LIGHTS! CAMERA! …CLICK!
Basic Techniques for Taking Digital Pictures of Your Miniatures
Ahhh…. Another job well done, you’ve just finished you latest masterpiece, the paint is barely dry and you’re already thinking of a list people to show it to, your parents, your kids, even your significant other, but what then? You’ve thought about posting it on a few forums and possible entering it in a couple of online painting contests but that requires you to submit a picture of it, the problem is you can’t seen to take a half descent picture to save your life. Here are a few easy techniques I use when taking pictures of my work for posting on forums.
Background
Create a SIMPLE backdrop, remember, you’re trying to showcase your mini not your room. Clutter in the background will distract the viewer from your focal point (your mini). It may also make it difficult for your camera to focus on your mini if it sees multiple objects in the shot that are at different distances from the camera, it will try to get them all in focus but it can’t, so some items will be in focus and some (most likely your mini) will not. (This applies if you are using the auto focus option on your camera)
When choosing a background the idea is to keep it as simple as possible. The colour of your background will have an effect on how well you subject stands out from it, for example taking a photo of a blue Space Marine against a blue background isn’t a good idea, the picture will appear too flat however the same blue Space Marine against a red background will stand out quite a bite more.
While the idea is to keep the background simple, too simple can be boring, to spice it up a bit without over complicating it, I use a simple gradients that I can quickly print off using any basic photo editing software. I use two colours, a contrasting colour to the mini and white. I’ll usually have the coloured portion on the bottom of the backdrop, which will transition to white on the top of the backdrop, this, in my opinion gives the bottom of the picture more weight, making it appear more balanced, but this is just my preference.
Another thing to note, on dark coloured miniatures I use a lighter background and on light coloured minis I use a darker background, this is just one more contrast that allows the miniature to stand out more.
Close-Up Shots
Try and get the camera as close as possible to the mini, using the digital zoom on the camera doesn’t actually get you closer to the object but rather it blows up the image that it already sees, now depending on your camera settings (Specifically the resolution) this may cause very obvious pixilation the final image, so, always try to get the camera as close to the miniature as possible then use the zoom function if necessary. If this fails you can adjust the image in the photo editing stage (see the bottom of this article)
Focus
Focus the image, if you’re going through the trouble of paying attention to the detail on your model or you have laboured over the best free hand work you have ever done, we want to see it! Nothing annoys me more than posts from someone raving about their work then seeing an image of a barely recognizable lump of plastic or metal. More than likely you will get ridiculed more for a blurred picture than a less than spectacular paint job.
Sometimes when you’ve got the subject focused appropriately then you snap the picture it still comes out blurry… why? Well that’s pretty simple to answer…. you moved the camera slightly while you snapped the picture, a very common problem, one that I’m guilty of as well. There are a few ways to resolve this issue.
· Don’t have any caffeinated beverages just before a photo shoot
· Pick up an inexpensive mini tripod for your camera $10-$20, be sure to get one that fits your specific camera, some are not generic and you might be miffed when you get it home and it won’t fit onto your camera
· Brace your camera on something, such as a stack of books.
· Lightly and slowly press the shutter button, don’t worry, your mini might look great but it won’t be running away from you, being heavy handed and quick here will surely result in blurred pictures
· If you camera has a “timer” option, use it, then you’ll be guaranteed not to move the camera while taking the picture
Just as a side note, my camera has an auto-focus feature, if I slightly press the shutter button half way the camera will project a sensor light on to the subject and auto-focus based on it’s distance to the camera, pressing the shutter button the remaining half way finalizes the shot and the picture is taken. If I press the shutter button down all of the way too quickly the camera doesn’t have a chance to auto-focus and the final shot may be blurred.
Camera Settings
I don’t know how to classify this, either in “Focus” or “Close Up Shots” because it sort of fits in both categories we’ll fit this into “Camera Settings”.
Back when I first started taking pictures of my work I wondered how everyone else was getting such clear and close shots of their minis. I would get close to the mini with the camera but then the focus would be way off, so, I would get some distance between the camera and the mini, enough that I could focus but the mini would be so darn small that I couldn’t see the detail…how the heck did they do that?
