Light tents
 

Can anyone recommend a light tent for photographing small items? About 50cm on each side. The EZCube is rather pricey but probably well made. There are similar ones on ebay going for much much less i.e. £30 down to about £4 + P&P. But of course the concern is that they might be rubbish. I know from experience that much of the cheap Chinese made stuff on ebay is tat.

Kind of depends on your requirements Leif. I seem to remember Wolfie posting a DIY job made from a collapsible mini laundry bin. It has stuck in my mind each time I've seen one.

So the starter question is really, off the shelf, or DIY.

Don

Hello Don. Well I could buy a transparent plastic container, and line it with translucent material at little cost. But I'd like something that folds up. The ones I have seen are a cube and fold into a flat pack. I have a Lastolite light tent that is like a teepee when unfolded, but it's a nightmare to use. It cost £70 too. Grrrr.

Leif

:eek: :eek: :eek:

Leif,

Plastic is not the best material. I will search for Harry's post before going further.

Don

No need to search Don. What I use most of the time is the wife's dirty linen basket (well it's mine now).
Actually it's not a basket, but a wooden frame that supports a canvas bag. Somehow the bag got lost.
what I do is drape a white sheet over it and hey-presto a light tent.

Recently (two weeks ago) I purchased a "Portable soft lighting studio" £13 from Maplins http://www.maplin.co.uk/Search.aspx?...2m12&source=15

This folds down flat with a carrying handle. I'm highly delighted with it, although it doesn't totally replace the "Linen Basket"

This is the one and only photo, that I've taken using the "Portable soft lighting studio"
http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j1...ynextyear1.jpg

Well there you go Harry. Saved me time doing a search so I can spend it looking at another of your crackers.

Don

Thanks Don.

The only problem I see with the Maplins "studio" is the slightly larger "Grain" of the material used, which gives the effect of "noise" especially when using a very small aperture.

Just as point of interest is noise apparent on the flower shot? or is it just my imagination.

Harry

That's a very nicely lit image Wolfie. What lighting did you use? BTW I see no 'noise' in the image. There is a slight large scale variation of the background which makes it looks like you photographed against a sky.

Harry I do not see noise but at a close look I think the background is a bit close to coming into focus. A good example to add coarseness of material into the equation. This was something I noticed with the newer Lastolite reflectors. Mine is 20 years old and is not as fine a material as Foxys.

Not sure of Leifs application, but if you have shots where you have used different materials it may be worth a post of side by side.

Don

Don.

Yes it's certainly to do with the coarseness of the material, coupled with the small f/stop, as you know I'm viewing on a 1600 x 1200 res. LCD. Maybe that's why I tend to see the grain of the fabric which then makes the image look a little noisy.

Leif.

The lighting. well actually quite a lot :)
My Canon twin light macro flash, with the Sigma Super and two Jessops mini-cells as slaves + 2 halogen desk lamps.

Will take a photo of the set-up to show how the lights where arranged, this I will upload a little later in the day.

The two desk lamps where placed behind the "Maplins Light Studio" The heads where angled at approx 70 deg to give a gradation from darker at the bottom to lighter at the top.

This was an attempt to give the impression that the photo was taken outside. I then selected the blue channel in levels to achieve the shade of blue that we would get on a beautiful sunny day.

Harry

Leif

Here are two photo's 1. showing the Maplins portable Light Studio and the lighting set-up (the second flash head of the macro flash can just be seen)

http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j1...Lighttent2.jpg

Photo 2. The result with just minimal processing.

http://i79.photobucket.com/albums/j1.../Lighttent.jpg

Harry

Good grief Harry !!!!

After pic one I will consider myself lights limited. :)

Don

I've used one of those clothes airers that you stick over the bath, drape a thin white sheet over it and you have a light tent.

BTW, great picture Harry.

Thanks Harry. I'm impressed and rather overwhelmed by your setup. You could stage the olympics under that lighting rig. I take it you used all those flash units because you had them, and not because they are better than desk lamps?

I have been toying with the idea of getting a macro flash, but maybe next year. I've spent too much on toys of late. :D

Leif

In case anyone is interested, I gave in and bought one of these Maplin gadgets. You can't go wrong for the price, which is a mere £13. It's quite decently made and comes with black, grey and blue backgrounds. The only real criticism I have is the lack of a white background.

