Colorful Glassware with Unique Shapes

[Mike Buckley]

Spring is always a good time for visiting yard sales to look for inexpensive subjects for tabletop photography. That's how I obtained these very cheap glasses (less than $1 each).

Setup
The tabletop is clear glass underneath translucent art paper with metallic threads. The background is translucent white acrylic positioned to fill the frame no more and no less. A medium continuous-light lamp fitted with yellow and salmon gels shining from behind the background toward the subjects creates the vignette and the dark outline of the glassware. A small continuous-light lamp fitted with a diffusion sock to reduce its brightness lights the tabletop from below.

[mknittle]

Thanks mike,

[just me]

Spring is always a good time to visit yard sales for inexpensive subjects for tabletop photography. That's how I obtained these very cheap glasses (less than $1 each).

Setup
The tabletop is clear glass underneath translucent art paper with metallic threads. The background is translucent white acrylic positioned to fill the frame no more and no less. A medium continuous-light lamp fitted with yellow and salmon gels shining from behind the background toward the subjects creates the vignette and the dark outline of the glassware. A small continuous-light lamp fitted with a diffusion sock to reduce its brightness lights the tabletop from below.

Very nice ........

[Shadowman]

Nice colors and shapes. That stem alone could make for a good subject.

[mugge]

Mike, as usual, stunning. I'll have a try at something like this - some day.
Cheers Ole

[James G]

Mike, simply beautiful. This image has made my morning
I tell my friends and anyone else who will listen that I got into photography because I'm fascinated by light.Your images are captivating and true symphonies of light! (Wow... lyrical or what! )

[bnnrcn]

Very nice Mike Does the image need just a little bit rotating anti clockwise or is it my eyes?

[Mike Buckley]

Thank you, everyone!

Binnur: You might be correct about the slight tilt. My camera's electronic level indicates that the image is level. Close examination of the middle glass stem's left side indicates that the correction you suggested is in order. However, the right side of the same stem indicates a true vertical.

On the subject of straightening, I did something with this image I've never done before. The lens is 35mm and was pointing down, which caused the outer two glasses to suffer noticeable perspective distortion. I liked the composition and other details so much that I didn't want to risk losing something using software to correct the distortion. So, I tilted the outer two glasses in the physical scene to the point that the perspective distortion created by the lens made them appear vertical. Cute, huh?!

[TonyW]

This is a fascinating composition and the lighting complements the colours in the glasses. I like the effect of the refractions in the spheres in the stem of the middle glass and in other places. The more I look at it, the more I see in it.

If there is any straightening needed, it is not bad enough to worry me at all. The explanation of the camera pointing down would mean that the stem of the central glass would look narrower towards the bottom but it actually looks slightly fatter. The top of the central glass slopes down to the right but all of these could quite easily be due to irregularities in the glass itself.

[Tony Britton]

These are really excellent. The color and lighting is fantastic.

Tony

[rpcrowe]

Nicely done Mike...

[Rob Ekins]

Very nice Mike,
I usually try and work out your set up before reading your set up notes, this time I nailed it.....so again thanks for adding those notes it really does help me learn.

FYI,
While I was pixel peeping I noticed a few dust bunnies around the central piece.

[Mike Buckley]

Continued thanks to everyone!

Robbie: When I shine light through the translucent acrylic background, people occasionally mention dust bunnies even though I know my sensor is clean and even though I have carefully reviewed all areas of the image at 100% and taken care of any issues. My hunch is that between the acrylic and the two gels, light is occasionally not transmitted perfectly evenly (though considering that the gels are behind the acrylic, any of their imperfections would be blurred by the acrylic). This perhaps gives the impressions of dust bunnies.

Please let me know if it would be helpful to post the setup details in a second message rather than the first to make it easier to review the image before reviewing the details of the setup.

[KimC]

Hi Mike. I saw this shot earlier this week, but I wanted to wait and see it on my monitor. I must say, this is one of my favorite images of yours -- I love the colors and lighting, and what I like best is that it gets my imagination going -- thinking of sitting at some chic bar in a beautiful city.

[Mike Buckley]

Thanks, Kim!

thinking of sitting at some chic bar in a beautiful city.

Your reaction is especially helpful to know, as I often think the same thing as I'm making images of glassware.

[Rob Ekins]

Continued thanks to everyone!
Please let me know if it would be helpful to post the setup details in a second message rather than the first to make it easier to review the image before reviewing the details of the setup.

Thanks Mike,
No need to go to extra trouble I can just scroll to where I need to be.

[joebranko]

Brilliant!