Answer, the “MACRO” button, on most digital cameras today, even the lower end ones there is a setting on the camera called “MACRO” it’s usually identified by a flower icon, this feature is intended to be used when taking extreme close up shots. Normally, if you were to take a picture 6”-12” from the subject with this feature not set properly no amount of fiddling will get the image focused, change your setting to “MACRO” and …. Voila!! A clearer image, I would like to tell you how to do this but seeing as how there are numerous camera manufacturers out there and each with a different level of quality, it’s best that you read you owner’s manual and figure out how to do it. I will tell you this, if you haven’t done it yet, you will kick yourself in the butt for not doing it sooner.
Another setting that you should be familiar with is “resolution”, as with the Macro setting, the procedure for doing this may differ depending on the brand and quality of camera that you have, so it’s best to check the owner’s manual on how to do this.
This setting will be sort of a “Trade Off”, quality for size. The higher the resolution the better the quality of the final image (especially if you intend to blow it up) but the more memory it will consume on your storage device and the longer it will take to transfer (upload or download). Capturing the image with a lower resolution setting will minimize the storage space required on your device and speed up data transfers (uploading and downloading) but your image quality will suffer (this is usually a concern if you intend to crop the image and blow it up). This setting is a personal preference sort of thing, for the record I usually have mine maxed out when taking shots of my mini’s but I reduce the settings when I go on a site seeing trip that I know I will need to take a lot of pictures.
Lighting
Have plenty of light, digital camera’s require a lot of light when taking a picture, the room or area might look bright to you but it still may not be bright enough for the camera.
With bright light comes strong shadows there are a couple of tricks that you can do to help minimize this.
· Trick number one, use multiple light sources, three are the norm, place 1 to the left… 1 to the right… and 1 above the subject, this not only give great light coverage but the light on the left of the subject will cancel (or at least minimize) the shadow cast by the light on the right of the subject… and so on.
· Trick number two, don’t place the subject right against the background, try and place it at least as far away from the background as the subject is tall (in other words, if the mini is 2” tall, place it at least 2” out from the background).
· The last trick I know, at this point, is, use a curved background, this not only helps with reducing the hard shadows cast on the background but it also eliminates the unsightly seam of the floor (desktop) meeting the background
Yes another note… to quote a famous poet “To flash or not to flash, that is the question” ok, that wasn’t a direct quote but that is the question that gets asked a lot. Some will say use it, others will swear up and down that you shouldn’t, my best advise it do both and pick the one that looks best to you. Keep in mind that without adequate lighting the flash will cast a harsh shadow on your background, if your model is glossy the model will reflect a lot of that flash back at the camera, not good. Using a flash too close to the subject, if it’s a light color may result in over exposure. Some lighting issues can be fixed with photo editing software (see below).
Photo Editing
Well now that we have the digital photo, is it as good as it’s going to get? Well, not really. This is a somewhat controversial topic, especially because it’s your painting or conversion work that you’re trying to show off not your skills with Photoshop. The reason that it’s so controversial is because with today’s technology a digital image can be reworked to look totally different than the original image. It is for this reason that I implore you not to fall into the photo editing scam, show us your work for what it is and not what it was meant to be.
There are several variables that can make your original image appear different than what you see with the naked eye.
· Overall size, the image in the picture will obviously be larger than the actual figure, hence, mistakes will be more prominent as well, refrain from trying to “fix” these mistakes through photo manipulation. By repairing these flaws in your work through photo editing you are misrepresenting your skills as a painter or modeller and yes, you are fooling us as the viewer, but in the end you are just fooling yourself.
· Lighting, the naked eye is more sensitive to light than your digital camera, this is why you need to project an excessive amount of light on you subject.
· Camera quality, it’s a no brainer that the better the camera the better the final image (this is mostly a result of using a higher resolution that is available on more expensive camera’s)
The only items that I personally find acceptable when editing a photo are light balancing, cropping and resizing. The reason that these editing functions are acceptable is they don’t change the representation of your work.
To sum it up
There are more complicated ways and there is definitely more expensive equipment that can be used to get excellent results when taking pictures of your miniatures, but let’s face it we would much rather spend our time and hard earned money on painting the models and playing the game than building a professional studio to take a picture of a …. are you ready for it …. toy.
Keep in mind, photography is an art in itself, and as with anything, it does take practice and a certain amount of tweaking to develop a system that works for you. These were a few of the basics to get you started.
While there are only two guarantees in life; death and taxes, I am fairly confident in saying that following these 6 simple techniques will improve the overall quality of your pictures.
I’m looking forward to seeing your pics on the Wartube Forum.
Thumper7458
Subject: Lights ... Camera .... Click 
