Photographing reflective surfaces in darkness?

Deleted User

Hey all,

I put some photos in the Random thread recently, with a little musing;

Deleted User wrote: »

Came across one of the newer Garda cars today. Pretty much just snapshots of it, but it made me wonder... If you wanted to take a proper shot of a Garda car, like a decent, pre-planned shoot with one... How would you do it? Presumably you'd want to show off it's features (ie; lights), so you wouldn't want to photograph it in broad daylight... Yet, you can't use flash, because it has reflective stickers all over it... Hmmm...

So, now I'm really curious, and I may be photographing a Garda car in poor light sometime soon, and I'm a bit perplexed as to what way to approach it at all.


Has anyone come across this at all? I know that if I use flash, the photos will be a bit crap because of the reflective stickers, but I don't know if it'll look too bad if a slower shutter speed is used?


For example, lets say it's 7pm, the sun has gone down, it's dry out. You've a garda car in front of you, lights flashing, doors open, big smile on it's grill... What way would you go about it?

I'd have a tripod, of course, as there's no way you'd get away with fast shutter speeds in poor light, and seen as the car is static, it won't give motion blur anyway.

If I stuck my flash in a 20x20" softbox (all i have at the moment) would it be diffused enough to not cause the reflective stickering to light up?

If I were to run around the car, popping the flash at every opportunity, would the reflective stickering being lit up all over, make the car look any better?

I don't want photos looking like this;



(Stole from Flickr via a Google search, no offence to whoever took it).


So yeah.. I'm just looking to see if anyone has any idea or if anyone has done anything similar in the past?

Cheers

challengemaster

Lucky for you've I've spent most of my last week researching car shooting techniques.... It'll be a tricky task, so if you're up for it...

You're gonna need to spend a bit of time on this one. It's going to be one giant composite shot to put together in photoshop after.

Lets try lay out a front 3/4 shot for you

Get the car set up, try get somewhere decent to shoot it too - backgrounds make all the difference. Either go with something to compliment it, or completely contrast it. Either way - for it to be a good photo, you need to think that if you removed the car from the photo, would you still consider it a good photo / worthy of looking at for more than 2 seconds.

You're going to need to break this down into a lot of photos to do it properly.

The parts of the car you want lit are:
Front
Bonnet
Side
Wheels
Roof / Roofline
Behind the car (sort of like a hair light for fashion, to make the edges stand out)
Front lights
Blue lights (if it's ASU vehicle, try get the middle bar as well)
Interior
Background/foreground

So you'll need some off camera flash, that's for sure. If you have triggers (even cactus would do) they'll be very handy.

Do them all as individual shots, and take your time.

Front shot: Just aim the flash (with/without softbox straight at the front of the car

Bonnet: Softbox on - Aiming down from above if possible should work, same for the roof/roofline, from behind the car (might have to do a long exposure + light paint for the roofline)

Wheels: Same as - just aim straight at the wheels.

The side, you have a few options, and I've no idea which if any will work right.

First option is to try a long exposure and see if it comes out right
Second option is long exposure + light paint with the softbox on
Third option is bounce the flash off the ground and hope that works

For the front lights - Turn 'em on and expose just for the lights. Then take another shot exposing for the light they're casting on the ground

Use the same technique for the blue lights and it should work

Interior shot, just pop a flash off through the passenger side window aiming towards the driver seat, should work

Make sure to get a shot where the BG/FG are properly exposed too

Now, you've a LOT of photos - Into photoshop with them all - Layer them one on top of another, and using layer masks, slowly add each component back until you've got a decent exposure of everything

Then go about your usual processing - clone/heal whatever needs doing, brightness/contrast, levels, etc...

Like I said, it's a LOT of work for one shot, but if its done well it'll look amazing.

Some tips:
Bring spare batteries (for flashgun & camera)
Try get an angle that compliments the cars shape
Don't have anything in the background like poles, wires, etc coming OUT of the car
Try not to have any conflicting lines breaking the lines of the car - eg, slanted wall behind the car

I know there's a LOT of info there, so I hope it's not too confusing. Just ask if you've any questions, and Best of luck with the shoot

What an apt username :pac:


Cheers, though. Normally I'd never have thought about firing off any more than one photo, so I'm really gonna have to do a retake of the whole situation.

I read the post, but I'll have to read it a few more times, slowly and whilst googling, to appreciate it properly.

Cheers ChallengeMaster. I'm sure you'll hear back from me (if not before I take the photo, then you'll definitely see a "poor me" thread, with a load of crap photos after I've taken it!)

SetOverSet

I'm a total noob when it comes to lighting but as regards the reflective stickers, I'd say the key is to make sure your light source is outside the family of angles seen by the lens... That flickr sample you posted looks like it was taken with on-camera flash.

challengemaster

Well, you could cut down the number of shots with more flashguns/strobes, but it's do-able with one.

