Anbody ever tried to take an interesting lume shot? Well I certainly did and was never really satisfied with the outcome. What I wanted to achieve is that the watch remains visible and the impressive lume could also be seen.
First let me go thru the essential equipment I used: Canon 20D, Canon EF-S 60mm Macro lens, tripod, cable remote and a Maglight D3 (I will come to that later)
The easiest one is the straight lume shot, where you only want to see the lume and how fabulous it glows.
10 second exposure lights turned off at F11 @100ISO
15 second exposure in total darkness at F11 @100ISO
well I thought those shots were OK, but I was looking for a different result. This is where the Maglight became a valuable tool
I left the setup and settings on my camera as they were and thought if I just turn on the Maglight for a 2-3 seconds I might be able to see the watches and the lume quite nicely.
So here is how that shot turned out:
again:15 second exposure in total darkness at F11 @100ISO but this time with a 2-3 indirect illumination provided by a Maglight
well, that didn't quite turn out as I hoped for - too much reflection and the lume is not really that visible :g: so I started experimenting - I kept the camera setup and settings and just focused on holding the Maglight at different angles and different "Maglight On" times
these are the shots that I got playing around:
The first one I took was almost there already but not quite
The second one turned out exactly the way I wanted
I overdid the third one by leaving the Maglight on too long - see for yourself:
After I was done with only those couple of shots I started editing them in Photoshop - I did no special effect trickery on any of the photos!!
here are a couple of crops from my favorite picture above that show the individual watches:
Panerai 025 Titanium Submersible - you have to love that gen SuperLuminova
Panerai 212 Swiss 7750 - SuperLuminova applied by our own Ziggy Meister - very impressive
Ulysee Nardin Maxi Marine Diver Blue Surf - the blue lume is so cool, not as bright as C3 but very very cool :shock:
and another one with a little more "level editing"
and last but not least - Breitling Hercules - again great Super Luminova and considering the small markers quite impressive
I hope you enjoyed reading this and take it as an inspiration to do your own experiments and post the results here in our great community!!
Thanks for looking and cheers
LP
First let me go thru the essential equipment I used: Canon 20D, Canon EF-S 60mm Macro lens, tripod, cable remote and a Maglight D3 (I will come to that later)
The easiest one is the straight lume shot, where you only want to see the lume and how fabulous it glows.
- Put your camera on a tripod[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- set aperture to F8 or lower - well lower means actually higher like F10, F11 and so on[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- set exposure time to value above 10 seconds - this will require some experimenting - just increase the exposure time in 5 second steps until you are satisfied with the result[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- charge the lume on your watches under a bright light - halogen lamps do a great job there[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- turn off the lights - duhh[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- use a cable or wireless remote to take the picture[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
10 second exposure lights turned off at F11 @100ISO
15 second exposure in total darkness at F11 @100ISO
well I thought those shots were OK, but I was looking for a different result. This is where the Maglight became a valuable tool
I left the setup and settings on my camera as they were and thought if I just turn on the Maglight for a 2-3 seconds I might be able to see the watches and the lume quite nicely.
So here is how that shot turned out:
again:15 second exposure in total darkness at F11 @100ISO but this time with a 2-3 indirect illumination provided by a Maglight
well, that didn't quite turn out as I hoped for - too much reflection and the lume is not really that visible :g: so I started experimenting - I kept the camera setup and settings and just focused on holding the Maglight at different angles and different "Maglight On" times
these are the shots that I got playing around:
The first one I took was almost there already but not quite
The second one turned out exactly the way I wanted
I overdid the third one by leaving the Maglight on too long - see for yourself:
After I was done with only those couple of shots I started editing them in Photoshop - I did no special effect trickery on any of the photos!!
- adjusted levels[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- adjusted color balance[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- cropped and re-sized[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- denoised with NeatImage - yes even with a digital SLR you get noise @ 100 ISO in particular if you play with the levels[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
- unsharpen masked and saved[/*:m:1pk5tmi9]
here are a couple of crops from my favorite picture above that show the individual watches:
Panerai 025 Titanium Submersible - you have to love that gen SuperLuminova
Panerai 212 Swiss 7750 - SuperLuminova applied by our own Ziggy Meister - very impressive
Ulysee Nardin Maxi Marine Diver Blue Surf - the blue lume is so cool, not as bright as C3 but very very cool :shock:
and another one with a little more "level editing"
and last but not least - Breitling Hercules - again great Super Luminova and considering the small markers quite impressive
I hope you enjoyed reading this and take it as an inspiration to do your own experiments and post the results here in our great community!!
Thanks for looking and cheers
LP
