Gourd Studio Setup

[qleak]

For xmas I've purchased some equipment for my mom, a gourd artist. I want to help her take better pictures for posting on her website. I'm also fairly new to photographic lighting.
Here is the equipment we have to work with:

2 x Clamp lights
2 x White foam boards
2 x Black foam boards
Lotsa Clamps
3 x Mic Stands (each with boom)
1 x Roll of white paper.
1 x Generic Flexpod camera holder.
1 x Coolpix L810

The sealing finisher she uses is very glossy. Here are a few shots I took with her adjusting the lights. We started with halogen floods but they were a little too hard even bounced off a card so we switched to CFL later. I have only scaled the images no other post processing. Throughout there are exposure compensation and white balance issues. I was trying to encourage her to slow down a bit.

1) Halogen lights 1 at 45degrees to the left front bounced off white foam board one in back right on the background apparently spilling onto the gourd too. These are faux-beads on the gourd.

2) Gourd plate, 2 halogens bounced off foam board left and right respectively. I had not suggested adjusting the exposure compensation positively yet.

3) Cowboy gourd I. 2 x CFL bounced off cards at slightly less than 45 degrees left and right front.

4) Cowboy gourd II. 2 CFL one on background on right, the other front left bounced off white card.

5) faux leather gourd. Front left CFL off card and 2nd on background.

6) Polar Bear Gourd. Both cfl front left and right off card. This one needed negative exposure compensation.. maybe next time.

I'd be interested in hearing your comments on some other ideas on improving these a bit. Just adding a backdrop and taking control of the light has improved them already. Given the equipment (or maybe some inexpensive equipment to add) how would you improve these in camera.

 

[snowbear]

Love the last one!

If heat isn't an issue, you can use tracing paper as a cheap diffuser. If the 810 can take filters, you might want to try a CPL to cut down on the glossiness.

 

[qleak]

Love the last one!

If heat isn't an issue, you can use tracing paper as a cheap diffuser. If the 810 can take filters, you might want to try a CPL to cut down on the glossiness.

Thanks for the suggestions.

 

[qleak]

I couldn't resist playing a bit with this lighting setup with my D7100. I found that the polarizing filter was not a very big help with this it simply made glare appear in different locations. I think this was due to the curvy surface polarizing lights at many different angles.

Here's one I took with the clamp lights. I had to fiddle with the exposure a little bit on this one to make it look more similar to the flash exposure:

DSC_8915 by n8.iverson, on Flickr

Here's one I took with my sb700 bounced off the same card as the main clamp light. I didn't have a background strobe so I just let it go gray.

DSC_8918 by n8.iverson, on Flickr