Light Painting Technique

Casio Duro 200

These past few days i have been doing a lot of light painting with most of the products that I shoot at the studio. Using this technique gives me the freedom to produce awesome highlights and shadows. I learned this technique when I attended Laya Gerlock's Advanced Photography workshop about 3 months back. 

Light Painting is really fun actually. It gives you that added control where you want to put the strong lights and their shadows. All you need is an enclosed room where you can turn off all the lights and make the room really dark as in Pitch Black. Your going to need a tripod as well and a flashlight. A cellphone will do as long as it gives out that white light. 

Everlast Watches from Time Depot

Place your products onto the table. Make sure they are secured. Then set up the camera onto the tripod. In photographing watches, i make sure the hands are at 10:10 position. Why? Because of the symmetry of the hands to the watch. Its evenly placed. It will make your photo more professional. For your camera settings, my aperture, I use f/8 to f/11, for my shutterspeed, i set it to 20 seconds, for my ISO, i use 200. I shoot on auto white balance or sometimes cloudy. Now focus on the brand of the watch which is usually at the top center of the watch. It is best to use a Shutter release chord if you may. After everything is focused, place your camera into Manual Focus setting. Bring out your flashlight or your phone. In my case, I use my iPhone when im doing my lightpainting. I downloaded this flashlight app at the apple store for free. Its basically a white wall paper.   

Jaqcue Martin Watches

Now turn off the lights. We are now ready to paint! Like I said everything should be dark to make this project really good. When everything is dark and ready, press the shutter of your camera and  begin light painting. Turn on your flashlight and slowly illuminate the sides of your watch..then the top then the bottom. Make sure theres no glare on the watch's glass as you lightpaint. If it does., do the same procedure once again. So there you go! simple as that. Try it sometimes :)

I also want to share Laya Gerlock's lightpainting technique here http://www.flickr.com/photos/l_s_g/6875783925/in/photostream