[Edited and thumbnailed the big 1911 picture]
Agreed-- the subject looks good (illustration), but IMHO could use some more cropping and less in-focus distracting background "stuff". The mag and Optima could be left out since they don't seem to be relevant to the 'story'.
It can be hard to get good gun pictures. I typically take a couple dozen just to get one acceptable one. Flash and glare are the usual culprits-- the real photo boys have equipment to handle that, but with a point-n-shoot camera, you have to get creative. Add in all the extra light you can get-- table lamps, windows, etc
The old-standard side-view portrait can be boring unless the blaster in question is significantly different and interesting. Put a little angle onto it and you'll also cut out a lot of your glare problems.
Backdrops are tricky-- I like something non-white, but contrasting and with some texture to it. Try and lift the gun off the background if possible (the single-stack is lying on something small that lifts it about 3/4"). If you lie the gun on the background for a picture, throw some extra light in from the sides to cut down on shadows (the singlestack photo has this as well). If you're taking a chromed gun, pure black backdrops can cause the camera to pour on even more flash, which you probably don't need.
Both of these were taken with a point-and-shoot digital camera-- I usually shoot from as far away as possible and zoom in just to get the flash further away from the subject, and sometimes stick a swatch of scotch tape over the flash as well, to soften it.
Here's one of my favorite shots. It's on the artsy side and there's some stuff wrong with it (go ahead, pick it apart), but there's a few things that came out right; because there aren't any polished parts (except the magwell) aimed directly at the camera, the flash didn't cause excessive glare. The background has some texture to it, but nothing distracting.
Here's another one.. this time a single-stack. The full-sized version is a bit large and should probably be sized down a bit for regular posting.
Click the picture to get the full-sized shot.
Again the slight angle adds some interest and gets big flat reflecting surfaces away from the direct line-of-flash.
If you do any digital editing, always edit in full resolution and only size down at the very end.
Edited by shred, 03 September 2007 - 12:34 PM.
fixed old photo link
