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All Forums >> [Bottle Forums] >> Displaying and Photographing >> bottle pics

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bottle pics - 9/24/2003 10:21:06 PM    baltbottles   Posts: 2200 Joined: 11/25/2002 From: Baltimore Maryland Status: offline Dose anyone know a way to photograph a bottle and get a good clear pic of all the embossing and to do it with a perfectly white background. I plan to write a book on baltimore sodas and would like to include pics of all the known variations. Chris Post #: 1

RE: bottle pics - 9/29/2003 5:45:43 PM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline What kind of cameras are you using? Are you very experienced with photography? You may have to forget a brilliant (pure) white background, especially if you use a digital camera and are photographing a cobalt-blue bottle. Most of mine are photographed with a 20-percent gray background, but, even then, the angle of the camera, embossing, and lights will make the difference between a nice clear photo and one that is not acceptable to readers. A clear bottle, on the other hand, can be photographed on a white background with the proper angles of lights and embossing. You'll have to experiment a bit, but you'll get it right, but there is no real correct answer in general. Good luck with the book! _____________________________ Mike Russell Author of: The Collector's Guide to Civil War Period Bottles and Jars -- Third Edition (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 2

RE: bottle pics - 10/2/2003 7:12:48 AM    Guest one thing i have found that helps alot is a quartz PAINTERS LIGHT the lens is frosted and will throw little or no glare on the bottle.use a flat white background,(white makes a smaller file size) and stand back and zoom in. this keeps you out of the way of the light .play with the camera angle a bit and you will get real good results. i think i paid $24.00 for the light at sherwin williams paint store.it is a 500 watt bulb. the best distance for the light is about 5-6 feet. be sure to correct the white balance on the camera before you take a photo. diggerjeff (in reply to baltbottles)   Post #: 3

RE: bottle pics - 10/2/2003 7:27:02 AM    Guest One of my friends who authored a book on archaeology recently told me that publishers were very fussy about the quality of the pictures and demanded nothing short of perfection! So it might be a good idea to speak with the publishers first. If you are self-publishing another friend had a great idea. He needed some detailed photos of jewellery for a brochure and nothing he did with his top of the range digital camera produced the kind of pictures he wanted. He went to the local Art Collage and spoke with a lecturer there who gave the job to a final year student as a project! The lecturer was happy because it was a real project and the student was happy because he got some beer money. And of course the student had access to the very latest studio technology. Just an idea for you and good luck with the book! (in reply to baltbottles)   Post #: 4

RE: bottle pics - 10/3/2003 2:26:04 AM    baltbottles   Posts: 2200 Joined: 11/25/2002 From: Baltimore Maryland Status: offline Hi, Thanks everyone for the help i managed to get some better results but I am still having trouble with lighter colored and aqua bottles. Here are links to a few sample pics. I use a Sony DSC-D770 digital camera it has many features including a white balance. I use two 100 watt spot lights in the front of the bottle I move them around until I can get the embossing to show and a have a 500 watt painters light positioned above the bottle slightly behind it to provide back lighting. This setup seems to work great for darker bottles but washes out the lighter examples. Any more ideas Chris http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/soda1.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/soda2.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/soda3.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/soda4.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/soda5.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/soda6.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/med1.jpg http://www.geocities.com/baltbottles/med2.jpg (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 5

RE: bottle pics - 10/3/2003 6:45:57 PM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline Chris, I took the image of the Couley's Fountain of Health and "tweaked" it a bit with Microsoft's Photo Editor and could improve it a bit by increasing the brightness and going up one click with the contrast. These are typical aqua bottles from that period of time and won't usually come up much better. On this particular bottle, I would use a background that is a bit lighter and focus the light at the same angle but on the fountain design as long as you don't get any light flash on the fountain. Take a look at your image and mine and you will see the difference. I'll comment more a bit later (dinner's on the table). Mike Attachment (1) (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 6

