First Lightbox - Lizard Pics C&C

[DogGoneGood]

I made my first home-made light box last night, and tried it out. I'm going to add/re-do some of the lighting this evening, and give it another try. Need to change my WB setting too, to get less yellow in some of the photo's. C&C always appreciated!

 

[wendyalana]

How do you make a whitebox? I'd like to try.

 

[Robin Usagani]

You need to use a lot smaller aperture man.

 

[Overread36]

I agree that the white balance needs a little attention to it - if you took the shots in RAW mode this is a simple quick adjustment that you can make in the processing stages. The last shot is certainly looking very red - which is not untypical of canon which has an auto WB that tends to run a little into the warmer reds.

You need to use a lot smaller aperture man.

why?

 

[Robin Usagani]

just to get deeper DOF so you can see more definition in the back.

 

[GooniesNeverSayDie11]

Looks like a red box to me I would adjust the WB. Also, as others stated, maybe a smaller aperture for a little more DOF. You are not needing to isolate the subject from the background because its a white seemless background. So it would probably look a lot better to capture more detail in the subject.

 

[DogGoneGood]

Thanks guys, I just took some new ones, and switched out one of the lights to a bright white instead of a soft white (that has a yellow tint). I also adjusted the WB, and DOF, I'll post them in just a few minutes in this thread.

 

[Robin Usagani]

the bulb you were using is fine, you just have to adjust the wb

 

[DogGoneGood]

Okay, here are the new pics that I took this evening. C&C really appreciated on how I can improve or change anything.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

 

[lyonsroar]

#2 and #4 are warm

Nice and sharp and clear though!

We've got a Beardie where I work. He's a good photo subject!

(I wont post the pics to avoid cluttering your thread...)
Spiky | Flickr - Photo Sharing!
Good Night | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

 

[SabrinaO]

Again with the DOF. Close it up a little bit more. And what do you have your WB set to on your camera?

 

[DogGoneGood]

Again with the DOF. Close it up a little bit more. And what do you have your WB set to on your camera?

I have it set on white flourescent light setting, and the last two green turtle pics were shot on F9. I could go higher, but then I have to bump up the ISO and lower the shutter speed, to get more light, and then I end up with noise from the ISO, and risk of blur from the lower shutter speed.

Also, it's annoying me that only parts of the face are in focus. The eye, but not the nose. How can I get more of the face in focus all at once?

 

[Overread36]

First of out of interest what is the softbox and lighting that you are using? An idea of the kind of lights you are using and their positioning as well as the size of the softbox would help.

As for the depth of field you've got two options depending on your lighting and on how still your lizards are.
If they are being perfectly still you can focus stack (see my post in this thread a few posts down -- http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/...-product-shot-2-taking-kundalinis-advice.html )
If not you have to increase your local lighting levels and use a smaller aperture (f8 - f13 kind of range) or raise your ISO/use a slower shutter speed to let the aperture be smaller.

On the white balance front try just leaving it in auto white balance you might get a better result. From there you have 2 options to further improve your white balance:
1) manual white balance setting - should be perfectly possible since your lighting is constant and your setting static - however note that some indoor light bulbs can change their colour over time (and some change constantly) so that can throw a manual white balance reading from them unless you are using a constant light temperature source (Eg flash or studio stobes).

2) Shoot in RAW mode where as part of the processing of the RAW you can adjust the white balance yourself (note this works best if you've also used a hardware based screen calibration setup on your computer monitor - such as a spyder 3)

 

[JoshC.]

I really like 3, 5, and 6 in your second post. The 3rd is really really cool

 

[blazerj]

Nice shots. However, what is the benefit of blurring the tortise's shell? Seems like overkill and none of your pics made me say "awwww"