it I crop to between 1024 and 800 pixels wide (72dpi) and save as a different filename. Once all are processed, I copy these modified pics to my web directory and open them in ACDSee, save at 85% compression, and resize and save as a second file, 400 pixels wide for a thumbnail for the website.