Pen Photo. Some critique please.

Ironwood

Senior Member
I am trying to display the pen in a setting to create appeal to the viewer.

Please give me some critique, and tell me what I could have done better.

(The pen barrel is a polymer clay artwork by Toni Ransfield.)

DSC_6638.jpg
 

egosbar

Senior Member
looks good but rotate a fraction so both butterflies are equally shown , spot remove the glare in the artwork (the thin lines) in between the butterflies and on the bottom one
 
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Ironwood

Senior Member
I think it looks great, but I do see alot of dust also maybe need to reduce the glare and a tiny bit but yeah looks great.
Thanks Scott.
You must have good eyes and a good screen :p.
I removed about 300 dust spots on this photo already ( my shed needs a good clean, very dusty in there at the moment ) that black glass is a dust magnet.

looks good but rotate a fraction so both butterflies are equally shown , spot remove the glare in the artwork (the thin lines) in between the butterflies and on the bottom one

Thanks, yes in hindsight the pen should have been rotated slightly.
I don't think my PP skills are up to removing that reflection line, I will give it a try though.
 

egosbar

Senior Member
use the spot removal brush in photoshop with the hardest brush setting , slightly larger then the glare , it should work fine , if not a little cloning as well

do u have photoshop if so what version , there is a great tool in the latest camera raw for seeing dust spots
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
use the spot removal brush in photoshop with the hardest brush setting , slightly larger then the glare , it should work fine , if not a little cloning as well

do u have photoshop if so what version , there is a great tool in the latest camera raw for seeing dust spots

I dont have Photoshop, I am using Apple Aperture and the NIK plugins.

I think I will address the dust issue by setting up a spot to shoot my pen photos inside the house, in the shed/workshop the dust is an annoying problem that I can do without.
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
use the spot removal brush in photoshop with the hardest brush setting , slightly larger then the glare , it should work fine , if not a little cloning as well
I used the retouch brush in Aperture to remove the glare lines, I definitely didn't get it any where near perfect, but the lines have been reduced.

DSC_6638 - Version 3.jpg
 

Ironwood

Senior Member
Do you have a diffuser to put between the pen and lights above? Can make one pretty easily out of an old window sheer.

My lightbox has some diffuser inside, at times I add more to experiment, but when I took this photo I didn't have any extra in the box.
 

FastGlass

Senior Member
So you used a lightbox? If so than I would have thought the reflections would have been allot softer. Nice shot though. I think if you shot this for someone they would be very happy.
 

egosbar

Senior Member
the aperture fix isnt working imo , find someone with photoshop use the spot heal brush tool at hard brush setting and paint up the line , make sure you have content aware highlited
 

mac66

Senior Member
I'm no expert, but it looks fantastic. Only thing I could think of doing better, is to maybe rotate the pen down a bit, so that more of the butterflys and perhaps some of the brass clip could show in the mirror image.
 
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