One from my boy's Kiss rubber duckie set (Gene Simmons). Used blue poster board for the background, baking pan with water, styrofoam with toothpicks to hold up grapes, 1 artists desk lamp, flashlights with 1 red and 1 blue colored gel on them.
Shot in raw and did most of the contrast/brightness/saturation adjustments there before PS. In PS adjusted levels a bit and USM, crop, border, save for web.
Lens used: Canon 28-135 IS
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Thank you so much for the nice critique. I had plenty of "real" rubber ducks around the house, but tried this approach to be different. This was a shot that I kind of threw together, but even at that took me about 4 1/2 hours from start to finish with many reshoots.
I know exactly what you mean about the water. I tried shaking the pan to get some ripples in the water to make it more obvious, but that didn't work. I had originally shot it much lower, and that horizontal line was more to the lower third, but you couldn't see much of the reflection which is the only vague proof of water there, so I moved up a bit knowing where that line was, but was stuck there.
Anyways, I had fun doing this crazy challenge, even though going into it I knew this wouldn't score so well. Thanks again for the nice words.
The first thing I notice about this shot, is that if I didn't know that I was suposed to be looking for it, I would not notice that there was water in the shot at all. I see the reflection of the blue kiss background on the 'floor', which leads me to believe that is where your water is, but it is not very obvious.
I like the lighting very much. I like how the 'duck' is lit nicely, and the background is just kind of hanging out in the background, but yet you can still see it and it's detail. If that makes any sense. I like how the background also ties in with the duck. Not just another plain blue background.
Focus and clarity are great. The focus on the duck is right on. We get very nice detail in the duck.
The one thing that I see that could be played with for improvement maybe is the strong horizontal line. The photo is divided almost directly in 1/2 at the bottom of the blue background. We might have a slightly different angle that moves that division down just a bit so that we see more upper light blue and less of the 'stage'.
Other than that, I think this is a nice take on the challenge and very creative use of 5 grapes, a duck, and a blue background.
~Heather~
extra points for finding a KISS rubber ducky! just when you think Gene Simmons has marketed everything... wow. I lso like how your grapers look like stage lights or audience members. well done!
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