As I said, feel free to ask advice on anything - if it's something I said that doesn't make sense, or even if you want advice on post processing. The main reason I can think of why I improved my photography is because of people on here helping me out, so I've no problems helping out someone else when I can

Well I have two flashguns, and have wireless triggers for both. However, neither have stands. I do have a softbox & stand set up I got off ebay, which can be used without the softbox (so i can put a bare flash on top).

I have one of those diffuser cap things that slides onto the flashes head. Well, I have three of them, but they're different colours (white, blue, yellow) so only one flash can use them at a time.


I'm looking at the diagram SOS posted, and I'm not sure if it'll apply to the stickers on a Garda car? I think that regardless of the angles used, once the reflective panel lights up, it can be seen from any direction (though I am curious).

challengemaster

Deleted User wrote: »

Well I have two flashguns, and have wireless triggers for both. However, neither have stands. I do have a softbox & stand set up I got off ebay, which can be used without the softbox (so i can put a bare flash on top).

I have one of those diffuser cap things that slides onto the flashes head. Well, I have three of them, but they're different colours (white, blue, yellow) so only one flash can use them at a time.

I'd avoid using diffuser caps and gels/colours - they'll screw up the white balance even more making your life harder, and more often than not, a bare flash is better than a diffused one.

I'm looking at the diagram SOS posted, and I'm not sure if it'll apply to the stickers on a Garda car? I think that regardless of the angles used, once the reflective panel lights up, it can be seen from any direction (though I am curious).

Your guess is as good as mine here, I've never done anything with garda livery before.

You could try using a circular polariser to minimise the reflections, although i'm not sure how well it would work.

Never thought of a circular polariser. Don't actually think I have one though (bought new lens recently, diameter is bigger than old one).


It's an interesting one alright. I think I might pop into my station some night in the early hours. They don't seem to mind me mooching about the car park. I'd like to try out different angles and pointing the flash in different directions and such.

I wouldn't use the coloured diffusers on the flashguns, but I wouldn't think the white one could cause any issues, could it? Flash lighting is why anyway, is it not?

challengemaster

Reason that diffusers aren't normally used on flashguns for car shots is it creates larger hotspots on the car, which don't look natural. It's normally either bare flash or something large enough to get a clean, even reflection...

Ah.. I thought bare flash would make a more noticeable hot spot!? To be honest, I thought bare flash would leave a small rectangular blown out white streak on the car?

I have a circular 5-in-1 reflector. I think when I take the outside covers off it, it's centre is a big diffuser. Could be usefuly to fire a flash through?

I'll have to think (and Google) a fair bit. Might not even get to shoot the car, but it seems like I may, so I'm gonna keep on looking for info while I can.


I'm useless with Post Processing, so I'm just trying to keep it to a minimum. Your first poist, CM, is intriguing, but as much as I know it makes sense, I don't know if I'd have the patience.

Borderfox

Paddy was looking for an article so I scanned it in here http://pix.ie/keithjack/album/379276

hi_im_fil

Would lightpaining the car rather than using a flash work better?

Paddy@CIRL

What Callum has suggested maybe one right way to do it, but it is far too complicated and too difficult for anyone who is apprehensive going into a shoot like this.

The golden rule for automotive is K.I.S.S. especially if you are anyway unsure.

I'd be looking at a golden hour shoot, some nice fast prime lenses and bracketed exposures. Storyboard the shoot and search for a location beforehand. Simples.

Paddy@CIRL

Paddy@CIRL wrote: »

The golden rule for automotive is K.I.S.S. especially if you are anyway unsure.

I'd be looking at a golden hour shoot, some nice fast prime lenses and bracketed exposures. Storyboard the shoot and search for a location beforehand. Simples.

I'm fairly lucky to be even getting the Garda car, to be honest. I'd never get KISS to make an appearance, too. :P

The location has already been decided (a car park) and the time is a time when the station isn't busy, and the car is available. I've stressed that broad daylight is no good to me (I want to accentuate the strobes and lightbar) but out from that, it's really all being played by ear so far. Might not even get the car (though they've practically already said yes, just need it properly confirmed).

Paddy@CIRL

Even if you are restricted, I'd still scout out the area beforehand and have everything prepared beforehand so the shoot is quick, painless and not too inconvenient.

Watch the lines on the ground in the carpark as they can be quite distracting, also try and minimize any background distractions.

Take a look through this post and you might get some ideas of how to make the distractions work for you : http://speedhunters.com/archive/2010/08/12/photo-roll-gt-gt-lotus-exige-by-andrew-thompson.aspx

Best of luck with it !