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Using a DSLR for Models and Toys Photography |
What is Model and Toys Photography?
Frankly, there is no "Models and Toys Photography". It is simply a name that I make up at year 2002. At that time, I do not know how to categorize what I am doing here.
As time goes by and while I am getting older, I got to know more about photography and found out that what I am doing here is similar to "Product or Tabletop Photography". This is how a professional photographer categorize this.
Do I need a DSLR to take great photos for my models and toys?
No.
I have been using Olympus Camedia C-200 2.0 MP for 3 years, Canon IXUS30 3.2 MP for 2 years and recently bought a Canon EOS 400D DSLR camera. Base on all those years of experience, I can summarize the following formulas.
- Good Photographer + DSLR = Good Photo
- Good Photographer + PnS = Good Photo
- Bad Photographer + DSLR = Bad Photo
- Bad Photographer + PnS = Bad Photo
* DLSR - Digital Single Lens Reflex Camera. Modular in design for
professional and semi-professional.
* PnS - Point and Shoot Camera. Consumer level cameras. Cannot change lens and comes with
none or very limited accessories.
A good photographer does not need a DSLR. If you took bad photos, blame it on your skill rather than your camera.
Take a lot around my site. I hope you like the photos here. Some might wonder I must be using some super expensive equipment like a ultra high-end DSLR and a studio with ultra expensive lighting equipment for taking photos.
The truth is, at the point of writing this article, 90% of the photos on this site is taken with the ultra cheapskate method as explain on this article: "Model Photography for Beginner". I have been using the mentioned technique for years with good results.
Some might notice that the newer photos are generally better than the older photos. This does not mean I have better equipment. This simply means my skill and my understanding on photography is improving from being a complete idiot to somewhat passable.
Still not convinced? Take a look at the following samples.
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| Taken with a DSLR, EOS-400D, 18-55mm kit lens, with Tungsten white balance. No modification made beside crop and resizing. | Taken with a PnS Digital Camera, Canon IXUS30, with Tungsten white balance. No modification made beside crop and resizing. |
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| Taken with EOS-400D with EF-S 60mm USM Macro lens. No modification made beside crop and resizing. | Taken with Canon IXUS30. No modification made beside crop and resizing. |
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Yeah, right! You have a DSLR and you are preaching about not requiring one. You hypocrite bastard!
If you are rich, go ahead and buy one. If you are not familiar with your camera, having a DSLR might end up taking photos that are worst than using a PnS.
The difference in PnS and DSLR can be said like a car running on Automatic Transmission and the other on Manual Transmission. A DSLR gives you more control and in return making it harder to use but both camera will bring you to where you want to go.
For those who are on a budget, a PnS camera should suffice. I have been a PnS shooter for years and the photos that I took with it are not really bad.
This is because in the digital world, there is another gem call Photoshop. It is a tool that fill in what a DSLR can do but a PnS camera cannot do.
No matter you are using a PnS or a DSLR, you still need some post-processing work.
Consider the following.
- 100% DSLR + 0% Photoshop = Good Photo (Require very good skill and sometimes luck)
- 90% DSLR + 10% Photoshop = Good Photo
- 80% PnS + 20% Photoshop = Good Photo
A correctly taken photo reduces the post-processing work. I am taking around 200 shots in a single night and doing the 20% Photoshop work is killing me. Proper use of a DSLR camera helps me to reduce the post-processing work thus making it a good investment for me in the long run.
So, if you are taking 20 photos a month, save yourself the money and invest it on something else. Unless you want to show off to your peers that you are a professional photographer with an expensive DSLR.
Also consider the fact that you do not simply buy a DSLR camera body and that is the end of the story. You also need to consider the range of cameras, lenses and accessories that you are going to need. That is the reason why it is call the "EOS System" or "Nikon System". You do not simply buy the camera body. You will eventually buy the whole family! That is what every DSLR manufacturers are hoping for!
For a PnS user, additional Photoshop work will bring you the same result. The good point being a PnS user is that you can simply replace your camera with a new one when the price dropped and the technology becomes much better every 2 to 3 years.
A DSLR user normally will stick with his camera for at least 5 years since it is too expensive to upgrade. Switching to another brand is almost impossible. I am married to Canon now. If I divorce Canon to take Nikon as my next wife, I will lose half of my wealth by buying back all the Nikon's lens and accessories.
Do not make hasty decision on buying your first DSLR. It took me a whole year in saving up and planning for it.
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| Original photo taken with EOS 400D using EF-S 18-55mm kit lens. | Original photo taken with Olympus Camedia C-200 2.0 MP. |
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| Photos adjusted in Photoshop. Can you tell the difference between photos taken by a DSLR and a PnS? | |
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What??!! Isn't Photoshop cheating?
This is a very hard question to answer.
In harsh reality, almost everyone cheat with their photos. They do it on film and it is even easier in the digital world.
Take a look at a Bridal Studio. They are rubbing off pimples, eye bags, wrinkles and blemishes off your sister's or wife's photos.
Take a look at McDonald. Their Big Mac looks extremely big and delicious on a photo. In reality, everyone knows that they have the smallest burger around.
