My first photo of a 747!

[Mike Buckley]

You thought I had photographed an airliner. Gotcha!

A good friend had seen my photo of the pasta ladle my wife gave to me and remarked that I like to make mundane objects look beautiful. She also joked that she had given her husband a stapler but that it would be difficult to make anything like that appear beautiful. I took that as a challenge. The subject in this photo is her husband's stapler.

Setup
The background is black foam core lit by a small continuous-light lamp fitted with a dark blue gel and a dark purple gel. The tabletop is black paper. A medium continuous-light lamp on the right near the rear is fitted with heavy white presentation paper to reduce the brightness and a red gel to add that color to the side of the stapler. A small continuous-light lamp high above the scene on the right side fitted with a salmon gel and a yellow gel serves two purposes. It lights a white reflector placed on the front left side of the scene that in turn brightens the front end of the stapler and helps define the shape of the curved areas. It also brightens ever so slightly the top area of the background, which creates separation between the top of the stapler and the background.

[Manfred M]

But will it fly?

[Shadowman]

Good one.

[mknittle]

But will it fly?

Bet my wife could make it fly

[mknittle]

I really like the lighting Mike.

[Wavelength]

Nice one; congrats to your wife's husband

[NorthernFocus]

You did indeed make it look good. OK, let's all start thinking up things for Mike to shoot.

[Rita]

Nice choices for the lighting and, I guess nobody can say that it isn't a 747. My thought is that your
friend is going to be very impressed.

[Dave A]

Being able to photograph everyday mundane objects and make them interesting is not easy. Well done image Mike. And you did have me going there for a moment.

Dave

[Mike Buckley]

Thanks, everyone! It was definitely an enjoyable project and in some ways very different from the norm.

[chauncey]

But will it fly?

Photoshop could attach wings...and away we go.

[madcrow]

Fabulous image, lighting and colour. Another awesome piece of work.

[bnnrcn]

You made it look beautiful Mike, very nice lighting and colors

[JAndrews]

Nice catch!

[Mike Buckley]

Continued thanks to everyone and a welcome to the forum to Jonathan!

Photoshop could attach wings

How do you know I didn't use Photoshop to remove them?