Thread: Woody Pear

Darren, they look ok, very hard to acually see the grain in photos, the finish looks flat, and that may be intentional, we don't always have to finish with a "shine". Amos

Amos it is my usual CA finish that are on all pens. It was a very dark piece of Woody Pear. Not my favourite timber but nice all the same. Only used an over head light source and generally focus on the centre band. My technique on photography my need to improve or more side lighting. I just don't like the way you lose the grain in photos with the reflection.
Darren

Your Woody Pear looks ok I am not a fan of the timber. To remove flare buy a polarising filter and use one light source with reflector,when I can I will do another photoessay or three and see if I can make a one fits all set for quick good pics of pens. Regards Peter

Some time ago someone posted a thread on a "light box", if I find it I might try to make one, for about $20 you can get two halogen lights on a tripod at Bunnings, I now switch them on to light up the scene when taking photos, but I do get a shadow one side. Amos

Every light creates a shadow,try one light a polarising filter,odd sizes of foam sheets to use as reflectors on the other side from where the light is,I will in time do all of these things.

All the best Peter.

PS Take a walk in the IAP site in America in the special section on Pen Photography,plenty of top ideas there,I believe the pen is more important than the creation of scenes every time and will concentrate on a repeatable,clear pic or the pen first and foremost.Some of the pics on the IAP would cost you hundreds or more dollars from a professional here believe me.We are only needing a small set for pens,a formula that includes 1.Wattage of artificial light.
2.Spectrum value of the light.
3.Use of diffusion and reflectors.
4. A platform to sit the pen on.
5.How many views are acceptable.
6.Use of a polarising filter to remove flare.
7.How to make a place board carefully marked for placing the tripod,camera,light,distance from the subject.

I want to follow the Kiss Principle words to me only Keep it simple stupid.
Certainly apperture selection etc will feature heavily in this.
I use a Google free program called Picassa 2 and one other to reduce pixel count to send to the forum.
I had hoped to bypass all of this but as the Walrus said it is time.

Peter

Biggest trouble is white background reflection try subdue the light a little or use material that doesn't reflect flash and light so much.
I use an old black T-shirt

Next question did you use your macro setting when shooting pic this may help greatly.

Darren,
I have had a few pens (brown mallee in particular) that will just not hold a shine. It will come off the lathe with a nice gloss, two days later, flatter than my brain pan. I have tried using CA and same thing. On some wood, using CA seems to make it worse (cotton wood). I was doing some reading on the Ubeat site and the attribute a lot of that to the oil in the wood. Maybe next time, I will try the alcohol first.

Cheers,

Rick

I am developing my technique for pen pics to avoid the use of macro because my experience tells me depth of field ie the distances between the first point of real sharp focus and the back focus areas is compressed.Then also the image is huge and hard to dumb down in pixels for the forum.Having said that I have 9 times optical zoom that is handy for cropping in the camera.

More so for digital I feel is to use a tripod for all pen shots unless you have the steady grip of a world champion shooter. Place the pen square across from you so sharpness is easier for the whole pen,take and show more than one view(shows what they really look like)

Rick that drink before,after or instead,sorry use of alcohol as a cleaner with Brown Mallee sounds good but that stuff from me is now years dry and is not known as greasy in any way unless you used the ends that had wax and that migrated on the pen unlikely as that theory is.

A friend of mine said never uses oils,polish on Gidyea his spelling from the International Wood Collectors Assn? and some others he only uses nitrocellulose laquers as he said the other finishes result in a loss of not enhancing of the beaut colours especially over time.Iwill have a real good look at my oldest pens Rick but the finish holds up real well on all my pens I feel the little touch up at the end of polishing with the wax stick in fact just went to the workshop this stick I have used on every pen I have made for at least 15 yrs and you can still read the large letters of Liberon on the stick easily.Its hard but for me the ants pants today there are a real lot of different sticks not least the U Beaut one I would name but it might be seen as rude by moderators since it has a swear word in it.

Take care dont let the bed bugs get you.(just watched Flushed Away movie with our nearly 4 yr old granddaughter) this brought new meaning to the expression.
Peter

Originally Posted by Penpal

I am developing my technique for pen pics to avoid the use of macro because my experience tells me depth of field ie the distances between the first point of real sharp focus and the back focus areas is compressed.Then also the image is huge and hard to dumb down in pixels for the forum.Having said that I have 9 times optical zoom that is handy for cropping in the camera.

More so for digital I feel is to use a tripod for all pen shots unless you have the steady grip of a world champion shooter. Place the pen square across from you so sharpness is easier for the whole pen,take and show more than one view(shows what they really look like)

Take care dont let the bed bugs get you.(just watched Flushed Away movie with our nearly 4 yr old granddaughter) this brought new meaning to the expression.
Peter

1st pic taken by and old hand photographer still learning how t use his digital
2nd pic after I changed it to Macro
3rd pic I took showing acual size
4th slight change in angle an see the flare back there are difusers available for even small digitals
5th I have used the gama feature to slightly darken the image reducing the brightness a little

Even though I have photoshop and Corel Photo I use a small package called irfanview http://www.irfanview.com/ a free download it will save the file by about half if you set it right ideal for posts without changing quality also has some ideal features for quick fixes. But never save the file to same folder!!!!

In many photo editing packs you can play with all sorts of arrangements to off et original pic.

Not sure what camera your using but see if it has anti shake and if it does turn it on.

Originally Posted by Woodenink

Some time ago someone posted a thread on a "light box", if I find it I might try to make one, for about $20 you can get two halogen lights on a tripod at Bunnings, I now switch them on to light up the scene when taking photos, but I do get a shadow one side. Amos

Wasnt this one was it Amos ?
http://www.woodworkforums.ubeaut.com...ad.php?t=45718

My upside down card table works pretty good for me for small items. I have managed to work out a system that gives results like this quick and easy with minimal photo shopping required

Attachment 51653

for this pic
* The camera I used is a Nikon 4Meg Pixel compact

* I used an A4 sheet of paper as the back ground.

* I have the camera on a tripod and use the timer.

* I have the camera set on the highest resolution. Which results in an 11meg TIFF file. Which is then reduced using a photo editing program. The software was bundled with the PC when I bought it.

* Lighting is 4 standard desk lamps that use incandesant bulbs. Two of the lamps are used as direct lighting (one is diffused with "Glad Bake). The other 2 lamps are reflected off white card board. NO FLASH

*I zoom in as much as possible but pic still needs to be cropped. No MACRO setting. As Peter says depth of field isnt real good.

*then I just play with the exposure (EV+/-) till I get the look that I want



If I had some money to splash around though I think one of these things would be handy and would be easier to pack up
http://cgi.ebay.com.au/32-80cm-Soft-...QQcmdZViewItem

For larger items I got one of those twin 500w halogen work lamps that you mention and teamed it with a photograhic white umbrella to diffuse the light
Attachment 51651 Attachment 51652

cheers
BD