Moreover, how often we are being misled by "Prototype Photos" from Bandai, Takara and Medicom?
This is not really cheating. Professional calls this "Art of Photography". Sorry, I am kidding.
How much "Art" and "Reality" to depict in the photos is very much depends on the photographer. Take this site for an example. This is sort of a review site. I cannot be too "artistic" with my photos else I am not being frank with you. I always keep a principle that I will not hide imperfections away by manipulating my photos via Photoshop (CG Wallpaper is an exclusion). I am merely using Photoshop to adjust the photos' color and contrast to what is being perceived by my eyes and not what my camera has recorded.
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Enough of the preaching you long winded old man! I have a DSLR. Tell me what I need to do!
I am being long winded here is just to clarify a very important misconception about DSLR into you mind. I am going to repeat this again.
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If you already have a DSLR, please welcome me to your club. I am a late starter and you should already know what is in this article. If you don't then you are not working as hard as I do. Shame on you. Anyway, this is my setup using my Canon EOS 400D. Use this as a guideline and don't come back blaming me that this does not work. Note that every photography book will not tell you the exact setting to use. This is simply because there is no setting that works all the time. It also depends on your environment and your camera make and model. I am telling you my setup that works for me and use this as a guideline to do your own test shots. |
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General Setup
| Name | Settings | Remarks |
| Image Quality |
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| Picture Style |
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| Flash |
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| ISO |
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| Metering |
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| White Balance |
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| Shooting Mode |
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| Mirror Lockup |
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Dial Setup
| Name | Settings | Remarks |
| Av Mode (Aperture Priority) |
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| Full Manual |
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Adjustment to make while shooting
| Name | Settings | Remarks |
| 9-AF points |
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| Manual Exposure Bracketing |
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| Auto Exposure Bracketing (AEB) |
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What a lousy camera (lens)! The photos are blur!
Unless your camera or lens is defective, a blurred photo normally means poor skill. Reason your photo blurred is commonly drilled down to 3 reasons:
- Camera shake
- Shallow Depth of Field (DOF)
- Wrong focus
If your entire photo is blurred, it is most probably owing to camera shake while the shutter is open and/or sometimes wrong focusing.
If certain parts of your photo are sharp and some parts are blurred, you most probably taken your photos in a shallow Depth of Field (DOF).
Avoiding Camera Shake
* Focal Length - Distance from the center of the lens to the focus point.
* Shutter speed - The time the shutter is held open during the taking of a photo to allow
light to reach the imaging sensor.
You should not take a shot with shutter speed lower than your focal length. That is the
general rule of avoiding camera shake while handholding your camera.
This means if you are taking at 300mm focal length, you cannot lower your shutter speed
below 1/300 second. This rule applies up to 1/60 seconds and that is about the limit a human
can hold a 1 Kg and above camera dead still. Anything lower than 1/60 will most probably
blur your photos.
By knowing this makes handholding impossible for tabletop photography. You need more than a
fraction of a second exposure time to allow enough light coming into your camera.
Always use a tripod plus the following functions configured to ensure a rock steady shot:
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The DSLR is sensitive. Your finger pressing and releasing the shoot button do shake the
camera. A timer function allows the camera some time to stop shaking after your hand left
the camera. The best solution is to use a remote control since your hand is not touching the
camera at all.
Also note that, the shutter blades open and close mechanism might shake the mirror and cause
a blur shot. The "Mirror Lockup" function helps by locking the viewfinder mirror in place
just before the shot is taken preventing any internal vibration.
All these setup sound crazy but necessary for indoor tabletop shooting. The camera will not
feel it when taking a photo outdoor where your photos are taken at a fraction of second (say
1/100 seconds and above). This simply means the shutter is opened and closed so fast that
your CMOS could not capture the motion blur.
However, we are taking tabletop photos under low light condition with long exposure time. A
tripod is a must.
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Shallow DOF / Image Softness
* Depth of field (DOF) - The distance in front of and beyond the subject
that appears to be in focus. The area within the depth of field appears sharp while the
areas in front of and beyond the depth of field appear blurry.
"Depth of Field is your Enemy."
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| Photo taken with shallow-DOF at f/2.8. Notice that the near and far sections are blur while the center remain sharp. This is a shallow DOF shot. | Photo taken with full-DOF at f/16. Notice that the entire picture is sharp. |
New DSLR user like me has a tendency to use the lowest f-setting available in the lens
owing to the faster wait per shot (faster shutter speed) under low light condition.
Moreover, we had paid so much to get a fast lens.
As for tabletop or product photography, this is a big no-no here. The lower f-settings will
turn our close-up photo with "everything near" and "everything far" being out-of-focus. We
want our audience to see everything sharp, don't we?
In landscape photography, everything sharp shot is called a Full-DOF shot or an infinity
shot. To get an infinity shot, there are 3 things to consider:
- Adjust the lens to have a smaller aperture. (Higher f-settings)
- In Landscape photography, a full-DOF usually mean f/16 to f/22.
