Sugar Skull

Sugar Skull
Originally uploaded by killy

I find myself needing the same things over and over again when trying to shoot stuff in the studio. Tonight, i wrote it all down and set up a priority of purchase.

I had to stop and think today. I was immediately in a whirlwind: the sugarskull was thrown down onto the table, i picked up the camera, setup a strobe/umbrellas combination and started shooting. Naturally, it was a disaster.

I felt a self loathing begin to set in so i stopped. I resisted the urge to delete every shot from my camera. I put it down. I stared and took note: the light was at the wrong angle, the zoom on the flash was not set correctly, i hadn't looked at the shape of the object at all. I picked up the camera - the exposures were all over the place.

I started over and slowly created a shot. I picked up the sugar skull and looked at it and found the shape. I set it up and composed and focused. I set the strobe/umbrella camera right and set the zoom at 85mm on the sb-600. I used an old red umbrella in front of my Vivitar 285 (@ 1/16) to add some color (no gels ... yet) and set that up directly camera left. I tested exposures with a light meter, made some minor adjustments to light placement and came away with a shot i was happy with.

So the moral of the story for me is ... slow down. Also, it troubles me that skeletons have no nose.