Sugar Cubes & Spud Guns

Yesterday I received a request for a photo of a couple of sugar cubes to be used in an article of some kind. This is a paying job! I was like, 'OH WoW, this is going to be the easiest money I've ever earned!' Oh Boy I was so excited! Oh BOY was I ever wrong!!! You see, the sugar cubes had to be on a white background, and they had to stand out. The sugar cubes are white as well. This was not an easy task and it took me all day to get a shot, and then I had to do some Photoshop trickery on it to make them stand out. I should have done that to begin with I reckon, but I wanted to get it right in the camera. I can be so stubborn sometimes. :-D I tell ya, I learned a lot about lighting today!

My set up was a light cube tent on a small table. I used two different cameras with different lenses, a Canon 30D and an Olympus E-3. Two studio lights on either side at different angles. A Canon 580ex Flashgun inside the tent with a slave eye attached and aimed at the background to make it white. I can't tell you the exact set up of all the lights as I took so many photos and rearanged the lights so much that I don't really know what the set up was on the shot that worked the best. I'm pretty sure that I had one light from direct left and the light on the background from the right and slightly behind the cubes. I gave up on the second studio light as there just wasn't enough contrast and definition in my shots with it. The biggest problem was the light shinning through the cubes making them as bright and white as the background. This has been my most difficult assignment or project to date! But it was fun and I learned a lot.

Here is my final result: (Camera: Canon 30D, Lens: Canon 28-135mm IS macro lens)
Here are my sugar cubes in action, on the Contents page:
And again in an article on page 34:
Now I need to send them an invoice and get paid! :-D

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Tonight was MRG's anual Christmas Dinner. My husband works for MRG and they always treat us to a lovely meal and a bit of fun. We all bring a £5 gift and then later draw numbers to see which gift we get. One year I got my own gift which was funny. I would have been happy with my own gift this year as well as it was chocolates! Everyone loves chocolates. Well except my Mom, and I never understood that. Most people try to bring funny or embaressing gifts for people to open. This year I got a nice keyring, which I don't need so I'll probably give it away. Peter (my husband) and this other guy got a spud gun!! With a potato attached! This lovely pub restraunt will never have us back! These two grown men spent the rest of the evening loading their spud guns with bits of potato and shooting them accross the room! I so wish I'd brought my camera now. I usualy do, don't know what possessed me! Maybe it was shooting sugar cubes all day. hhmm.