- Reduce your focal length. (a.k.a. zoom out)
- A further camera-to-subject distance.
- Place your camera further away from your subject (a.k.a. back away)
On my experiments with my EF-S 18-55mm and EF-S 60mm USM Macro lens, the about right f-setting should be at around 9.0 to 16.0. These higher the settings, it will give a full-DOF shot but expect to wait at about 2 to 30 seconds of exposure time allowing enough light coming into your camera.
"Depth of Field is also your Friend."
DOF is not really a bad thing. Instead of using a tabletop studio, some photographers prefer taking their photo at the windows under direct sunlight, they will use a photography technique to throw the background out of focus. The reason here is to isolate the subject from the background so that the audience is not distracted. This is known as a "bokeh" shot.
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| Photo taken with full-DOF at f/16. Everything is sharp and the background is distracting your attention from the subject. This is also known as "Wasting DOF". | A "Bokeh" shot taken at f/2.8. Background is blur but subject remained sharp. This guides your eye to the subject, which is the center of attention on this photo. |
Please read more on Depth of Field (DOF) on your own. The topic is too wide and I do not want to write a book on this.
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| Wrong Focusing If you are doing manual focusing, I hope you know what you are doing. In most situations, the camera Auto Focus (AF) is the way to go. They are smart enough to assist you in focusing the subject 90% of the time. I said 90% and this is because there are in some situation your camera’s AI will make a wrong decision for you. This is where the 9-AF point feature (for Canon EOS camera) comes in handy. Your viewfinder should come with 9-AF points displayed and arrange in a diamond formation. These are to manually tell the camera where it should focus on in this 10% situation where your camera cannot decide on the best focusing position. Please refer to your camera's instruction manual on how to use this feature in detail. |
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What a lousy camera (lens)! The color does not come out right!
This is most probably your white balance is wrong.
Note that all camera manufacturers assume that you take you photos in broad daylight most of the time. Thus, the camera's AI is geared towards outdoor photography. Taking photos of your models and toys indoors under the lighting condition that you setup is altogether another story. There are 3 different methods to solve this problem.
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Use the closest pre-defined white balance setup from your camera to your lighting
condition. Take the photo then adjust it in Photoshop.Your camera should come with "Tungsten" and "Fluorescent" white balance setting. If you take your photo under fluorescent light, choose the "Fluorescent" setting. Note that the camera manufacturer pre-defined these setups under the most common lightning condition. You will get a somewhat correct White Balance but it is not a 100%. Adjust your photo in Photoshop. |
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Configure your Custom White Balance settings.
Most DSLR comes with a Custom White Balance setup. This is a feature that does not come in most PnS camera. It usually involve taking a photo of a pure white surface (a piece of white cardboard comes in handy) under your current lighting and set the taken shot as your Custom White Balance. Please refer to your camera manual on how to set it up. A correctly set Custom White Balance should give you around a 90% to 100% accurate white balance. |
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White Balance BracketingThis is another advance feature in my DSLR that I have yet to try. It allow you to take multiple shots with multiple White Balance setup that you configured. You will then choose which shot has the most accurate white balance. |
You liar! I have done what you said but the color is still wrong!
Is your monitor calibrated properly?
Look for the methods to calibrate your monitor. Application like Adobe Gamma that comes with Photoshop is a good tool to start with. I will not explain in detail here. Please look for additional information somewhere else.
Also take note on the ICC profile. Your camera color space should be defaulted to sRGB. This is the standard ICC profile for web publishing. Almost all browsers interpret colors in sRGB color space. Unless you are doing magazine and press printing, you should stick with sRGB ICC Profile.
Configure you Windows Monitor Adapter to sRGB.
Also configure your Photoshop Color Management to sRGB.
Note that sRGB ICC Profile can be downloaded from the internet. Use a search engine to look for it.
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I cannot get the all white or all black background like you do. What you have forgotten to tell me? Spit it out, old man!
Have you setup a tabletop studio?
Getting the camera setup right is one half of the story. Product / Tabletop Photography involves taking photo indoors. You have to control the lighting and setup of your studio. There are basically 2 things to consider; your backdrop and your lights.
I have not changed the tabletop and lighting setup since year 2002. Please refer to my previous article on how it is done.
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| My tabletop setup ever since 2002. This photo was taken on July 2004. |
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| My current tabletop setup as at December 2006. This photo was taken on December 2006. |
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Muahahahaha! You have told me all your trade secrets, you fool! I am professional photographer now!
Learning on how to use my DSLR is not easy. Writing this article is not easy. It took me S.H.I.T.S. (Super High Intensive Testing [Self-relying] ) for a month, working on 18 reviews and another 5 days to write and compile the materials for this article.
If you have benefited from this article, I am happy for you. This mean that you have work very hard on improving your photography skill.
I can tell you all my secrets but one does not acquire Photography skill by just knowing it. You have to work your guts out on it. I can write another load of grandmother stories but at the end of the day, it is hard work, perseverance and creativity that make your work great.
Remember. You can only call yourself a professional when you can show professional work. Talking about it does not count.
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| Document Date : 03.01.2007 |
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