I've attached a few attempts, using three table lamps which cost £5 each from Asda.

For those who are interested, the first watch is an old 1953 Jaeger Lecoultre inherited from my great uncle. It is rather a beautiful design, but it has seen better days. The other watch is a modern automatic, and the spinning wheel, visible through the display back, is the balance wheel which regulates the speed of the timepiece.

These are early attempts, and I think they are okay, but there's a lot of room for improvement. (Criticism is welcome.)

Anyway, I can recommend the Maplins gadget. Thanks Harry/Wolfie.

Very good results Leif.

No. 1 would always be very tricky due to its age. As No. 2 is in mint condition, with no marks that come with age, it is really SUPERB. I remember a previous image of yours using these lights and that was also seriously impressive.

Don

Hello Don. I'm stuck between being flattered by your comments, and annoyed that you have not passed on some of your experience. :D The first one has a few hotspots, and I would like to control those a bit more. There's also some loss of detail over part of the dial. So I think there is room for improvement. I photographed the dial of the modern watch, and the results were poor. Part of the problem is cleaning the surfaces. How do you clean your cameras, especially the polished metal? You always seem to get such good results.

Leif

Leif,

Sorry about that. My visit last night was a bit brief at the end of a long workshop day so my head was involved in other things.

Cleaning : I use a drop of ' Mr Muscle ' glass cleaner sprayed onto ' Bounty ' kitchen roll - just enough and not too wet. After much testing I have found this kitchen roll to be softer than others so does not cause scratching. At this point I do not touch the subject with fingers but hold it in a seperate piece of tissue. An occasional blow over with a rocket air or similar blower will shift any settling dust.

When setting up the subject I do an initial placement of lights then determine the preferred camera angle. Position of the lights is then fine tuned to reduce/eliminate hot spots. With this light tent you have the advantage over me of being able to use cheap lights, but my advantage is that I have far greater flexibilty of direction of lights relative to the subject.

To return to your pic no. 2. A great subject for watching how light positioning affects the result as it has a lot of angled polished surfaces. Reflection from the white diffused surface contrasting with the dark area's that are not affected. The light on the centre ( movement ) area is totally brilliant and if you look at a far tighter crop you will see what I mean. Pieces of black art card could have been placed inside the tent to limit the area of the casing receiving the white reflection if you wanted to create more form. Compare left and right hand sides to see what I mean.

As none of us are playing with full studio lighting set ups that would allow taking on almost anything, whatever set up we have will limit us in some way.

My first tip, which is probably a bit unconventional is to forget any books, until you have had a good play. Find a subject that YOU WOULD REALLY LIKE to take a pic of and so are really prepared to spend time on. I cannot stress enough that the subject should really appeal to YOU and not be a subject primarily directed to pleasing others. ( At this stage I had to tell Foxy he did not really have to hug it :rolleyes: , but needed to really get involved with it ) Take a pic then leaving the camera and subject set, move the lights a bit. Take another pic and compare the results. Repeat and compare with your first and second pics. Look for how moving the lights has changed the results. If you cannot move the reflecting light surfaces as in this particular tent then ' Bluetak ' to the rescue. I use Bluetak, bits of wood. metal, wire, plastic, pipe insulation foam, anything that I can use to change the subject angle that will not show in the final pic.

Please add a pic of your set up with final result as it helps to understand how to overcome any probs you have. Also how to achieve superb results on a limited budget.

Don

Hi Lief,

Firstly I would say that highlights (or hotspots as suggested to Don) are not all bad and I would be dissappointed myself it the image had not had them!

One thing I found with highly reflective surfaces such as watches and trying to capture the detail of any engraving was to surround the area where the camera is with a dark cloth, you may have to move it around, some above and below - if your using the maplin portable studio device maybe draping a dark cloth over the upper part might also work. It's the opposite of the principal behind light tents but it does work.

But remember it is a reflective surface and IMHO it's better that the final image shows this.

Another tip and I don't know if your doing so but if you can shoot linked to a laptop you'll get a larger preview and can see any changes you make better.

Regards

Jon

Hello Don. LOL. Excellent! Many thanks for taking the trouble to post a very informative post. At this stage it is a question more of luck than skill. Practice makes perfect as they say.

I do agree with the bit about liking the subject. Why else would I photograph so many damn mushrooms ... :D

Leif