RE: bottle pics - 10/3/2003 9:18:48 PM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline Hi Chris, Now, to continue... In the image produced from yours, with some "tweaking," notice that the image is lighter and more like the real bootle would like if it were in front of you. It is still aqua, of course, but the image is a brighter image now. By increasing the contrast a little, the letters and design are also more crisp. Note the design (fountain) now has the lines in the center and more lettering begins to show. If it had more contrast, the image would begin to break up with sharp lettering and it would no longer look like the actual bottle. Remember, the image I produced was from your image. That tells you that you can do it by simply playing with the image you would get from your camera. No magic was involved! The sharper image you can get, the better image you can get after working with Microsofts program or most others that will work on improving an image. Microsoft's program is inexpensive. I have other photo/design software, but I chose to go with Microsoft's for simplicity's sake. These images will all come out a bit better, but, as you indicated, the darker ones are better because of the more discerable contrast on the bottle itself. That also is why I chose to use the aqua bottle (it is more difficult to tweak). With only a little work, these images will be useful for even the most contrary publisher you can find! Mike (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 7

RE: bottle pics - 10/9/2003 6:52:06 PM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline You're welcome _____________________________ Mike Russell Author of: The Collector's Guide to Civil War Period Bottles and Jars -- Third Edition (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 8

RE: bottle pics - 10/13/2003 3:05:43 PM    Harry Pristis   Posts: 495 Joined: 7/24/2003 From: Northcentral Florida Status: offline Hello, Mike . . . Now I understand your other post about manners. But, your advice is useful for lots of readers. Thanks you! Besides the mechanics of good lighting (diffused, color-balanced light, and back-lighting), I think pix of clear bottles are improved with more aggressive use of image-processing software. I use 500w incandescent photo lamps and my x-ray film-viewer for back-lighting. Even so, the soft-ware tweeking is crucial. My first move is to jack up the "brightness" until the background is blanked out (the bottle may appear slightly washed out at this point). Then I crank up the "contrast" until the bottle image is sharp. It's hard to quantify this tweeking, it just has to be done by eye. The majority of the posted pix on this forum would benefit from this basic "brightness/contrast tweeking." If there is a shadow or other distraction in the image, I may just "erase" it. If there is a distracting flare on the bottle, this can be touched up using the "brush tool" or the "cloning tool." You just have to learn how to use these tools by practice. This is time-consuming at first, and not something everyone will enjoy doing. But try it, see how you like it. ----------Harry Pristis Attachment (1) _____________________________ ______________________________________________ Visit The Demijohn Page at: http://members.aol.com/pristis/index.html (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 9

RE: bottle pics - 10/15/2003 11:27:06 AM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline Hi Harry (and all). First, my comments posted elsewhere were general comments and not specifically aimed at anyone. Just an observation. I think your approach to photographing bottles is right on the nose, especially where you mentioned that it's not something you can get a set of specific instructions for (paraphrasing). You do have to experiment a bit and one set of "experimentations" will not necessarily work on the next bottle. For most anyone with a digital camera, it's not costly to experiment, but for someone with a 35-mm camera, my sympathies go to you. What I had mentioned before about a 15-20% gray background will work, and, if you experiment, it will produce a nice background or none at all (white), depending on the contrast / brightness found during experimenting. I'd love to see a few more pictures from the people who are reading this post. _____________________________ Mike Russell Author of: The Collector's Guide to Civil War Period Bottles and Jars -- Third Edition (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 10

RE: bottle pics - 10/16/2003 1:37:24 PM    Guest quote: I'd love to see a few more pictures from the people who are reading this post. OK here goes, please feel free to comment, I am here to learn! For the record this is an aqua Daffy's Elixir. 5 1/4 inches high and embossed on all 8 sides; TRUE DAFFY'S ELIXIR DICEY & Co. No 10. BOW CHURCH YARD LONDON Unlefs the Name (Note f for s) of DICEY & Co. Is In the Stamp Over the Cork the Medicine is Counterfeit The bottle was dug from the foundations of the gable end of a stonemasons house on Portland, Dorset, 25 years ago when he was rebuilding the wall. It was cemented inside the inner core of an 18 inch thick stone wall together with clay pipes, broken jars etc. The house deeds went back to 1840 so the bottle dates to at least this age. Attachment (1) (in reply to Pontiled)   Post #: 11

RE: bottle pics - 10/16/2003 4:55:45 PM    Harry Pristis   Posts: 495 Joined: 7/24/2003 From: Northcentral Florida Status: offline Nice bottle, Roger! What did you do to get that nice image? Lighting? Software tweeking? Background? -------------Harry Pristis _____________________________ ______________________________________________ Visit The Demijohn Page at: http://members.aol.com/pristis/index.html (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 12

