Studio Photography - Still Life

 

 

John set us the task of bringing in textured objects that we could make still life arrangements out of and then photograph with his Mamiya medium format digital camera (which is a gorgeous camera by the way!).

 

I used a soft box on the side, which gives a soft diffused light and spreads it evenly, and a deep reflector with the barn door accesory behind the arrangement to bring out the textures in the subject. Reflective card is also useful when doing still life photography to highlight areas that are hard to get to.

 

 

 

 

I chose to photograph a large sea shell i've had on my shelf for years and some pebbles. I asked a fellow student to hold a piece of gold reflective card just infront of it so that I could capture the detail in the wood beneath the shell because without the card, the detail was lost and looked too dark. 

 

 

 

 

I then went outside and had a look round the college grounds to find more things to photograph. I picked a sprig of Holly, some bark and some small bits of tree branch to make a christmassy still life arrangement! I used the gold card again but maybe should have positioned it a little closer as the detail below the bark is lost.