Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Experiments with Lighting



I've been trying out different lighting sources for my books. As you can't count on having a lot of light in Canada in the winter, I decided to invest in a couple of Ego digital imaging lights. They are supposed to provide soft, even light that mimics natural light.


I've tried them out, and they do create a nice, soft light, but I'm finding that my pictures are too dark. I have a feeling that the problem is with my picture taking abilities not with the lights, though.


Here is a pic taken with the Ego lights, without any extra light in the room:




As you can see, it's toooo daaaark!






Next, I took a pic of this purple journal with a combination of natural light coming in through the window, plus an ego light. Looks better, but still kind of dark. Next time I take photos, I'm going to try fiddling with the white balance on my camera to see it that makes a difference.











2 comments:

Linda said...

I tend to only use natural light for my photos, but then tinker (very slightly) with them using Photoshop Elements. I don't do much -- usually it's just brightening them up a bit -- but it really makes a big difference between yuck and nice.

We get about the same sort of light in Calgary. :-(

moonandhare said...

Photoshop definitely makes a difference. I was looking at my "before" and "after" photos yesterday, and I can't believe how dark the non-Photoshopped ones looked.

I hear you about Calgary--I used to live in Edmonton, where there's no light at all in the winter...