RE: bottle pics - 10/16/2003 6:36:31 PM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline Harry, at this rate, I'll have to hire him to take my next pictures! _____________________________ Mike Russell Author of: The Collector's Guide to Civil War Period Bottles and Jars -- Third Edition (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 13

RE: bottle pics - 10/16/2003 7:35:24 PM    Harry Pristis   Posts: 495 Joined: 7/24/2003 From: Northcentral Florida Status: offline Mike, Have you substituted pictures for line-drawings in your new edition of "...Civil War Era Bottles..." or are you using the images somewhere else? Got a website with a description of your books? -----------Harry Pristis _____________________________ ______________________________________________ Visit The Demijohn Page at: http://members.aol.com/pristis/index.html (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 14

RE: bottle pics - 10/16/2003 11:05:21 PM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline Harry, we're still using the same line drawings since most of the readers said they showed better detail. The last edition had quite a number of new entries, updated price ranges, and a bit more text. The third edition will be the final edition as I'm getting a bit too old now to continue and there are fewer new entries now. We just installed a new computer here, so we haven't gotten around to getting a new Web site yet. I'll let you all know when we have it. Business systems are a bit more complicated, but they certainly are powerful! You have to remember that the first computer system I worked on was very primitive! The printer room was as big as the average size of a modern kitchen and everything was transferred to storage tapes for printing. When I was teaching, I was one of the "old guys" who could bring in some of the vacuum tubes and components from the old systems for the classes to actually see! I'm sure glad that we progressed! _____________________________ Mike Russell Author of: The Collector's Guide to Civil War Period Bottles and Jars -- Third Edition (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 15

RE: bottle pics - 10/19/2003 2:27:27 PM    Guest quote: What did you do to get that nice image? Lighting? Software tweeking? Background? What I do is wait for an overcast day, 100% cloud cover but not dark. In the garden I put a piece of white semi-transparent perspex on a white plastic table. The bottle goes on top on its side. Then I put my Olympus C-300 (D-550) at maximum resolution on a tripod but mounted downwards inbetween the legs. I switch it into macro mode for close ups and adjust the tripod until the bottle just fills the frame. Set the 10 sec timer and hit the button. Post processing I just play around in 'Photoimpact' until I get the desired result, which isn't that often because I really don't have a clue how photoimpact works (Yet!). (in reply to baltbottles)   Post #: 16

RE: bottle pics - 10/20/2003 12:00:19 AM    baltbottles   Posts: 2200 Joined: 11/25/2002 From: Baltimore Maryland Status: offline Hi, I want to thank everyone that has mad suggestions on my photo issues. It seams that the consensus is that you can't get perfect pictures directly from the camera. But you must use the digital darkroom of a good photo editor program to tweak the pictures. Chris (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 17

RE: bottle pics - 10/20/2003 10:04:51 AM    Pontiled   Posts: 411 Joined: 8/27/2003 Status: offline That's right Chris, the photo is just the beginning of the process. The better the photo, the better you will end up after processing it. Good luck! _____________________________ Mike Russell Author of: The Collector's Guide to Civil War Period Bottles and Jars -- Third Edition (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 18

RE: bottle pics - 10/20/2003 11:18:25 AM    lost marble   Posts: 8 Joined: 8/19/2003 Status: offline To avoid reflections there's a spray available in good photographic stores that'll give anything a temporary matt finish. Here in the UK it's called 'dulling spray'! http://www.speedgraphic.co.uk/pdfiles/p84-85.pdf (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 19

RE: bottle pics - 1/4/2004 8:00:46 AM    mercabago55   Posts: 5 Joined: 1/4/2004 From: Roebuck S.C. Status: offline Hello Out there I am the new guy (mercabago55) I have several Warners Bottles that I have had for 25 years plus.We dug most of them up, (my wife and I), in upstate N.Y. in the mid seventies. We now live in upstate South Carolina. Want to know how to show pictures on these forums. We have a digital camcorder(new). That has a memory card and I am able to load still pictures on my computer.But that is as far as Ive got. Have not taken pictures of the bottles yet. My wife has a large collection of fruit jars also. We are planning on selling these collections but want to do it so they get into the hands of collectors and not dealers. Well thats it for now hope to hear from any body with good suggestions etc. Thanks John (Jack) Curtis (in reply to baltbottles) Post #: 20

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