Archive for the 'Photographing Work' Category

Photo Set Up

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Last Thursday, I spent most of the day at the church where the guild holds its sales photographing work to use in future show advertisements and on their website. Our sale runs Thursday - Saturday for obvious reasons and the church apparently gives the guild favorable rental terms. It doesn’t hurt that it’s huge and that there are numerous rooms at our disposal. Some might consider it sacrilege, but we did our photographing in a small intimate annex chapel with the set up above - notice the cross behind the photo tent. It worked so well, I think I’m going to abandon photographing outside with my ghetto setup. The room was completely dark except for the lighting on the tent. We were able to get some great shots this way.

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Platter by guild member, Kathleen Laurie, photographed in our set up

Meanwhile, during the marathon photo session, a few swear words escaped our lips - and we all laughed nervously while asking for forgiveness.

I’m feeling the urge to do a little glaze testing. Last night, I dusted off my copies of Mastering Cone 6 Glazes by Hesselberth & Roy as well as my copy of The Ceramic Spectrum by Robin Hopper. I’m feeling pretty relaxed now that the sale is over and I really do need to expand my glaze palette.

My in-laws are flying up today for a few days. They didn’t want to miss my daughter’s performance at the Shakespeare Festival on Friday and then we’ll spend Mother’s day together as a family.

Tonight, my husband and I are going on a rare date. We”re going to see Justin Currie, former lead singer of Del Amitri at the Toad Tavern. I’m not normally a live music fan, but this will be in an intimite venue - so I won’t feel so claustrophobic since there shouldn’t be any large crowds to speak of.

Happy Wednesday,

~Cynthia

Photographing Ceramics

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Photo Light Tent

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Ceramic Ewer (not mine) photographed in light tent with graduated backdrop

I took a 45 minute drive to the mountains yesterday and spent the afternoon at Tim Young’s Evergreen Studio learning how to photograph ceramic work for the Colorado Potter’s Guild using his set up. The guild’s biannual sale is less than one month away and I am on a team of people who have volunteered to photograph select work from all of the members for posterity before the sale begins. Surprisingly, we used fluorescent daylight light bulbs in garage type aluminum reflectors with great success, instead of more expensive tungsten type lights. I think it’s time to upgrade my ghetto solution and head on over to Denver Pro Photo in the next week or so and invest in a better photo set up. Five of us were present for the photo shoot and as we compared cameras, I have to say, my little Olympus c-7070 held its own against the other more sophisticated cameras. I took the shot above of the ceramic ewer (artist unknown) and it is pretty true to life.

Meanwhile, Jim asked if I would reveal the name of my porcelain box from my last post - ya’ll got it right… “Birds and Bees”. I might have to get a little more creative with my titles. :D

And, Judi asked for a photo. I’ll indulge you with a 10 year old photo and one of my faves:

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Have a great week,

~Cynthia