The subject of photography has come up several times in the past,
but I hope you can help me with a specific question about equipment.
I’m going to be submitting my work for consideration in several art
festivals, so of course I have to prepare for the dreaded jury
photos. Would it be better to purchase something like the EZcube
lightbox or go with something interesting I saw in my Grande catalog
called an “infinity board” ). Do you have an opinion on which of
these would be better ? Or is another option my best choice
Check out the light boxes at thelittlecameras.com. Light boxes of
almost any size and configuration are available and work on a much
different (and better) principle than the EZ Cubes. A single light
is all that is needed for soft, even illumination…happy to make
one in any size for you…
The ez cube and the infinity board do different things. EZ cubes
(and similar white shooting environments) are designed to even out
the light that reaches the object, but more importantly, they’re
designed to minimize environmental reflections in the object being
photographed. (try shooting a big steel ball-bearing. It’s nothing
but a great huge mirror, and reflects everything in the room with
it, including you, your camera, your tripod, and your lunch over on
the next table.) Jewelry items, especially silver holloware, are the
same problem: they’re giant mirrors. The white boxes are designed to
give them nothing but blank white to reflect. I’ve used (and made) a
number of EZ cube like systems, and I’m currently using the midsized
EZ cube, even in preference to one I made myself. (With a few
modifications, naturally.) It’s well made, and a very simple, easy
to use system. (The people who make it are just down the road from
me, and good folks. Thus I give them money.)
The infinity board is a backdrop designed to hide the table you’re
shooting on. The EZ cube has a row of grommets at the top rear to
allow you to rig up something similar with colored art paper for
roughly 1/10 the cost. (Try shooting on fancy papers from an art
supply store. You can get some really amazing textures that way.)
The infinity board (while a good idea) won’t do anything about
environmental reflections. If I were planning to shoot with one, I’d
rig a soft box (Big huge light diffuser) over it, and shoot in the
middle of a very large, very empty, blacked out room. Lacking that
sort of studio space, you’ll need to do something to control your
reflections.
Alaina - despite what anyone says to you, jury slides ARE judged
with the current fad in mind.
There STYLE FORMATS of photography for slides but i have never been
able to get the jury to tell me what style format they want to see
and each jury has a preferance to which style format they want thier
own applicants to submit.
perhaps you should focus on networking with the show you are
planning to submit to prior to spending loads of cash on the
entrance and jury fee not to mention the horendous expense of
producing pictorial pieces of your work and the emotional and
physical strain of the effort it takes to get this action
accomplished.
if i ever submit to a juried show again my plan is to go to the show
and personally find out if i can sleuth out & get in touch with
those photographers that took the winning juried slides and then
have those folk shoot my work for that particular juried show
entrance application
I am new to this forum. I would like to know this too. The
guidelines for the photos are a mile long nowadays. I am not all that
great with jewelry photos so I use Joe Byrne for them. He’s the most
reasonable I’ve found so far.
Here’s his Number and email: (408) 946 4756 & Joe Byrne [jbyrne at
gmail dot com] He charges $25 for a photo.
If you want to check the quality you can visit my web at KushlaniHall.com
If you decide on a light box, http://www.cyberguys.com SKU#16007
offers a compact photo-studio-in-a-box for $49. It includes a light
box, (2) adjustable lights and a tripod. The lights are
color-corrected to 2800 kelvin, but I imagine that other bulbs could
be purchased if desired. All-in-all, it looks like a nifty kit. I’ve
purchased many items from Cyberguys.com (although not this item) and
never been disappointed.
It is very similar to Item#: 204 0900 which is also available at
your friendly local WalMart. While this box is good and easy to
store, the lights are almost useless. I have kept mine and use them
to fill in a shadow from time to time, more light is needed. More
light allows for higher F stops… this gives greater depth of field.
This is very important for shooting jewelry with any camera. These
are
awesome lights: 55 Watt Trumpet Top Item# TT-CFL-5K-55W They will
screw into a regular socket and hardware store reflector. This web
site has these lamps and light sets based on them. The light is soft
and cool. There is virtually no heat. A must in Arizona! http://store.tabletopstudio-store.com/ To get it right you sometimes
just have to invest.