Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Question for you photography experts

Guy posted these on GunBroker. I asked via PM how he'd managed the floating effect but he wouldn't answer.

Any ideas?






Thx,
DMc

Houdini-like magic!

Not an expert by a long shot, but based on the shadowing my guess is two sections of 20 lb. fluorocarbon (think leader material for fishing) and three colors of magic marker to match the cloth's red, the stock's brown and the barrel's blue/black. Easy enough to trick the eye at the distance.

Or maybe a clear plastic rod inserted into the barrel + minimal Photoshop.

my guess would be KG's fishing line one...

I'm thinkin two little stands of the right color could be PS out or blended really easily...

Take the initial photo on a green cloth, and chroma key out the green. Layer the picture of the gun over the red cloth, and digitally add the shadow.

could but i doubt it in the above pics....chances are if someone did that the shadows in both pics woulf have similar densities....they instead look like an actual flash was used.....my guess is the guys set up is an overhead frame with two loops of very thin fishing line.....chances are alot of time you have minimal or even nothing to photoshop....

The shadow appears to be directly below (vertical) the shotgun yet the shadow reveals most of the horizontal outline of the shotgun. Meaning Photoshop and hence not that good since it is quite easy to erase fishing line or a rod into the barrel.

However, great way to showcase a firearm.

key word is appears, its not.......on the top photo if the top of the shotgun is 12, bottom 6, side facing the camera is 9 and the one away 3 the light is coming from bout 10:30-11, prolly mounted off the same frame thats holding the fishing line....

plus if yah got the green screen setup to pull off the above in photoshop, you have EVERY thing you need to do this exact real shot....only difference is the background is a red cloth instead of green......half hour work on a computer or 5 minutes for the real thing....which is more likely?

You sound like you know what you're talking about. Is this a professional opinion?


DMc

There's more pictures. Gunbroker item: 474098879

http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/ViewItem.aspx?Item=474098879


DMc

definitely real pics and not photoshoped other than maybe touch ups....would guess really fine fluorocarbon line...

Doubtful anyone at this level of photography will use a flash in this type of setup (i.e. softbox).

look at all the pics, the red cloth changes hue with the intensity of the flash....if it is photoshop the guy is a dead nuts perfectionist and doesnt have a life.....check out his other auction and the pic of the scope box end on on the red cloth.....

Photoshop makes things like that easy. Here's an example. This is an elk my partner shot years ago. The pic was taken in his garage, not the natural habitat of elk. He wanted it in the forest so I put it there. It came out pretty good for my 1st attempt. Someone with experience could do far better.

Take a photo of the gun, trim off the background, and paste it over the red photo. Add a detached shadow to give it the floating look.

Obviously real pics and definitely photoshoped. I think the discussion is more about the setup and how photoshop could be used to replicate the picture. More than one way those photos could be produced.

as i said look at all the photos on the link DMc provided, if the guy isnt doing it the way i said or something similar, he has no life.....hours on the computer for an auction when a a few minutes in real life will do the same thing....for phug sake i was in the process of making a similar set up in my basement when i got divorced and im not a professional photographer.....the setup to do this for real just needs a chunk of space 4ft by 4ft by bout 6 ft to do his above pics and you have a permanent set up.....semi permanent, remove the cloth and you have a lighted work bench too(my plan)

Angle of the camera compared to position of the lights; and the camera's metering point(s).